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UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer gives the UN Human Rights Council a piece of his mind.
Mr. President,
Six decades ago, in the aftermath of the Nazi horrors, Eleanor Roosevelt, Réné Cassin and other eminent figures gathered here, on the banks of Lake Geneva, to reaffirm the principle of human dignity. They created the Commission on Human Rights. Today, we ask: What has become of their noble dream?
In this session we see the answer. Faced with compelling reports from around the world of torture, persecution, and violence against women, what has the Council pronounced, and what has it decided?
Nothing. Its response has been silence. Its response has been indifference. Its response has been criminal.
One might say, in Harry Truman's words, that this has become a Do-Nothing, Good-for-Nothing Council.
But that would be inaccurate. This Council has, after all, done something.
It has enacted one resolution after another condemning one single state: Israel. In eight pronouncements—and there will be three more this session—Hamas and Hezbollah have been granted impunity. The entire rest of the world—millions upon millions of victims, in 191 countries—continue to go ignored.
Please go to the linked page for an approximate transcript of the entire speech, along with a video of the speech.
The funniest (and most telling) part is the last minute of the video, when the President of the UN Human Rights Council, Luis Alfonso de Alba responds by basically calling Neuer rude and threatening to remove his speech from the official record of the proceedings. He does not however respond to any of the charges leveled against him and his council by Neuer and UN Watch.
