VZCZCXRO6012
RR RUEHAT
DE RUEHGV #3134/01 3490831
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 150831Z DEC 06
FM USMISSION GENEVA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 2126
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 1805
INFO RUEHZJ/HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 GENEVA 003134 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR IO/RHS, DRL/MLGA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PHUM UNHRC UN
SUBJECT: HRC:  CONGRESSIONAL STAFFDEL MEETS OHCHR, COUNCIL 
PRESIDENT, DELEGATIONS, AND NGOS 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
 
¶1.  Congressional staffers for the outgoing and incoming 
chairs of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House 
International Relations Committee were in Geneva Nov. 27-Dec. 
1, 2006 to discuss the state of the Human Rights Council 
(HRC) with key players from the diplomatic community, United 
Nations, and NGOs.  Almost all, including the UN High 
Commissioner for Human Rights and the HRC President, urged 
the United States to run for a Council seat.  Western 
diplomats said the Council was headed in the wrong direction 
and was a captive of the Organization of the Islamic 
Conference (OIC) and the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). 
However, no one was ready to write off the Council just yet. 
Most urged finding ways to make it work, including by the new 
Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process, improving the 
quality of membership, and weakening the hold of blocs. 
Staff delegates were Paul Foldi (Sen. Lugar); Jennifer Simon 
(Sen. Biden); Barton Forsyth (Rep. Hyde); and David Killion 
(Rep. Lantos). END SUMMARY. 
 
UN High Commissioner Louise Arbour 
------------------------------ 
 
¶2.  Arbour said it was too early to write off the HRC and 
encouraged the U.S. to run for a Council seat since a more 
authoritative intergovernmental body was needed.  Though the 
prevailing mood in the Council was against country 
resolutions, she believed that the UPR process could 
represent a modest improvement if sufficiently robust and 
frequent.  Also, since many member states considered 
resolutions on Israel to be thematic (occupation), Arbour 
said Council members could consider taking up Sudan under the 
theme of armed conflict, though an obstacle to this approach 
was U.S. resistance to consideration of humanitarian law 
issues.  (NOTE: Subsequent to this meeting, a Special Session 
on Sudan was called for December 12. END NOTE.)  Arbour said 
developed countries needed to listen to developing states on 
issues of cultural, economic, and social rights.  Arbour 
cautioned that the call to reduce voluntary contributions 
would offset the doubling of OHCHR,s budget over the next 
five years, which would lead to zero budget growth just when 
growth was needed.  Arbour made her usual appeal for 
unearmarked funds, saying OHCHR was the best investment in 
human rights work. 
 
HRC President Luis Alfonso de Alba (Mexico) 
------------------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  De Alba said the Council got off to a bad start and had 
numerous problems, notably its composition.  He presented 
himself as almost powerless, saying the Council had no tools 
or rules of procedure, and that he did not even have the 
authority to call meetings.  However, he encouraged a long 
view of what the Council would look like in five years rather 
than six months.  De Alba said discussion about country 
resolutions was useless, though UPR could be used as a basis 
for them.  As far as accommodating NGOs, de Alba said he 
suggested they organize and determine which should speak on 
which issues and establish procedures for their 
participation.  De Alba said it was the Western countries, 
desire for a low threshold for calling special sessions that 
made it easy for the OIC to call so many special sessions on 
the Middle East.  He cautioned that calling a special session 
on Sudan without having the votes to pass a resolution could 
be a real setback (NOTE: A consensus resolution on Darfur 
passed on Dec. 13. END NOTE.), and suggested that the EU and 
GRULAC coordinate and build on the votes obtained on the EU 
amendments to the African Group's Sudan resolution tabled at 
the second HRC regular session. 
 
Geneva-based Missions 
--------------------- 
 
¶4.  Staffers met with representatives from Canada, the UK, 
Pakistan, Ghana, Guatemala, South Africa, and Israel.  All 
expressed varying levels of concern for the Council. 
Canadian Deputy PermRep Paul Meyer said, in the broader 
context of UN reform, that putting human rights on a par with 
security and development in the UN system was a great 
achievement.  He stressed the need to build cross-regional 
coalitions to fight off the existing regional blocs.  He 
added that country resolutions were increasingly viewed as 
ineffective in addressing human rights issues -- a view 
strongly shared by most developing countries. 
 
¶5.  Guatemalan Counselor Stephanie Hochstetter suggested 
developing a two-tiered system that would include technical 
 
GENEVA 00003134  002 OF 003 
 
 
assistance and country resolutions based on UPR conclusions 
depending on the gravity of a country's human rights 
violations.  Guatemala's own experience with HRC special 
procedures has not been good, according to Hochstetter. 
While readily acknowledging Guatemala's human rights 
problems, she said her country simply did not have the 
capacity to handle the multiple visits, reports, and other 
obligations, so it was a serious disincentive for developing 
world countries to cooperate with the UN's human rights 
apparatus. 
 
¶6.  UK PermRep Nick Thorne expressed frustration over the 
European Union's (EU) fixation on maintaining common 
positions.  He blamed the Finnish presidency for failing to 
speak on issues of importance.  (NOTE: Germany takes over on 
Jan. 1, 2007. END NOTE.)  He cited outside factors as the 
driving force behind Pakistan (OIC), Algeria (African Group, 
OIC), and Egypt's (African Group, OIC) desire to lead blocs 
on human rights discussions in Geneva.  He especially focused 
on Pakistan, saying it was driven by a desire to dominate its 
region and keep rival India in check.  Both Meyer and Thorne 
said the Community of Democracies would be ineffective in 
caucusing at the HRC, the latter adding that the group's 
image was tarnished after U.S. efforts to use it to mobilize 
votes on Cuba-related resolutions. 
 
¶7.  Pakistan's Deputy PermRep Tehmina Janjua -- and later at 
a lunch, Pakistani PermRep and OIC human rights coordinator 
Masood Khan -- claimed that Pakistan was actually a 
moderating influence on the OIC, and that if it were not 
leading the OIC a more radical country would do so. 
Ambassador Khan said that Pakistan only kept the OIC 
coordinating job in Geneva because nobody else wanted it and, 
in any case, the OIC,s importance in the Council was 
exaggerated.  When questioned by staffdel about the three 
anti-Israel special sessions to date, Khan recited an 
abbreviated and creative version of the events that led to 
the sessions and of the OIC's behavior.  Pakistani Human 
Rights Director Shafqat Ali Khan contended that it was 
Western targeting of OIC countries with human rights 
instruments and Western silence on atrocities towards Muslims 
(such as a massacre of Muslim worshippers in India) that had 
unified OIC countries and made them such a strong force. 
 
¶8.  Ghana Deputy PermRep Paul Aryene blamed the situation in 
the Council on mutual suspicion among Council members.  Even 
among the African Group itself, many members were weary of 
the current leadership.  He said change was possible though 
it would take time.  Aryene identified Zambia and non-members 
Guinea and Lesotho as African Group countries that might be 
counted on to vote responsibly.  On Israel, he suggested 
that, rather than wait to see what the OIC came up with, the 
U.S. should take the initiative and negotiate texts ahead of 
time. 
 
¶9.  Pitso Montwedi, South African Chief Directorate for Human 
Rights and Humanitarian Affairs, acknowledged there was a 
divide between Western and developing countries over the 
breadth of human rights issues.  Developing countries viewed 
poverty, deprivation, and the like as human rights issues 
while Western countries felt these issues belonged in other 
fora.  Montwedi criticized country resolutions, and said what 
developing countries really needed was technical assistance 
to improve their human rights situations.  He credited the 
international embargo on South Africa during the apartheid 
era for helping South Africa rather than country-specific 
human rights resolutions. 
 
¶10.  Israeli PermRep Itzhak Levanon was unimpressed with the 
Council.  He said that although Canada had shown real 
backbone on the Council by calling for votes on anti-Israel 
resolutions, Israel would prefer to know that it could rely 
on the U.S.  Levanon held that the best chance to change the 
Council's direction lay in getting the right countries 
elected.  He saw some frustration about the direction of the 
Council from countries such as Guatemala, Ghana, and Cameroon 
-- an attitude that might be utilized to counter the OIC 
stranglehold.  Asked what incentives such countries might 
have for leaning in the other direction, Levanon said that, 
if the U.S. were a member, it could provide them cover. 
 
NGO Roundtable 
-------------- 
 
¶11.  During a Mission-organized NGO roundtable, the group met 
with representatives from Amnesty International, Human Rights 
Watch, International Service for Human Rights, UN Watch, the 
Quaker UN Office, and the Baha'i Community.  Most were 
critical of the U.S. choice not to run for the Council, but 
 
GENEVA 00003134  003 OF 003 
 
 
welcomed U.S. engagement as an observer in the Council.  All 
said the U.S. should run for the Council next year.  Several 
participants criticized the U.S. focus on country 
resolutions, and some bristled at one staffer's reference to 
"bad guys."  One participant charged that it was this type of 
approach that had brought the "bad guys" together.  Another 
participant said the U.S. position on economic, social and 
cultural rights was not helpful, noting how other countries 
that had previously opposed considering these issues under 
the human rights rubric (e.g., UK and Australia) had 
eventually changed their views.  The Amnesty International 
representative observed that the worst members of the Council 
were America's "best mates" (Pakistan and Egypt) and wondered 
why the U.S. could not bring them into line.  When asked 
about prospects for peeling members off blocs, a participant 
cautioned that this might apply also to the EU, the most 
rigid voting bloc in the Council. 
 
¶12.  In a separate meeting, UN Watch Executive Director 
Hillel Neuer said the new Council was worse than the 
Commission, dominated by power blocs (especially the OIC), 
and intensely anti-Israel.  He said various EU members were 
sensitive to their Muslim populations and reluctant to 
confront the OIC.  Neuer saw the UPR as a chance to move the 
Council away from its fixation on Israel.  However, UPR could 
go in the wrong direction if criteria for review accounted 
for cultural and religious factors, and/or if the information 
base for review was a simple questionnaire answered by the 
country under review.  Despite the Council's shortcomings, 
Neuer held, it was better for the U.S. to be a member, inside 
and effective, rather than outside and merely "engaged." 
 
TICHENOR