UN Watch lauds UN condemnation of Syria

PRESS RELEASE

UN Watch lauds UN condemnation of Syria,
regrets deletion of reference to Assad's cynical
bid for UNHRC membership

For Immediate Release

Geneva, April 29, 2011 — UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer today congratulated the US government for its "diligent work in achieving an extraordinary UN Human Rights Council condemnation of the Syrian government's gross abuses," but regretted the deletion of an originally-proposed criticism of Syria's bid for a council seat in elections to be held May 20 in New York.

"The resolution constitutes a weclome exception to the council norm of turning a blind eye to regimes that fire on their own civilians. It shames and pressures the Assad regime, and hopefully will help victims on the ground," said Neuer.

Voting YES to condemn Syria were: Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Chile, France, Ghana, Guatemala, Hungary, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Maldives, Mauritius, Mexico, Norway, Poland, South Korea, Moldova, Senegal, Slovakia, Spain, Switzerland, UK, USA, Uruguay, and Zambia.

Voting NO: Bangladesh, China, Cuba, Ecuador, Gabon, Malaysia, Mauritania, Pakistan, Russian Federation.

ABSTAINING: Cameroon, Djibouti, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Uganda, Ukraine.

ABSENT: Angola, Bahrain, Jordan, and Qatar.
UN Watch regrets that the final version of the resolution -- reportedly in order to win votes from Latin American and other countries -- weakened the orignal draft in two ways: (1) The original call for an "independent, international commission of inquiry, to be appointed by the President of the Council" was reduced to a lesser mission under the UN bureaucracy; and (2) the original criticism of Syria's cynical bid for a council seat, in elections to be held on May 20, was deleted. For more, see UN Watch's press release from today here.
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UN Watch Testimony to UN Human Rights Council
16th Special Session
"The Situation of Human Rights in Syrian Arab Republic," 29 April 2011
Delivered by Leon Saltiel

Madam President,

UN Watch welcomes the holding of the Special Session today and congratulates its sponsors, the US, the EU, and all other nations that endorsed the call.

Yesterday, in this chamber, the distinguished representative of Syria condemned the holding of this session, and called for a resolution that would be, and I quote, “free from offending us, and free from harming our feelings.”

Accordingly, we need to know:

Will it harm the feelings of the Syrian Government if we speak out for the human rights of its own people, for the innocent civilians across the country whom it has brutalized over the past few weeks, the thousands it arrested, and the 500 it killed?

Will it harm the government’s feelings if we speak of the six protesters in the Omari mosque killed on March 23, the mourners killed at a funeral on April 17, or the unarmed civilians in Daraa who were shot, and then prevented from receiving medical care?

Madam President, it is time for this council to focus more on the human rights of the victims — the right to life, freedom from torture and arbitrary detention, freedom of speech and assembly — and less on the feelings of the perpetrators.

In the written statement that is before this council today, submitted by our international coalition of more than 20 human rights groups and dissidents, we call for the following:

1. The Security Council urgently must exercise its responsibility to protect the civilian population.

2. The International Criminal Court should prepare to arrest and prosecute President Bashar al-Assad for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Four decades of impunity in Syria must end.

3. This council should condemn Syria’s bid to become a member of this body, a cynical act that mocks the government’s victims and harms the reputation of the UN.

4. The UN’s Asian Group should apologize to the thousands of victims for endorsing Syria’s candidacy to the Human Rights Council.

5. Switzerland should convene the High Contracting Parties to the Geneva Conventions, to address the Syrian military’s attacks against civilians.

Madam President, in this historic time, let us send a message to dictators the world over: that the jackboot of repression can last only so long, while the yearning of every human being for freedom and dignity can never be destroyed. Thank you, Madam President.

See UN Watch's reports on today's debate at www.twitter.com/unwatch.

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