U.N. Ready to Welcome China, Russia, Saudi Arabia to Human Rights Council

China, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Cuba and Pakistan are tipped to finish top of Tuesday’s election for seats on the United Nations Human Rights Council, prompting disbelief from freedom campaigners and exiled dissidents alike.

U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based monitoring group,  said allowing these countries anywhere near the council “is like making a gang of arsonists into the fire brigade.”

Saudi Arabia was previously on the council until 2019. Just last month, dozens of nations condemned it before the council over serious rights violations and demanded accountability for the murder Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post newspaper columnist who was killed in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018.

China, which is under fire over its treatment of ethnic Uyghurs in the far western region of Xinjiang and its imposition of a National Security Law in Hong Kong, is already preparing to take its seat.

This is in defiance of a coalition of 70 Uyghur organizations that have already called on the U.N. not to vote in favor of China’s membership, given its extensive record of human rights atrocities, as Breitbart News reported.

All of which has left the U.N. entirely unperturbed as it defies any and all criticism of its actions, as has always been the case.

However back room deals appear to have ensured Cuba and Russia are running unopposed in their regional blocs while China, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia will compete with Nepal and Uzbekistan for four seats allocated to Asia.

Human Rights Council terms last three years. If elected, China will join some of the world’s most repressive states including Libya, Eritrea, and Venezuela.

President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from the body in 2018 citing its status as a safe haven for rogue regimes.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has previously said the council is “a haven for dictators and the democracies that indulge them.”

“If the Council were serious about protecting human rights, there are plenty of legitimate needs for its attention, such as the systemic racial disparities in places like Cuba, China, and Iran,” Pompeo said in a statement at the time.

Before the U.S. left the council, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley slammed it as being a “bully pulpit for human rights violators, as Breitbart News reported.

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