The UN's unserious human rights "watch"

Peter Brooks:

WHAT do China, Cuba and Saudi Arabia have in common? Well, for one, they have dreadful human-rights records. For another, they're supposed human-rights watchdogs - as members of the United Nations' new Human Rights Council.

The council is the completely underwhelming replacement for the old U.N. Commission on Human Rights. (Talk about old wine in a new bottle . . . ) Re-tooling it should be high on the agenda of new Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon.

Since its inception, the United Nations has been charged with protecting and advancing human rights. U.N. member states pledge to uphold the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights. But the U.N.'s record on this front has been nothing short of abysmal.

The Commission on Human Rights had evolved into an obscenity, its members including many of the world's worst human-rights abusers - who cynically used their seats on the panel to parry criticism and to block exposing other nightmarish human-rights records.

Over the years, members included such violators as Algeria, Pakistan, Sudan, Syria, Vietnam and Zimbabwe. Libya actually served as chairman in 2003, despite its ties to terrorism abroad (such as the Lockerbie bombing) and brutal repression at home. The next year, Sudan - a government engaged in ongoing genocide in Darfur - won a seat on the panel.

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These shortcomings, among others, led the United States to vote against creating the HRC this year. John Bolton, our U.N. ambassador, said America lacked confidence that the new body would be any better than the old one - and that it wouldn't run for a seat.

He's been proven right. Among those voted onto the council were nine countries ranked "not free" in political/civil liberties by Freedom House: Algeria, Azerbaijan, Cameroon, China, Cuba, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Tunisia.

And, like its predecessor, the council wallows in Israel bashing - the attacks continued at last week's meetings in Geneva. One small plus came there: The council finally agreed to send a fact-finding team to Sudan (something African and Muslim states had long blocked).

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The UN is such a corrupt organization that it is unlikely to ever undertake serious reform. This latest undertaking with the human rights body demonstrates this lack of seriousness. While genocide is ongoing in Darfur and Zimbabwe, it is focusing on Israel's response to terrorist who who want to conduct genocide against Israel. To them resistance to genocide is what has to be watched.