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USA, Universal Periodic Review, UN Human Rights Council

Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The United States takes its turn presenting its human rights record Friday 5 November in Geneva, when it has its Universal Periodic Review (UPR) with the United Nations Human Rights Council. It also faces potentially heavy criticism, notably over its military behaviour in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also its continuing application of death sentences by several American states.

US Ambassador to the HR Council Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe said before the review that the US expects to field questions that “range across the board from race discrimination, religious intolerance issues, immigration/migration issues, economic/social/cultural rights issues” and “tensions that are created because of the war on terror with respect to detention practices, issues with respect to respecting citizens’ privacy.” The US has brought to Geneva a large delegation of top officials from several US government bodies.

The high-powered delegation will field questions from NGOs at a Town Hall meeting Town Hall in Room XVIII at the UN from 15:30 to17:00 Friday November 5.

“This event will enable activists and nongovernmental groups to question and engage with members of the US delegation on the US’s human rights record,” the US Mission notes. A live webcast can be followed: “Enter as a visitor” by typing in your name and selecting “Enter Room”.

Each of the 192 members of the United Nations is reviewed once every four years with a UPR. The 1-12 November session is reviewing 16 countries, with the US and Libya among those with the most, or at least most vocal, critics. The US review is from 09:00-12:00 Friday and can be followed live on-line. Ed. note: it will be available afterwards in the archives, at the same web address.

The report on the view is scheduled to be adopted Tuesday noon 9 November.

Cameroon, France and Japan make up the troika for the US review, with the task of “facilitating the review” of each State. The US review is attracting more media attention than is usual, in part because of the presence of Julian Assange, vocal founder of Wikileaks, who is in Geneva as a witness for the review.

The UPRs began in 2006, when the Human Rights Council was created, replacing the highly criticized Human Rights Committee. All 192 UN member States will have been reviewed by 2011. The preparation for a review takes months, but the actual review lasts half a day and takes place in Geneva.

The UN describes the UPR as “a State-driven process, under the auspices of the Human Rights Council, which provides the opportunity for each State to declare what actions they have taken to improve the human rights situations in their countries and to fulfil their human rights obligations. As one of the main features of the Council, the UPR is designed to ensure equal treatment for every country when their human rights situations are assessed.”

US Ambassador to the HR Council Eileen Chamberlalin Donahoe met with journalists earlier in the week at the US Mission, to assess the success of the UPRs and field questions about what the US expects at its review. She emphasized the importance of the review process, stating that the UPR is the most significant new tool for the protection and promotion of human rights in the past four years “because it’s universal. The UPR requires every country in the UN system to undergo a process of self-reflection on its own human rights record every four years. It requires engagement with civil society. It requires, in effect, a peer review because other members in the UN system get to pose questions and participate in the interactive dialogue. And it requires that this process take place in the open. It’s a public international dialogue.”
So those features are very significant. And to date, this new tool has garnered 100 percent participation from every country whose name has come up in this process.
This is the first time the international community has had a mechanism in place whereby even the most repressive countries subject themselves to international scrutiny. That is unprecedented. It really is a remarkable tool.

The critics lined up as witnesses include XX

The review process depends heavily on a set of documents for each State, which can be consulted in advance (USA review documents):

• information prepared by the State concerned, which can take the form of a national report, and any other information considered relevant by the State, presented either orally or in writing
• information contained in the reports of treaty bodies, special procedures, including observations and comments by the State concerned, and other relevant official UN documents, compiled in a report prepared by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).
• information provided by “other relevant stakeholders” to the universal periodic review, summarized by the OHCHR in a document. Stakeholders may include, among others, non-governmental organizations, national human rights institutions, human rights defenders, academic and research institutions, regional organizations, as well as civil society representatives.
• The national report must be prepared on the basis of general guidelines adopted by the Council, as are documents prepared by the OHCHR.