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Trump UN human rights snub will buoy repressive regimes, top Democrat warns
Source: The Guardian
Trump UN human rights snub will buoy repressive regimes, top Democrat warns
• Bob Menendez condemns administration in letter to Pompeo
• State department has not responded to UN’s official complaints
Ed Pilkington
Tue 30 Apr 2019 07.00 BST Last modified on Tue 30 Apr 2019 07.02 BST
The Trump administration’s refusal to engage with UN human rights monitors risks undermining standards around the world and will embolden repressive regimes such as China and Russia, the top Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee has charged.
Robert Menendez, US senator from New Jersey and the committee’s ranking member, has written to the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, to condemn the Trump administration for its apparent boycott of UN human rights investigators. Since 7 May last year the state department has failed to respond to any of the UN’s official complaints – a silent treatment never before seen in American history.
In his letter, Menendez points out that the US government has also failed to respond to all requests for official visits to the US by UN monitors, known as special rapporteurs, since Donald Trump entered the White House in January 2017. The visits are seen as a crucial way of holding all countries – including the US – to account for their treatment of vulnerable populations.
By shutting out the monitors, Menendez says, the US “risks undermining human rights globally and will be seen as empowering repressive regimes, like China and Russia, who seek to delegitimize internationally accepted human rights norms”. He notes that monitors “play an important role in advancing the fundamental human values traditionally championed by every previous US administration”.
The effective US boycott was introduced by stealth in the absence of any public announcement. It appears to be an act of pique by the White House after Trump was heavily criticized last June by the UN monitor on extreme poverty, Philip Alston, who accused him of deliberately forcing millions of Americans into financial ruin.
-snip-
• Bob Menendez condemns administration in letter to Pompeo
• State department has not responded to UN’s official complaints
Ed Pilkington
Tue 30 Apr 2019 07.00 BST Last modified on Tue 30 Apr 2019 07.02 BST
The Trump administration’s refusal to engage with UN human rights monitors risks undermining standards around the world and will embolden repressive regimes such as China and Russia, the top Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee has charged.
Robert Menendez, US senator from New Jersey and the committee’s ranking member, has written to the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, to condemn the Trump administration for its apparent boycott of UN human rights investigators. Since 7 May last year the state department has failed to respond to any of the UN’s official complaints – a silent treatment never before seen in American history.
In his letter, Menendez points out that the US government has also failed to respond to all requests for official visits to the US by UN monitors, known as special rapporteurs, since Donald Trump entered the White House in January 2017. The visits are seen as a crucial way of holding all countries – including the US – to account for their treatment of vulnerable populations.
By shutting out the monitors, Menendez says, the US “risks undermining human rights globally and will be seen as empowering repressive regimes, like China and Russia, who seek to delegitimize internationally accepted human rights norms”. He notes that monitors “play an important role in advancing the fundamental human values traditionally championed by every previous US administration”.
The effective US boycott was introduced by stealth in the absence of any public announcement. It appears to be an act of pique by the White House after Trump was heavily criticized last June by the UN monitor on extreme poverty, Philip Alston, who accused him of deliberately forcing millions of Americans into financial ruin.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/30/trump-un-human-rights-china-russia
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Related: Letter from Senator Menendez to Secretary Pompeo
