U.S. slams UN’S new human rights council

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United States sharply criticized the new UN Human Rights Council yesterday, calling it a “disappointment” and saying it has failed to address serious violations in its first few months of operation — par­ticularly in Sudan’s Darfur region.

Sudan responded with a harsh con­ the U.S. human rights record and said Washington had no right to judge the effectiveness of the UN agency.

The barbs came during the Human Rights Council’s first annual report to the General Assembly. The U.S. is not a mem­ber of the council, which was created ear­lier this year to replace the highly politi­cized and much-maligned UN Human Rights Commission.

Miriam Hughes, head of the economic and social development section of the U.S. mission to the UN, criticized the council for a “slow and discouraging start,” say­ing it has “accomplished little that will make a concrete and significant difference in the lives of millions around the world.’

Hughes said the council has failed to reach agreement on how to address “egre­gious violations of human rights in places such as Sudan,” where more than 200,000 people have been killed in fighting between the army and rebels in Darfur since early 2003.

Referring to the two special sessions the council has held to discuss alleged human rights violations by Israel, she said some nations view the council “as just another arena in which to play political games.”

“Sadly, so far the Human Rights Coun­cil, into which was put so much hope and work, has been a disappointment,” Hughes said.

The council, which began its work in June, held two special sessions this sum­mer to discuss the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip and the lsrael-Hezbollah war in Lebanon. One of the United States’ main criticisms of the former Human Rights Commission was that it spent a great deal of time criticizing Israel.

In his speech to the General Assembly, Sudanese diplomat Idrees Mohamed Ali Mohammed Saeed called the U.S. criti­cisms “amazing and ridiculous.”

“Everybody knows the magnitude of the gross violations of human rights in the United States,” said Saeed, the second secretary of the Sudanese mission. He cited as examples the treatment of prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention centre and detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.