Human Rights watchdog UN Watch has declared in a statement that Wednesday’s reports of a Syrian application for membership of the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) “would be virtually assured of victory”.
The controversial claim follows news that a US and EU-backed draft resolution debated informally by a council meeting in Geneva to pre-emptively declare Syria ineligible for a seat received heavy opposition from Chinese, Cuban and Egyptian delegations. Furthermore, Russia and India opposed making a ruling before the authoritarian regime made an official application for membership.
The watchdog wrote of its conviction any such application would be approved, on its website, after Syria was last year admitted to two UNESCO human rights committees, despite the government having been engaged in violence against Syrian civilians during the last 16 months.
The draft resolution slammed Syrian President Bashar al Assad’s administration for the “indiscriminate targeting of civilians” whilst stressing “that the current Syrian government’s announced candidacy for the Human Rights Council in 2014 fails to meet the standards for council membership”.
Egypt responded by saying “we don’t like to speak to country candidacies”, whilst Brazil argued that debate over membership eligibility was “outside the scope of the resolution”.
Syria had previously announced plans to apply for membership last year as violence erupted in the beleaguered state, but, following international pressure, the Syrian Un Ambassador, Bashar Ja’afari agreed to defer the issue until the 2013 elections, describing it as an agreement “to reschedule the timing of our candidacy” rather than an absolute withdrawal.
UNHRC has been heavily criticised by pro-Israel groups for seemingly taking a one-sided approach to criticism of the Jewish State. Earlier this week, the UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in the West Bank and Gaza, Richard Falk, compared Israel’s “discriminatory” legal system to apartheid, adding that international attempts to aid the peace process were nothing but “a trick”.