Finally it's 2006...
It took a year, but at long last 2005 has concluded and 2006 has arrived...
So what will the world see in 2006? If the papers are anything to go by, we should be seeing some reform at the United Nations, then again we expected that in 2005, however, be encouraged...
The International Herald Tribune reports that Secretary-General Annan's yearning for replacement of the Human Rights Commission with a Human Rights Council, is likely to happen over the coming weeks.
A 'Human Rights Council' was first floated by the Sec-Gen within his March 2005 report 'In Larger Freedom: towards development, security and human rights for all.'
On the current HR Commission:
So what will the world see in 2006? If the papers are anything to go by, we should be seeing some reform at the United Nations, then again we expected that in 2005, however, be encouraged...
The International Herald Tribune reports that Secretary-General Annan's yearning for replacement of the Human Rights Commission with a Human Rights Council, is likely to happen over the coming weeks.
A 'Human Rights Council' was first floated by the Sec-Gen within his March 2005 report 'In Larger Freedom: towards development, security and human rights for all.'
On the current HR Commission:
'... The Commission's capacity to perform its tasks has been increasingly undermined by its declining credibility and professionalism. In particular, States have sought membership... not to strengthen human rights but to protect themselves against criticism or to criticise others. As a result, a credibility deficit has developed, which casts a shadow on the reputation of the United Nations system as a whole.' (Para 182)
International Herald Tribune (2/1/2005):
The current commission has 53 members serving staggered three-year terms and elected from closed slates put forward by regional groups. It meets each year in Geneva for six weeks.
The proposed council would exist year-round, be free to act when rights violations are discovered, conduct periodic reviews of every country's human rights performance and meet more frequently throughout the year.
Still in dispute are the council's size, the procedures for citing individual countries, how often the panel would meet, a possible two-term limit for membership and whether members would be chosen based on agreed criteria of human rights performance or by a two-thirds vote of the General Assembly as a way of weeding out notorious rights violators.
The other two major areas of reform Annan intends to address (according to Mark Malloch Brown, Annan's Chief of Staff), a new Peace Building Commission, and a biennial budget.
The Budget has been approved... see here
The Commission has been established... see here
Stay tuned to see what happens with the Human Rights Council...
posted by Mark @ 11:27 PM
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