This development reminds me of when the Russians finally got tossed from the United Nations' so-called 'human rights' body -- months into Vladimir Putin's heinous, war-crimes riddled invasion of Ukraine. I'd been asking why the Biden administration wasn't pushing for that outcome weeks earlier -- but they eventually got around to it, and the UN's General Assembly voted days later to suspend Russia from that position, 93-24, with dozens of abstentions. That episode brought me little satisfaction because it was ultimately empty symbolism from a farcical organization. More than 80 member nations voted no, or abstained, on the question of suspending Russia from the Human Rights Council.
The fact that Russia was a part of that organization in the first place tells you everything you need to know about its worth, in addition to the presence of other cartoonishly undeserving countries sitting on the same panel. Indeed, China remains a powerful member of the council, recently spearheading an effort to successfully torpedo a vote on whether to debate its own active genocide against an ethnic and religious minority group. The council is an insulting joke, and the Trump administration was fully justified in removing the United States from participating in it, as it deserves no legitimizing American presence. Team Biden rejoined it immediately, of course. Another United Nations embarrassment is the the 'women's rights' commission, which has finally seen fit to expel one of its member states. Yes, Iran has been on the global women's rights commission, even as the regime has brutally suppressed women's rights demonstrations in the streets, murdering protesters and executing dissenters. The unrest and bloodshed has been playing out for months now, but the UN has finally gotten around to this:
VICTORY! ⚡️
— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) December 14, 2022
By a vote of 29 to 8, with 16 abstentions, the Islamic Republic of Iran was just expelled from the U.N. Women's Rights Commission. First time in United Nations history that any member state was removed from this body. Bravo to all who helped to make this happen! 🙏 pic.twitter.com/LDMBKTPWMO
Iran was ousted from a United Nations women's group on Wednesday for policies contrary to the rights of women and girls, a move proposed by the United States after Tehran's crackdown on protests over the death of a young woman in custody. The 54-member U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) adopted a U.S.-drafted resolution to "remove with immediate effect the Islamic Republic of Iran from the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) for the remainder of its 2022-2026 term."
Twenty-nine countries voted 'yes' on Iran's removal, but 24 voted 'no' or abstained. For reference, among the 'no votes' were China (where baby girls have been slaughtered for years, just for being girls, under the regime's longtime, barbaric one child policy) and Russia -- which remains on the committee that governed this vote, despite having gotten the 'human rights' axe. Authoritarians look out for and protect each other. Though China and Russia were unable to spare Iran this minor humiliation and rebuke, both are permanent members of the Security Council, so either or both could block and meaningful UN action against Iran in other respects, if such a scenario were to arise. For now, we're left with scenes like this:
The moment the mother of Iranian protestor Mohsen Shekari, age 23, learns he’s been hanged for “waging war against God”. The regime told her to stay silent to win his release. This execution was meant to deter further dissent, but likely does the opposite. pic.twitter.com/FdX9uWIcKw
— Karim Sadjadpour (@ksadjadpour) December 9, 2022
After months of protests in Iran that have only escalated as the government’s crackdown has turned deadlier, officials have begun publicly executing protesters, including a 23-year-old man who was hanged on Monday from a construction crane, bringing a new wave of outrage from an Iranian public calling for the end of the country’s theocratic regime. The hangings — the first was on Thursday at a prison near Tehran, the second on Monday in the northeastern city of Mashhad — have brought intense condemnation from the public and human rights groups, and even criticism from some senior figures within Iran’s clerical establishment who questioned the religious validity of the death sentences. Since the protests began in September, Iran’s security forces have killed hundreds of Iranians, in a harsh response characterized by mass arrests and beatings, military assaults and the killing of dozens of teenagers and children. Human rights groups say at least 450 protesters have died, and the United Nations says 14,000 have been arrested. Now, the public executions are widely being taken as a last-ditch effort by the government to suppress an uprising that has become the most profound and widespread since the 1979 revolution that brought the clerics to power.
If they keep this up, the regime in Tehran might just win itself a spot on the UN's Human Rights Council. I'll leave you with some righteous moral shaming from Canada's representative during the Iran expulsion debate:
WOAH! 🎤 drop for @CanadaUN this AM before Iran was removed from the UN Women’s commission!
— Morgan Ortagus (@MorganOrtagus) December 14, 2022
#MahsaAmini #WomenLifeFreedom pic.twitter.com/yI25E7Aces
Canada has its own disturbing issues on matters related to human dignity, but nothing like this. Good for him.
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