Saudi Arabia fails in bid to join UN human rights council

UNITED NATIONS

Saudi Arabia has been defeated for a seat in the U.N.’s premier human rights body after a campaign by rights groups that accused the Saudis of serious rights violations.

The 193-member General Assembly elected 18 new members to serve on the 47-nation Human Rights Council, which allocates seats to regional groups to ensure geographical representation.

The Geneva-based council reviews the human rights records of all countries periodically, appoints independent investigators to examine and report on issues like torture and situations in countries like North Korea, Iran and Myanmar, and sends fact-finding missions to investigate rights violations, including in Ukraine.

It was created in 2006 to replace a human rights commission discredited because of some members’ poor rights records. But the new council soon came to face similar criticism, including that countries sought seats to protect themselves and their allies.

This year, the Asia-Pacific group had the only contested slate in the election in the General Assembly, with six candidates for five seats. Thailand received 177 votes, Cyprus and Qatar 167 votes, South Korea 161 votes, Marshall Islands 124 votes and Saudi Arabia 117 votes.

Before the vote, Louis Charbonneau, U.N. director at Human Rights Watch, called Saudi Arabia “unfit to serve on the Human Rights Council.”

Human Rights Watch and other groups also criticized other candidates.

They called for the General Assembly to also oppose Qatar, Bolivia, Congo and Ethiopia, declaring them “unqualified” because of poor rights records. Human Rights Watch also cited Thailand.

But all the candidates from other regions where there were no contested slates were elected. The 18 countries will serve three-year terms starting on Jan. 1, 2025. Last year, Russia was defeated in its bid to regain a seat on the Human Rights Council after it was suspended in 2022 following its invasion of Ukraine.