The Obama administration’s reference to Arizona’s immigration law in a report to the U.N. Human Rights Council has caused a stir, but its decision to engage with the body in the first place has drawn criticism for a lot longer.
The U.S. had been strongly supportive of the plan to replace the 60-year-old UNCHR. “When Sudan and Zimbabwe sit on it and somehow cast judgment on democratic countries like the United States, it is objectionable and it’s indefensible,” then-Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns said of the commission in 2005.
The U.S. participated in the new body as an observer, but later ended even that limited involvement, citing the presence on the council of some countries with poor rights records and its repeated targeting of Israel.
But the Obama administration joined the Human Rights Council last year, saying that while the body was imperfect, the U.S. could work to improve it most effectively by being a member.
The State Department last week released a self-assessment of human rights in the U.S.
As reported earlier, the report contained a pledge to fix America’s “broken immigration system,” and cited the Arizona immigration law.
Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer on Friday wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, calling the reference to the law “downright offensive” and demanding that it be removed from the report.
“The idea of our own American government submitting the duly enacted laws of a state of the United States to ‘review’ by the United Nations is internationalism run amok and unconstitutional,” she wrote.
Submitting duly enacted laws of a state for review by the United Nations? Where in the Constitution does it give any rights to "the United Nations" to rule or review any state in America?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment