UNITED NATIONS (BNO NEWS) -- Fifteen new countries have been selected to join the United Nations Human Rights Council, including six countries that have never previously served on the Geneva-based body.
Austria, Benin, Botswana, the Republic of Congo, Costa Rica and Kuwait will make their debut on the Council next month, starting three-year terms on the 47-member panel that allots seats according to a formula based on world regions. The other elected members are Burkina Faso, Chile, Czech Republic, India, Indonesia, Italy, Peru, Philippines and Romania.
Last week, Syria withdrew its candidacy for a seat on the United Nations Human Rights Council. Human rights groups from across the world had called on General Assembly members to reject Syria's candidacy for the rights body. Shortly after, Kuwait announced that it was running for one of the four Asia seats.
Last year, all regional groups put forward what are called "clean" states since council members are expected to "uphold the highest standards" of human rights.
A United Nations watchdog group slammed the election of Congo and Kuwait, but hailed the defeat of Nicaragua, after a campaign with other rights groups that spotlighted the poor records of all three countries.
"Congo, Kuwait and Nicaragua have poor records in respecting the basic human rights of their own citizens, and have consistently voted the wrong way on UN initiatives to promote and protect the human rights of others," said UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer in a statement.
"With today's election, only 20 out of 47 of the new members rank as free democracies, while the rest -- a majority of 58% -- fail to meet basic democracy standards, rated as either not free or only partly free by Freedom House's annual survey," Neuer added.
General Assembly President Joseph Deiss announced the results of the voting on Friday, which was conducted by secret ballot among Member States at UN Headquarters in New York.
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22. May 2011 at 10:53 pm
No matter how they try to reform, a corrupt organization run by the worlds dictators can never have a true Human Rights Council. Unless the worlds democracies are all on it (including Israel, and you know that will never happen at the UN), and quite possibly the membership has to be semi-permanent (you’re on for life unless you suddenly go rogue) and sadly, there probably aren’t 47 nations that qualify, so the number would have to be reduced.