US Pulls Out of UN Human Rights Council

By Rohini Kejriwal / June 26, 2018;

US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announce US withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council

The United States recently withdrew from the United Nations Human Rights Council, with Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley calling it “a mockery of human rights” for allowing China and several other countries to join, and for a rule that scrutinises Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people. She further declared that the US’s commitment to human rights would not allow it to remain part of a “hypocritical and self-serving organisation that makes a mockery of human rights”.

The US pullout has strongly affected humans rights activists and dissidents who relied on its support for taking actions against regular violators such as China, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, who have lost out on a critic. According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), the Council had an important part in addressing serious rights abuses worldwide, and the US’s withdrawal gives free reign to the ruling Chinese Communist Party to carry out human rights violations unchecked. This in turn means that other governments will have to increase their efforts to address human rights issues. HRW’s China director Sophie Richardson has declared this move “highly problematic” for human rights in China as it paves the way for a new world order centred on the Communist Party.

Prior to this, the International Religious Freedom Report 2017 was released by the United States State Department on May 29, which highlighted the control over religious freedom exercised by the Chinese authorities, who claim that “citizens enjoy freedom of religious beliefs”. The report also brings to light the “forced disappearance, physical abuse, prolonged detention, and arbitrary arrest of persons due to their religious practice” and revealed that according to local sources, 11,500 monks and nuns were evicted from Buddhist institutes at Larung Gar and Yachen Gar by Chinese authorities. The report further stated that cases of self-immolation as a means of protest against government policies doubled in 2017.