UN Watch applauds calls to suspend Libya, dispatch mission

UN Watch applauds calls to suspend Libya, dispatch mission
But to stop atrocities, victims need No Fly Zone and concrete measures

For Immediate Release
Contact: media1@unwatch.org

GENEVA, February 25, 2010 -- UN Watch, which heads the Global NGO Campaign to Remove Libya from the UN Human Rights Council, applauded the adoption without a vote of a resolution in today's Special Session of the UN Human Rights Council. The text calls for suspension of the Qaddafi regime from the world's top human rights body and the dispatch of an independent and international commission of enquiry.
See below our speech as delivered in the plenary today as well as the chronology of UN Watch actions to expose the human rights abuses of the Qaddafi regime and demand justice for its victims.

UN Watch Oral Statement
The Situation of Human Rights in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya
UN Human Rights Council
25 February 2011

Mr. President,

Time is running out.

Innocent people in Libya are being slaughtered by their own government, under the orders of Muammar Qaddafi.

Witnesses describe horrifying scenes. Libyan forces, with mercenaries under their command, are firing on peaceful protesters. Civilians are being attacked by warplanes. Ambulances are being blocked. The death toll is estimated to range from 600 to 2,000.

Time is running out.

According to Ibrahim Dabbashi, Libya’s own delegate to the UN, “The regime of Qaddafi has already started the genocide against the Libyan people.” Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, the former justice minister, warned that Mr. Qaddafi and his sons could use biological and chemical weapons—that they would “burn everything.”

Mr. President, this week, on behalf of 70 human rights groups, UN Watch urged the council to convene this urgent session, to condemn Libya’s crimes against humanity, to dispatch investigators, and to suspend Libya from this august body. We applaud the EU, the US, and the other sponsors of today’s session for answering our request.

As our appeal made clear, however, today’s session is hardly sufficient.

Time is running out.

The international community has a responsibility to protect the civilian population that is now under attack. We urge member states to take concrete, collective and decisive action to save those in danger. A no-fly zone is one way to start.

Mr. President, from the day this council was created, UN Watch repeatedly urged it to address the gross violations by the Libyan government. Why did all our requests fall on deaf ears? When Libya was elected to this council in May, a coalition of human rights groups led by UN Watch demanded it be expelled. Why was the UN silent? Why did no country speak out?

One foreign minister even justified Libya’s membership, saying it was important to keep a dialogue with all countries to improve the human rights situation across the world.

Mr. President, today’s session repudiates this doctrine. It repudiates the policy of accommodation and appeasement of rulers who oppress their own people. It recognizes that no tyrant has ever been improved by council membership. On the contrary, the veneer of legitimacy only provides international cover for their records of abuse.

If the world had acted earlier and signaled to the Libyan government that it was watching, maybe we would not be in the situation we are in today.

Let us now draw the necessary lessons so that future victims will be spared.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Chronology: The NGO Campaign to Remove Libya From the UN Human Rights Council
• May 2010: UN Watch leads 37 NGOs in a protest on the eve of Libya’s election to the UNHRC, with a widely covered media event at UN Headquarters in New York, and a mass email campaign. Countries are urged to oppose Qaddafi's candidacy. Instead, in a secret ballot, the UN elects Libya by a landslide of 155 out of 192 UNGA votes. UN Watch warns on Swiss TV that Qaddafi’s government is a “murderous and racist regime.” Not a single country speaks out against Libya's candidacy or election.
• September 2010: Libya takes its seat at the council. UN Watch launches a global campaign, supported by 30 NGOs, and victims of Libyan abuses, to remove the Qaddafi regime. To confront the Libyans in the plenary UN Watch brings Bob Monetti, whose 20-year-old son was murdered in Libya’s 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103; Mohamed Eljahmi, brother of slain dissident Fathi Eljahmi; Kristyana Valcheva, one of the five Bulgarian nurses who were framed, imprisoned and tortured for eight years on false charges of poisoning children with HIV; and Ashraf El-Hajouj, the Palestinian doctor framed and tortured together with the nurses. The Libyans and their allied regimes rudely interrupt the speakers. The incident and the victims’ appeal to remove Libya is widely covered by dedicated stories in Voice of America and Agence France Presse, and by a cover story in Sweden’s Neo magazine. “The HRC grants legitimacy to ‘murderous’ Gadaffi regime,” reported Radio Netherlands on UN Watch’s campaign. Yet the UN council and its member states stay silent.
• November 2010: When Libya’s abysmal human rights record is addressed under the council’s universal review procedure, UN Watch renews its call for the Qaddafi regime to be removed. The appeal is reported by Germany’s DPA, Swissinfo and elsewhere. Yet the UN council and its member states stay silent.
• February 21, 2010: Working closely with Libyan dissident Mohamed Eljahmi — who sounds the alarm on massive atrocities being committed by the Qaddafi regime — UN Watch spearheads an international appeal by 70 human rights groups to remove Libya. The plea for UN action is covered around the world. Three days later, the EU requests a special session of the Human Rights Council, but fails to contest Libya’s council membership.
• Yesterday: UN Watch publicly calls on EU foreign minister Catherine Ashton, and the governments of France, Germany, and the UK, to demand Libya’s removal from the council.
• Today: Finally, for the first time in the council’s five-year history, the EU calls for the suspension of a council member -- Libya -- on grounds of committing gross and systematic human rights violations. The vote is tomorrow.
UN Watch has been the leading voice at the United Nations challenging Libyan human rights abuses for many years. To see compelling YouTube videos, click here.

www.unwatch.org

UN Watch is a Geneva-based human rights organization founded in 1993 to monitor UN compliance with the principles of its Charter. It is accredited as a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) in Special Consultative Status to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and as an Associate NGO to the UN Department of Public Information (DPI).

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