No more rights

The US, a country that till a few days back was busy snatching children away from their parents and locking them up in cages, is withdrawing from the UN Human Rights Council because it believes the council is biased against Israel, a country that is brutally and illegally occupying Palestine. For the US, which is currently involved in multiple wars around the world, to lecture anyone else about human rights reeks of hypocrisy. That it did so on behalf of Israel only adds to the insult. It also shows the total disregard the Trump administration has for multilateralism. Since being elected president, Donald Trump has withdrawn from the Paris climate agreement, Unesco and the nuclear deal with Iran. The US has never played by the same rules as everyone else but it is now taking its go-it-alone approach to a new level. That the withdrawal came just a day after the UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein criticised the US for its forced separation of children from their parents is surely not a coincidence. The US is now doing exactly what it has denounced other countries for doing in the past but doesn’t want to be held accountable for its actions.

The UN Human Rights Council is far from a perfect organisation but many of the problems with it are the same as those with the UN as a whole. It is in effect a toothless body since it has no power to take action against gross human rights violations. That can only be done through the UN Security Council where the US and other permanent members are quick to use their veto power to shut down any criticism of themselves or their allies. We got a taste over the last week of how ineffective human rights enforcement can be at the UN when a report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights calling for an investigation into human rights abuses in Kashmir was quickly rejected by India and its allies. This double standard will continue to exist whether the US is part of the Human Rights Council or not. But it is still important for every country, not least a superpower like the US, to try and build such organisations. By withdrawing from the Human Rights Council, the US has shown that it does not intend to work to strengthen the UN or be an honest advocate for human rights.