Human Rights Council reform should happen from within, says former Vice-President
Introduction:
Human rights affect everyone and all countries have a responsibility to work together to protect them, a former Vice-President of the UN Human Rights Council has said.
Speaking in defence of the UN’s principal political human rights body, following the United States’ decision to leave it earlier this week citing allegations of long-term bias, Christian Strohal insisted that “we need the engagement of everybody”.
On the question of reform of the Council amid concerns that its peer review procedure threatens the sovereignty of Member States, the veteran Austrian diplomat insisted that the body was a “living system”.
He told Michelle Kusuma in Geneva that “the Council of today is not the Council of 10 years ago…and I’m sure the Council in 10 years’ time will look different”.
Human rights affect everyone and all countries have a responsibility to work together to protect them, a former Vice-President of the UN Human Rights Council has said.
Speaking in defence of the UN’s principal political human rights body, following the United States’ decision to leave it earlier this week citing allegations of long-term bias, Christian Strohal spoke to Michelle Kusuma, in Geneva, and told her that everybody needed to be engaged on human rights.