Australia can, and does, ignore human rights abuses

At the political level, the Government has largely ignored the process. With five years more experience under his belt since the last time, one can imagine Minister Downer just ignoring his civil servants’ reports and recommendations, or rejecting them out of hand.

Even the US administration gives higher regard and more energy to UN reform. A high powered delegation from the US has been everywhere at this year’s Commission meeting, even distributing leaflets on the Bush Administration’s position on torture outside an NGO seminar. Australia has previously made contributions way outside its league, but now we’re irrelevant to the processes. Even in areas where we have a strong track record, like protecting people from discrimination on the grounds of their sexual orientation, the PM’s office wouldn’t allow our diplomats to join a New Zealand led multi-national initiative calling for this type of discrimination to be discussed at a future meeting.

The Secretary-General of the United Nations made some strong comments on the reform of the UN human rights mechanisms:

This [UN Human Rights] Commission’s ability to perform its tasks has been overtaken by new needs, and undermined by the politicisation of its sessions and the selectivity of its work. We have reached a point at which the Commission’s declining credibility has cast a shadow on the reputation of the United Nations system as a whole, and where piecemeal reforms will not be enough.

In Australia, the reputation of the UN system has been deliberately damaged by both our Foreign Minister and Attorney General when it suits in order to deflect human rights criticism.

Australian NGOs are of course not blind to the deficiencies of the system, but will continue to press for reform and development, in both our own and our collective interests. And we will continue to press for our government to do the same. It may be that we’re playing a little outside our league, but we’re doing what we can. It’s an approach that has worked for Australia before, and I’m sure it can again.