At a hearing entitled "UN Human Rights Commission" Before the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee International Operations and Terrorism Subcommittee, Washington,
DC , May 24, 2001
Mr. Chairman, Members of the Foreign Relations Committee:
It is an honor to be here to discuss the Bush Administration's democracy promotion
and human rights policy and the importance of maintaining our leadership in
this field. This is my first chance to address this committee since I became
the Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs. I look forward to future discussions
with you on these important issues. My purpose today is to highlight the Bush
Administration's commitment to democracy and human rights promotion, and the
policies we intend to pursue in support of them.
U.S. commitment to human rights dates from the Declaration of Independence and
our nation's founding. This reflects our nation's values and our deeply
rooted belief in the importance of developing and maintaining democratic governments,
subject to the rule of law, that respect and protect individual
liberty. At the same time, the defense of human rights clearly serves our national
interest.
As the history of the past century has shown, the strongest, most stable, tolerant,
and prosperous countries are precisely those which respect universal human rights.
For that reason, we have long made the promotion of human rights a focus of
our foreign policy and our foreign assistance programs.
Since the end of the Second World War, the United States has been without equal
in articulating a vision of international human rights and having the grit to
carry it out. Whether crafting the United Nations Charter and the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, championing freedom and democracy throughout the
Cold War, insisting on human rights in the Helsinki Final Act, compiling the
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for the past 25 years, or helping
establish the Community of Democracies in Warsaw last year, the United States
has been the country that has set the agenda and has done the heavy lifting.
Throughout these years, our message has not wavered. Promoting democracy and
protecting the individual against the excesses of the state is the policy of
the United States.
Fortunately, that effort has been successful. The U.S. vision has come to be
shared by many other states, and is now a fundamental component of NATO,
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, and the Organization
of American States and the Summit of the Americas, and in the basic laws of
many states that have emerged since the end of World War II. It is increasingly
an important factor in decisions of countries in other regions, for example
in Africa.
Let me turn now to a subject that has been much in the news recently: the United
Nations Commission on Human Rights. I am sure you are all aware of
the UN Economic and Social Council vote in New York on May 3, which resulted
in the United States losing its seat for the first time since the Commission
was created in 1947 under the chairmanship of Eleanor Roosevelt.
As President Bush said on Cuban Independence Day last week at the White House:
"Last month, the UN Human Rights Commission called on Castro's regime to respect
the basic human rights of all its people. The United States' leadership was
responsible for passage of that resolution. Some say we paid a heavy price for
it, but let me be clear: I'm very proud of what we did. And repressed people
around the world must know this about the United States: We might not sit on
some commission, but we will always be the world's leader in support of human
rights."
The President was right: we did pay a price for taking forthright, principled
positions at the Commission this year. Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke
about this when he addressed the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign
Operations May 15, and stressed that the future policy of the United States
toward the Commission would be the result of a review and ultimately a decision
by the President. This review is now underway within the Administration.
As the President said, the United States will remain committed to human rights.
It will be a crucial part of our approach to China, Cuba, Indonesia, the Balkans,
Iran, Sudan, and all the other places where fundamental freedoms are at stake.
We are working ever closer with our friends and allies at the UN, the OSCE,
OAS, NATO, and other multilateral organizations, and the State Department remains
strongly committed to its round-the-clock, round-the-year, round-the-world human
rights monitoring portfolio.
We shall continue to be the world's leading advocate for democracy and human
rights. We shall continue to meet foreign government officials and insist
that our views on human rights be known. We shall speak up for the dissidents,
the victims of persecution, the tortured, and the dispossessed. We shall continue
to tell the truth when we submit our Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
to Congress and to the millions who now access them via the Internet. We shall
continue our reports on International Religious Freedom, now in its third cycle,
and a new report on Trafficking in Persons to be released on June 1.
Is this easy? No. Is it always appreciated by our friends and allies? Unfortunately,
not. But it is necessary. It is worthwhile. To quote the President again: "History
tells us that forcing change upon oppressive regimes requires patience. But
history also proves, from Poland to South Africa, that patience and courage
and resolve can eventually cause oppressive regimes to fear and then to fall."
The vote by the member states of ECOSOC has limited our role in one highly visible
forum, but it has hardly crippled us. Those states which voted against us in
the hope that they would prevent us from being forceful advocates for human
rights were sadly mistaken. Indeed, in the policy review to which I earlier
referred, we are taking a close look at new approaches and new opportunities
to pursue our human rights objectives worldwide. We may be forced, for a time,
to shift our tactics, but we will never abandon our goal.
I would like to say a brief word about the proposal by some to link the payment
of our arrears to the outcome of the Commission election. The Administration
believes strongly that any attempt to link U.S. payments to the UN -- now or
in the future -- to U.S. membership in or support for the
Commission is counterproductive. Not only will withholding money or adding additional
conditions on arrears payments provide ammunition to our
adversaries, but it will also frustrate our efforts to further U.S. political
interests and push for reform of the institution and its agencies. In the words
of the President, "a deal's a deal."
While the Commission on Human Rights is far from a perfect institution, it
has done much good over the years. It established Special Rapporteurs on
country situations like the Former Yugoslavia or Iraq, and on crucial thematic
issues such as Torture or the Independence of Judges and Lawyers. These special
mechanisms of the CHR are among the activities of the Office of the UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights, former Irish President Mary Robinson, which also
maintains field offices in trouble spots like Congo and Colombia.
We would caution against penalizing the UN, the UN human rights program, or
the Office of the High Commissioner, for the vote by a small number of UN
Member States in the Economic and Social Council over membership in the CHR.
I strongly urge the Committee to proceed very cautiously in this regard.
Thank you.
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See http://www.state.gov for Senior State Department
Official's statements and testimonies
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