US, EU refuse to cooperate with UNHRC on human rights

America was defeated at the UNHRC on a key human rights issue. American reaction was instantaneous : it hit back refusing to cooperate with UNHRC’s follow-up action on human rights abuses by transnational corporations (TNCs).

The majority in the  UNHRC voted for a proposal to negotiate a legally-binding treaty to prevent human right abuses by TNCs and the world business conglomerates. The next step is for UNHRC to appoint an intergovernmental working group (IGWG) to lay down ground rules for negotiating the proposed treaty. The first meeting of IGWG is due to start next year. But immediately after the defeat was announced US declared that it will not cooperate with the IGWG. What is more it is pressuring  others also not to cooperate.

The vote was 20 for, 14 against and 13 abstentions in the 47-member Council. The United States and EU members, including France, Germany, UK, Italy, Ireland, Austria, Estonia and the Czech Republic, along with South Korea and Japan, voted against the resolution.

American reaction was voiced by Stephen Townley, the U.S. representative in the HRC, who told the delegates: “The United States will not participate in this IGWG, and we encourage others to do the same.” Townley, who is the  Special Assistant to the Legal Adviser at the U.S. State Department. added: “There are also a host of practical questions about how an internationally binding instrument would apply to corporations, which are not subjects of international law, and how states would implement such an instrument,”

Reviewing this American reaction T.M. Deen, U.N. Bureau Chief & Regional Director, Inter Press Service (IPS) news agency, United Nations, said that “the United States and the 28-member European Union (EU) have assiduously promoted – and vigourously preached – one of the basic tenets of Western multi-party democracy : majority rules.

“But at the United Nations, the 29 member states have frequently abandoned that principle when it insists on “consensus” on crucial decisions relating to the U.N. budget – or when it is clearly outvoted in the 193-member General Assembly or its committee rooms.”

And after the vote, the United States said this legally binding treaty that the UNHRC will produce in due course will not be binding for those who vote against it. This then is American democracy for you and for me.

The response of Anne van Schaik, Accountable Finance Campaigner with Friends of the Earth Europe, was quite blunt. She told IPS that the voting list “makes clear we are up against powerful forces”.

“She said the EU has clearly stated it will not cooperate in implementing the proposal.

And after the vote, the United States said this legally binding instrument will not be binding for those who vote against it.

“So we can expect some fierce opposition,” Schaik said, even as the IGWG plans to hold its first meeting sometime next year.

“But we are cheerful because it is not every day public interest wins over corporate interests which are backed by the EU and the U.S.,” she added.

Both United States and the EU have argued that the three-year-old U.N. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights is adequate as a yardstick to monitor the business practices – and malpractices – of corporations and big business.

“We have not given states adequate time and space to implement the Guiding Principles,” Townley told delegates.

He said “while we share and appreciate the concerns expressed by some delegations and civil society colleagues that we need to do more to improve access to remedy for victims of business-related human rights abuses, our concern is that this initiative [for a legally binding treaty] will have exactly the opposite effect.”

Speaking of the proposed treaty, Schaik told IPS this is something that Friends of the Earth has campaigned for years, if not decades.

“We have always wanted the U.N. to take responsibility to develop such a mechanism, since they are the only international democratic decision-making body that is able to work on such a proposal.”

So, it is better than, for example, having legislation adopted by some countries, or regional bodies (if this would have been feasible at all), she added.

Secondly, Schaik said, what is very positive as well is that in the resolution, a roadmap is already laid out for the first steps of this working group.

“The division of the votes clearly shows that the countries who are host to a lot of TNCs, such as the EU, as well as Norway and the U.S., are against this proposal,” she noted.

Asked how the Western opposition could be countered, she pointed out the U.S. warned, even before the vote, that countries who voted against it would not be obliged to respect the resolution.

“This is of course total nonsense, but it does mean that both civil society, as well as the countries who voted in favour, will have to do what they can in order for this working group to be successful.”

She said the treaty alliance is already making plans on how to follow up on this victory, “and I think particularly for groups in Europe, the U.S. and Norway there is an important task to keep pressuring their countries to respect the resolution.

“We will campaign, set up email actions, present research, organise speaker tours and take to the streets, if necessary, to ensure the working group will be successful,” she said.

As to whether street protest can win against Big Power politics is yet to be seen.  In the meantime, the gun-toting cowboys of the West will continue to impose their own laws, dismissing international laws which are invoked and applied forcibly only to make the weak and the helpless submit to the powerful will of lawless bullies parading as founders of a new moral order. Arbitrary law and self-serving morality reign supreme in the UN like in the towns of wild West. When US and EU, the chief defenders of human rights and the guardians of international law, defies and rejects UN resolutions what principles and authorities are left to protect and maintain world order? How can a moral order be acceptable to the international community when laws passed by the UN are rejected with utter contempt by the Big Powers? This is a tragi-comic scenario where the accredited fire-fighters turn into unauthorized arsonists.

When the leading champions of human rights refuse to accept UNHRC resolutions on human rights it places a huge question mark over the future of human rights as a viable and valid doctrine for the rest of the world. If the new world order, peace and justice are to be based on human rights then the Big Powers cannot arbitrarily pick and choose human rights issues that favour only their political agenda. Of course, not every resolution passed by the UN / UNHRC deserves to be enforced / implemented. The UNHRC is a heavily politicized institution and the vindictive anti-Sri Lankan resolution led by US is one that should be rejected for cogent reasons stated elsewhere on several occasions. But the UNHRC resolution on violations of human rights by TNCs is not one of them.

The ganging up of leading market forces is clearly seen in the Western alliance of US, EU, Norway etc., rejecting the UNHRC resolution on TNCs. Their decision to protect profits at the expense of human rights is unacceptable. It reveals that when the global high priests of human rights are asked to choose between human rights and TNCs they have no hesitation in sacrificing human rights of the powerless for the plundering, exploitative robber barons ruling the global economy. When America is asked to choose between the governing principles of majority rule and minority aggression she decides to dump the majority and impose the will of the defeated minority. When America is faced with the issue of granting consent for pluralism and tolerance – a fundamental tenet in democratic governance – as opposed to authoritarian denial of fundamental rights she abandons the democratic norms to assert the supremacy of the Big Brother. So is the difference in Obama’s regime and that of Osama’s only in name? Are the two letters of “b” and “s” in their names interchangeable and, if so, would there be much of a difference?

The rule of law must apply universally to human rights in all spheres – from the multi-national corporations to states. There is no provision in international law for international humanitarian and human rights laws to be applied selectively according  to the whims, fancies, pleasures and necessities of US. The callous disregard with which US handles human rights and institutions that campaign for human rights is seen in the blatant and cynical rejection of the UNHRC resolution on transnational corporations. How can Ms. Michele J. Sisson, US Ambassadress in Colombo, insist on Sri Lanka adhering to the UNHRC resolution on violations of human rights when her government has rejected a similar resolution on human rights passed by the UNHRC? 

The aggressive rejection of the UNHRC resolution by the US, EU etc., should ease the pressures on Sri Lanka to comply with the UNHRC resolution. Sri Lanka can now cite the precedent set by US and ask the 12-member team of investigators to unpack their bags and stay put in Geneva, engaging in more useful work like giving some assistance for Ms. Navy Pillai to fly on her broomstick to S. Africa.

Obviously, US has rushed to protect the transnational corporations at the expense of human rights. If the profits of TNCs can triumph over human rights it means bluntly that human beings are not worth the dust that falls off the polished shoes of corporate crooks. These TNCs are responsible for the misery of children exploited in the sweat shops of Asia and Africa. Asian women slaving to produce cheap garments to Western TNCs are crushed under bricks that fall in buildings manufacturing profits for corporate conglomerates. TNCs have caused some of the biggest financial crises in recent times while collecting millions in golden shakes. They artificially jack up prices of essential medicines denied to the poor and the needy in Afro-Asia. The rejection of an international treaty for the supervision and management of human rights in TNCs reveals the lobbying power of the corporate sector. Shamelessly, US is now leading a campaign to reject human rights in order to protect the margins  of profits of the global corporate sectors.

The contradiction is so apparent that it makes US one of the most hypocritical abusers of power. On the one hand, it brazenly goes all out to reject the UNHRC resolution to rein in the TNCs violating human rights on a global scale and, on the other, insists that Sri Lanka must cooperate with the UNHRC and allow its investigators to probe alleged violations of human rights in the last five months of the 33-year-old Vadukoddai War. On any scale of comparison the alleged violations of Sri Lanka within its borders during five months do not match with the violations of human rights by TNCs on a global scale running into centuries. So what is the urgency/necessity for US and its cohorts to push human rights issues against Sri Lanka exonerating the TNC violators of human rights?

What moral authority does Navi Pillay have to force Sri Lanka to accept the US-led anti-Sri Lankan resolution when UNHRC will not force US, EU and their allies to comply with the UNHRC resolution on TNCs? The best option available for Sri Lanka right now is to follow the example of US and ask UNHRC investigators to go jump in the Beira Lake, taking Ambassadress Sisson with them.

The example set by US, EU and their allies in rejecting UNHRC resolution on human rights justifies any move by Sri Lanka to follow their lead and refuse entry to the UNHRC investigators planning to probe human rights violations. In fact, Sri Lanka, contrary to the condemnation of Atul Keshap, Deputy Assistant Secretary for South Asia, Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs, who bracketed Sri Lanka with Syria, N. Korea and Libya for rejecting UNHRC resolutions, can be quite proud that it is now in the elevated company of US, EU, Norway and other leading democracies. Poor Mr. Keshap! He has been let down by his own State Department. Only the previous week he condemned Sri Lanka for rejecting the UNHRC resolution saying that it is in the deplorable company of Syria, Libya and N. Korea. This week he has to eat crow for breakfast, lunch and dinner after his country rejected UNHRC resolution on human rights.

What is ketchup for the goose must also be ketchup for the gander, eh Mr.Keshap?