UN Human Rights Council helps prompt dialogue despite members’ sparring, says its leader, Nazhat Shameem Khan

Name: US offers temporary ‘safe haven’ for Hongkongers in response to crackdown on opposition
Uploaded: 2021-11-04T17:56:23.000Z
Duration: 3 min 44 s
Description: US offers temporary ‘safe haven’ for Hongkongers in response to crackdown on opposition

After an annual session decried as acrimonious, Fiji’s ambassador in Geneva rejects the charge that the council is polarised

‘There is always greater understanding when people are forced to hear other people’s views’

Reading Time:6 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

Nazhat Shameem Khan of Fiji will serve as the UN Human Rights Council president until the end of the year. Photo: United Nations

Mark Magnierin New York

Published: 1:56am, 5 Nov 2021Updated: 10:19pm, 5 Nov 2021

Amid intense jockeying between Washington and Beijing, the United Nations Human Rights Council remains one of the few institutions where the two giants are forced to listen to each other, says its president, Nazhat Shameem Khan.

The United States was voted back onto the 47-seat council last month after then-president Donald Trump pulled it out in 2018, citing institutional bias, undue influence of authoritarian member states and systemic condemnation of Israel. President Joe Biden’s administration argues it is better to be in the room, to actively counter China, Russia and others with questionable rights records.

“I have the greatest hopes for the Human Rights Council,” Khan, who has been Fiji’s ambassador in Geneva since 2014, said in an interview. “We’ve always had members of the council at loggerheads with very different views.

“There is always greater understanding when people are forced to hear other people’s views.”

03:44

US offers temporary ‘safe haven’ for Hongkongers in response to crackdown on opposition

The council, formed in 2006, is the only intergovernmental global body promoting and attempting to safeguard human rights worldwide. Its functions include passing resolutions and joint statements on human rights violators and thematic concerns, including directives overseen by Khan this year on Afghanistan, Myanmar, the environment and climate change.

While it lacks enforcement power – since 2017, for instance, China has resisted as biased its calls for a delegation to investigate the treatment of Uygurs in Xinjiang – its ability to spotlight, arm twist and embarrass nations puts them under pressure to reform.