Saudi Arabia's Growing Influence Over the UNHRC
In March, Saudi Arabia launched a military coalition alongside its Sunni allies to support the deposed president of Yemen in his war against the Houthi rebels. On September 28, a Saudi coalition air strike targeted a wedding party near the port city of Mokha, killing an estimated 135 people, including many women and children. According to the talking points of a top UN official obtained by Foreign Policy, the coalition is responsible for dramatically more children’s deaths than the Houthi rebels. Yet a Dutch-led draft resolution in the UN Human Rights Council to send representatives to investigate potential war crimes in Yemen was blocked by Saudi Arabia, a move only possible given Saudi membership in the Council. Riyadh has now put forth what UNWatch describes as the Saudis’ own “softball resolution,” which omits any reference to a probe and focuses instead on vague “technical assistance and capacity-building for Yemen in the field of human rights.” Saudi Arabia has used its membership and influence in the Human Rights Council to block probes into its ongoing human rights violations in Yemen. However, the blocking of the Yemeni probe is only the tip of the iceberg—just one instance of the broader Saudi campaign to accumulate and abuse power in the UNHRC for the Kingdom’s own gain.
After World War II, the UN reaffirmed the centrality of human rights to international law by promulgating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Human rights, as currently defined by the UN, are “those rights inherent to all human beings, whatever [their] nationality, place of residence, sex, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, language, or any other status.” In 1946, the UN formed the Commission on Human Rights to establish an international legal framework for guaranteeing human rights and to serve as a forum for voicing human rights violations. For several decades, the Commission pursued these goals, but its “credibility and professionalism” were ultimately undermined by the joint efforts of autocratic members to silence scrutiny of their human rights records. In 2006, the General Assembly created the United Nations Human Rights Council, a body of forty-seven Member States, as a replacement for the council.
In choosing UNHRC Member States, the General Assembly ostensibly takes into account “the candidate States’ contribution to the promotion and protection of human rights, as well as their voluntary pledges and commitments in this regard.” Saudi Arabia’s election to the Council for the 2014-2016 period demonstrates that countries actually approach voting with a “quid pro quo” mentality, leaving human rights records as an afterthought.
The independent watchdog organization Freedom House releases its “Freedom in the World” report each year, scoring countries on the basis of the political rights and civil liberties afforded to their citizens. In 2015, Saudi Arabia became one of just eleven other nations, including as Syria and North Korea, to receive the lowest possible rating in both categories. It was the fourth consecutive year that Freedom House has ranked the Kingdom in its lowest category.
The report contributes to the growing body of evidence exposing human rights violations in the Gulf’s largest monarchy. In February, Amnesty International released a scathing new report on the government’s repression of its critics, women, and the Shi’a minority. By some calculations, the Saudis have executed more people this year than the terrorist group ISIS. Even Iran, one of just three nations deemed a state sponsor of terrorism by the US, has recently vowed to pursue criminal charges against the al-Saud government via international adjudication.
In June 2015, WikiLeaks began publishing the Saudi Cables, a collection of over half a million communications, many secret, from the Saudi Foreign Ministry to its embassies across the globe. A number of the cables, as translated by UN Watch, reveal how one of the world’s most abusive governments obtained membership in the council designed to expose the type of crimes it commits. The Saudi strategy has two components: the bartering of votes and dubious campaign transfers.
A classified cable to the Russians reads, “The Government of Saudi Arabia has the honor to propose an arrangement of reciprocal support wherein the Government of Saudi Arabia would gladly support the candidature of the Government of Russia to the Human Rights Council on the understanding that the Government of Russia would also extend its valuable support to the candidate of Saudi Arabia for membership in the Human Rights Council (HRC) for the period 2013-2016 at the election held in May 2013.” This unscrupulous offer to exchange votes, a move that the undermines the core values of the UNHRC, was also made to Mexico, Nigeria, and, according to UN Watch, “countless others.”
The cables also reveal particularly suspicious dealings with the United Kingdom. Unlike most of the agreements, where Riyadh is the initiator, the British actually approached the Saudis with their vote-trading scheme. The UK cables also reveal an exchange of funds from Saudi Arabia for “expenditures resulting from the campaign to nominate the Kingdom for membership” in the UNHRC. The transfer, which cryptically includes no breakdown of funds, totals $100,000, but demonstrates the utter lack of regard for human rights contributions in the November 2013 election.
Unfortunately, Saudi Arabia’s ability to shape UNHRC policy for its own gain has only increased in the past year. In September, UN Watch obtained a UN report discussing the appointment of Faisal Trad, the Saudi envoy to the UNHRC, as chairperson of the powerful Consultative Group (CG), a move that was apparently kept secret for several months. The CG interviews and selects applicants for over seventy-seven positions dealing with investigations into human rights violations on either a country or issue-specific basis. CG members’ access to confidential information makes Saudi Arabia’s appointment ripe for potential abuse in the future. Indeed, a leaked cable revealed that in 2014 the Moroccan ambassador to the UN faxed secret interview questions to a Moroccan candidate for a position in the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, who was then appointed to the position. The integrity of the appointments already made under Trad’s leadership must consequently be drawn into question. The ambassador interviewed and short-listed candidates for the July 3 appointments to the positions of UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, Member of UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, and UN Special Rapporteur on Independence of Judges, despite Saudi Arabia’s appalling record in all three of those areas.
The executive director of UN Watch, Hillel Neuer, has expressed suspicion that the appointment of Trad as Commissioner may have been granted in exchange for the Saudi government dropping its bid to head the UNHRC in its entirety. While unsubstantiated, the claim would certainly not be surprising in light of the backroom dealings that put the Saudis in the Council in 2013, and the effective preemption of the Yemen probe proves just how much Riyadh can gain from influence in the UNHRC.
To the dismay of international critics, Saudi Arabia’s sway over the Council is unlikely to decline anytime soon. Riyadh has been the closest ally of the United States in the Middle East since 1945 when President Roosevelt met Saudi King Abdulaziz in Egypt. Over the years, the relationship has only grown stronger with increasing American demand for oil, of which Saudi Arabia is the world’s largest exporter, and Saudi participation in the US-led coalition against ISIS. In early October, the US used its permanent seat on the Security Council to block a proposal mandating the cooperation of all parties currently fighting in Yemen with international investigations. When asked for the US’s reaction to the Saudi Consultative Group chairmanship, the US Department of State Deputy Spokesperson was caught off guard and responded, “. . . I mean, frankly it’s—we would welcome it. We’re close allies.”
The Saudi government appears intent on expanding its already considerable influence in the United Nations. Riyadh has already applied to continue serving in the Human Rights Council for the 2017-2019 term and also presented its candidature for a number of other international bodies, including the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization, the Economic and Social Council, the Committee Against Torture, and the Commission on the Status of Women.
The image featured in this article was taken by the United States Mission Geneva. The original image can be found here.