House Foreign Affairs Chairman: U.S. Must Withdraw from U.N. Human Rights Council

The chair of the U.S House Foreign Affairs Committee said Monday she will introduce legislation that makes U.S. funding for the United Nations contingent on reform. It also calls for the U.S. to withdraw from the Human Rights Council. Describing the Obama administration’s attempts to reform the HRC as a failure, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said the U.S. should quit the HRC and “explore credible, alternative forums to advance human rights.”
The Geneva-based HRC began the final week of a month-long session in which it will adopt up to six resolutions condemning Israel.
“Israel is the only country on the council’s permanent agenda, while abuses by rogue regimes like Cuba, China, and Syria are ignored,” she said
“Libya’s Gaddafi regime was actually a member of the council until recently, and other serial human rights abusers still sit on the body.”
Ros-Lehtinen said that since the HRC was established it has been “as bad as its predecessor,” the discredited U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
“The council’s rare resolutions criticizing real human rights abuses are usually too little and too late. Why did it take the massacre of hundreds of people in the streets for the U.N. to throw Libya off the Council? Why was Gaddafi’s regime permitted to join the council to begin with in 2010? Why are other human rights abusers – including China, Cuba, Russia, and Saudi Arabia – still on the council?
It appears that the sole purpose of this council since the Obama administration joined in 2009, is to demonize Israel.