U.S. Continues Attempts to Blackmail Countries on the UN Human Rights Commission

The annual United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) meeting is now halfway through its scheduled six weeks of deliberations in Geneva. The U.S. is an outsider this year, having been voted out last year for the first time in the UNHRC's 47-year history. One of the main reasons the U.S. lost its seat was its bullying and harassment of other nations in order to attempt to achieve its own agenda. One of the items the U.S. has repeatedly tried to bring forth at the UNHRC is a resolution condemning Cuba for alleged human rights violations. The U.S. has not let its absence from the Commission stop it in this pursuit this year, but it has not yet succeeded in lining up a sponsor. In the months leading up to the meeting, the U.S. increased its pressure on Latin American countries, as well as on EU members, to sponsor the anti-Cuba resolution. It had been desperately trying to find a new sponsor given that the Czech government, which sponsored the resolution for the previous three years on behalf of the U.S., was discredited internationally for its role and has therefore refused to be the sponsor this year. A Czech delegation was recently sent to various Latin American countries to try to ensure support. However, Mexico, Chile, Brazil, Venezuela and Ecuador have already made it very clear that they will have nothing to do with any anti-Cuba resolution.

The U.S. has used its tried-and-true methods of economic and political blackmail to try to achieve its end. It is reported that the U.S. has been circulating a document in several Latin American capitals urging a new resolution, claiming that not to do so would indicate an abandonment of "democratic dissidents" in Cuba. According to reports, this was one of the items on the agenda of President Bush's visits to El Salvador and Peru on March 23 and 24.

The U.S. also applied pressure on European Union members to give up their seats on the UNHRC, thus creating an opening for the U.S. to regain its place. The U.S. ambassador to the UN also met with Latin American ambassadors last month towards this end, telling them that his job depended on his getting back the U.S. seat on the Commission.

On March 26, Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque spoke at the UNHRC meeting, saying that any Latin American country that gives in to U.S. pressure on this question would be acting out of lack of courage to stand up to Washington rather than any real concern about the situation in Cuba.