US Will Seek Seat on UN Human Rights Council

In a statement yesterday, the U.S. State Department announced that the United States this year will run for a seat on the United Nations Human Rights Council. Describing the decision as part of the Obama administration's "new era of engagement", the U.S. said that it can make the Council more effective by working from within. The Bush administration refused to seek a seat, believing that there were insufficient safeguards to prevent countries with human rights violations from becoming members. (See prior posting.) Politico reports on the new policy. Anti-Defamation League expressed concern about the U.S. decision, saying: "Since its inception in 2006, the HRC has virtually ignored the major human rights violations of our times and instead has repeated the entrenched, institutionalized anti-Israeli bias of its predecessor.... We hope the U.S. will be vociferous in its representations against the one-sided anti-Israel pronouncements and can be a force for change within the body."