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IHEU blasts Human Rights Council on its selectivity

  • post Type / Humanists International News
  • Date / 3 March 2011

Speaking in a dialogue with the High Commissioner for Human Rights at the 16th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva today, 3rd March 2011, IHEU representative Roy Brown condemned the continuing selectivity of the Council, comparing the immediate and excellent response of the Council to the barbarity of the Libyan regime with its lack of effective response to many other crimes against humanity. Brown cited in particular the judicial murder of hundreds of people in Iran and the deaths of more than 200,000 innocent civilians in the Sudan.

Here is Brown’s statement in full:

UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL: 16th Session (28 February to 25 March 2011)

Interactive dialogue with the High Commissioner

Speaker: IHEU Representative, Roy W Brown: Thursday 3 March 2011

Continuing selectivity in the work of the Council

Mr President, Mme High Commissioner:

We welcome the report by the High Commissioner and applaud her immense and highly effective commitment to human rights worldwide. It is encouraging that you, and other speakers this morning, have recognised the contrast between the immediate and excellent response of the Council to the barbarity of the Libyan authorities, and the continuing lack of effective response by the Council to state-sponsored crimes, which include the rape and murder of their own people, in certain other states.  

On Monday, the US Secretary of State pointed out that a number of states have committed and continue to commit abuses of human rights against their citizens. In particular, we welcomed her clear statement regarding the gross abuses of human rights being carried out by Iran. Murder is murder, Mr President, even when it is carried out in the name of religious law. 

In the Sudan, government-sponsored barbarity has already accounted for the deaths of more than 200,000 innocent civilians. Despite the improvement in the reputation of the Council resulting from its actions last Friday, its failure to act effectively on the Sudan is a betrayal of the people of that country and hangs over this Council like a cloak of shame.

Would the High Commissioner agree that the credibility of the Council now rests on its ability to deal firmly and effectively with acts of barbarism and the gross abuse of human rights wherever and by whoever they are perpetrated?

Thank you.

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