U.N. scores symbolic victory (05/18/07)

Sometimes even the United Nations gets one right.

Though it slipped under most folks radar, there was an election at the U.N. this week. Two vacancies needed to be filled on the U.N. Human Rights Council, and only two nations initially expressed interest, one of them a notorious abuser of those rights.

The council is the successor to the old U.N. commission on human rights, which had virtually no credibility because it was loaded with autocratic regimes and dictatorships. So far, the new council's record is decidedly mixed; but it's trying to make a fresh start.

That's why this week's election was such an important early test.

Belarus, you see, wanted one of the seats.

That's the same Belarus where a Stalinist throwback routinely jails his political opponents, the same Belarus where rival presidential candidates disappear and are never heard from again, the same Belarus that the Bush administration has labeled - quite correctly - "the last dictatorship in Europe."

Election to the U.N. Human Rights Council would have simultaneously undermined the organization and provided a fig leaf of cover for the Belarusian dictatorship.

Here's what Alyksander Milinkevich, the embattled leader of the political opposition, had to say on the topic: "Over the last ten years both the U.N. and regional international organizations have regularly voiced their criticism over Belarusian government and its human right practices which are constantly deteriorating. Today ... membership of Belarusian government in the Human Rights Council would serve only to aims of official propaganda and would cause further deterioration of human rights situation, and ... the Belarusian government would use its membership as a shield."

Then there's this from Urmi Shah, a spokesperson for Human Rights Watch: "Belarus has an appalling human rights record, and has consistently failed to cooperate on any of the UN's human rights mechanisms."

Or this from Barys Charnahlaz, a Christian missionary who notes that many of his colleagues in Belarus are under constant pressure from the authorities and under a threat of deportation: "I cannot tell their names, as these people are already under pressure of the state security bodies."

Fortunately, this time the United Nations did the right thing.

At the urging of the U.S. and the Bush administration, Bosnia stepped forward as an alternative candidate for the post, giving members a choice other than Belarus.

It was a small matter, perhaps, and more symbolic than substantive. But to thousands of activists striving for greater freedom in their homeland, it counts as a victory. - J.R.[[In-content Ad]]