United Nations and Human Rights
Functions of the UN: Human Rights
Introduction to United Nations and Human Rights
One of the UN’s major goals under its charter is to promote and encourage respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms for all people, regardless of race, sex, language, or religion. But once again, the UN’s effectiveness in promoting its agenda is limited by its lack of authority over member nations.
After the atrocities committed by the Germans in the Holocaust, the slaughter of Jews that occurred during World War II, the UN adopted a Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The declaration was adopted on December 10, 1948, which is now celebrated annually as Human Rights Day. It proclaims that “all human beings are born free and equal” and establishes basic rights for all people and norms for the behavior of governments in many areas. For example, it says that all people have the right to liberty, religious and political freedom, education, and economic well-being. It bans torture and states that all people have the right to participate in their governments. The declaration does not have the force of law, however, and seems to have had little visible effect on the UN’s member countries. Governments with poor human rights records, such as China, criticize the UN’s attempts to promote human rights, saying that such actions interfere with their internal affairs.
Until 2006 the UN operated a Commission on Human Rights. In 2006 this commission was replaced with a Human Rights Council. The work of the previous commission had been largely discredited because countries known to violate human rights had become members. As members they often blocked the commission from censuring them for their human rights abuses. The reformed Human Rights Council was created to address this problem. The UN General Assembly now elects individual countries to the council by majority vote. Previously, membership on the council was allocated by region. The council also reviews the human rights records of member countries, and systematic violators of human rights can be suspended from the council by a two-thirds vote of the General Assembly. The council also meets more frequently than the commission did. The council meets three times a year for a total of ten weeks, compared with the commission’s single session of six weeks each year. The council has the ability to meet quickly to address a human rights emergency. The purpose of the council is to monitor human rights abuses in countries and address complaints about human rights violations.
The UN also operates the office of High Commissioner for Human Rights. The General Assembly created this position in 1993. The commissioner oversees all the UN’s human rights programs, works to prevent human rights violations, and investigates human rights abuses. The commissioner also has the power to publicize abuses taking place in any country, but does not have the authority to stop them. However, most publicity about human rights abuses does not come from the UN but from rival countries or from nongovernmental organizations, such as Amnesty International.
The UN has also drawn up four international conventions (treaties) on human rights, which are legally binding but hard to enforce. The conventions address the problems of genocide, racial discrimination, civil and political rights, and economic and social rights. The treaties have been ratified by only about half of the world’s nations. The United States has only ratified the convention on genocide and has declined to ratify the others. Other countries have also refused to sign the conventions, citing concerns about the specific terms of the conventions and the loss of authority that such treaties imply.
During the Cold War, Western countries continually criticized nations under Soviet rule for their lack of respect for human rights, such as freedom of expression and fair elections. But the UN played a small role in these arguments because of the Soviet Union’s veto power, and because many other national governments did not guarantee human rights in their own domestic politics. The most important Cold War pact regarding human rights, the 1975 Helsinki Accords, a diplomatic agreement between 35 countries that encouraged human rights, was negotiated outside the UN framework.
One of the UN’s most visible recent activities regarding human rights has been the creation of special war crimes tribunals to prosecute those responsible for atrocities committed during the civil wars in the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone. These tribunals, established by the Security Council in 1993, 1994, and 2002, respectively, operate independently of the UN (see War Crimes Trials). The UN also played an important role in the creation of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to prosecute war criminals, although the ICC is not a UN organ.” (1)
Resources
Notes and References
- Information about United Nations and Human Rights in the Encarta Online Encyclopedia
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