Congress may withhold funds to U.N.

By Sridhar Krishnaswami

WASHINGTON, MAY 4. There is anger in the administration and Congress over the United States losing its seat at the Human Rights Commission; and the first impression is that law makers will react to the vote by denying funds already agreed upon to the world body. As if the snub to Washington was by itself not enough, countries like Pakistan and Sudan have been chosen for membership.

The stinging loss of the seat, the first time since 1947, has signalled to the Bush administration the feelings of not just the developing world, but by the developed nations of Europe. And Conservatives here are seething with rage making the assessment that it was not only countries like Cuba and China that worked overtime behind the seats to ensure the United States was thrown out, but also some European countries.

Senator Jesse Helms, a long time critic of the functioning of the United Nations system, said the loss of the seat did not come as a surprise for a ``few European countries manoeuvred - in a secret vote - to eliminate the United States from the United Nations Human Rights Commission''. Mr. Helms was one of the senior law makers who had crafted an agreement for the payment of U.S. dues to the U.N.

According to a report in The New York Times, the Bush administration has been caught by surprise, for over 40 nations had apparently made it known that they would support the U.S. What has caused outrage in Congressional circles is that countries which the U.S. consistently criticises for poor human rights record are now in the Commission.

Says Mr. Tom Lantos, a California Democrat who chairs the Human Rights Caucus, ``It is absurd that rogue states and chronic human rights abusers such as Libya, Sudan and Cuba remain on the Commission and sit in judgement on the human rights practices of others while the United States now stands on the sidelines''.

Conservative law makers have predicted that the voting out of the U.S. will have an impact on the its payment plan to the world body. The House of Representatives, for instance, is to take up the State Department Authorisation Bill next week. What is being pointed out is that while Washington expected China and Cuba to campaign against the it, there had always been an understanding with Europe that the U.S. will have one of the three allotted seats on the Commission.

That so-called accord with Europe has now come to mean little. The belief that Europe may have had a hand in the secret vote against the U.S. will be added to the long list of differences the Bush administration has been having with its cross-Atlantic allies. The Europeans were dismayed that the Republican administration was walking out of the Kyoto Accords; appalled that Washington would want to carry on a high profile anti-China Human Rights Resolution in Geneva which eventually flopped; and are apprehensive of the National Missile Defence system. The U.S. stand on such issues as the International Criminal Court of Justice has not helped as well.

For the record, the State Department, in expressing disappointment, has said that the vote will not change the basic thrusts of American human rights policy. ``Our commitment and resolve to address human rights problem around the world is a matter of U.S. policy; it will not be affected by this vote'', it said in a statement. Aside from Europe, there has been general resentment in the developing world over the attitude of the U.S. on a number of issues including human rights. Several nations have come to despise the sermonising of Washington on the subject of human rights and freedoms, including religious freedom; and have not taken kindly to the U.S. annual ``report cards''.

The throwing out of the U.S. and the election of Sudan to the Commission, ironically, came on the day the President, Mr. George W. Bush, delivered a speech strongly backing human rights, religious freedoms and a scathing attack on Sudan. ``My administration will continue to speak and act for as long as persecution and atrocities in Sudan last'', Mr. Bush said in a speech. Mr. Bush made no reference to the U.S. losing its seat.

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Section  : International
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