John Ensign: “I rise today to decry the failure of the United Nations to create a human rights body that deserves U.S. support. I…”

“I rise today to decry the failure of the United Nations to create a human rights body that deserves U.S. support. I regret that the United Nations, tasked with the solemn duty to craft a Human Rights council that would be beyond reproach, has failed in its mission. It has created a council that in its essential components has the same failings as its predecessor, the U.N. Commission on Human Rights. The U.N. Commission on Human Rights is an embarrassment. The U.N. Secretary General admitted as much in March 2005 when he said that, ``the Commission on Human Rights suffers from declininq credlibility and professionalism, and is in major need of reform'' and that a fundamental problem is that, ``States have sought membership . . . not to strengthen human rights but to protect themselves against criticism or to criticize others.'' Just look at the current Members of the Commission on Human Rights, the U.N.'s primary human rights body. They include some of the world's worst human rights violators, such as China, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Venezuela, and Zimbabwe. The United States and other countries quite rightly called for the abolition of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights and its replacement with a new Human Rights Council. The Secretary General endorsed the need for a smaller body that would be less likely to include countries found complicit in massive and sustained human rights abuses would be able to serve.…”