Thailand Chosen to Head UN Human Rights Council

(photo credit: Prachatai on Flickr)

No matter which government we have in power, human rights remain essentially an alien concept in Thailand. The Rohingya affairs, the drug war, the perpetual emergency decree – you name it. And yet things have taken a strange, or should I say depressing, turn when the country was elected as president of the UN Human Rights Council (see here). Yes you heard it right. A country with serious human rights problems like Thailand now gets to chair a global agency in charge of promoting civil liberties and scrutinising human rights situation worldwide!

The Nation was quick to portray this as a significant achievement of the Abhisit administration:

Kudos must go to Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya, who did not budge when they were urged by international and Thai human rights groups to withdraw from bidding for a seat at the Human Rights Council.

The result was telling. Thailand came in second with 182 votes after the Maldives (185), despite the political crisis that was brewing on the streets of Bangkok. The result indicates the country’s diplomatic and human rights credentials. [...]

However, Pokpong Lawansiri in The Guardian provides an illuminating insight into what actually happened during the selection process (emphasis added):

Can this election of the council’s presidency be viewed as a realistic reflection of Thailand’s human rights standards?

The council was set up in 2006 to replace the contentiously debated UN commission on human rights. The election of the presidency is done on a rotating basis from five regional groups: Latin America and Caribbean, eastern Europe, Africa, western Europe and other states, and Asia. Since 2006, representatives of all four regional groups have served as presidents to the council, with the exception of Asia.

Based on this, Thailand was not competing against countries with better recognised human rights records such as those governments of Switzerland or Norway. Instead, Thailand was competing against countries in Asia, namely Bangladesh, Kyrgyzstan and Maldives – all of which are criticised by rights watchdogs as human rights violators.

[...]

Maldives, a relatively young democracy, has only just emerged from a history of military coups and held its first democratic election in 2008. The country was ruled by Maumoon Gayoom, who denied free and fair elections, for 20 years. Being a small country, the Maldives lacked the political leverage required to convince member states of their leadership.

This is how the council was left with Thailand. As chair of the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2009, Thailand had strong support from the member states in addition to many other states that could be provided by its ambassador.

Interestingly, one thing that The Nation and Pokpong seem to agree on is that this new privilege will also increase the pressure on the Thai state to do more to protect civil liberties and rectify existing human rights violations in the country. If pressures from rights groups around the world have not been strong enough for the government to act, now it has the added burden of chairing a UN body to live up to.

Related posts (automatically generated):

1. Petition to Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats, Regarding the Violence in Thailand
2. Thailand’s Continued Unrest: Implications on the Region
3. When and When Not to Criticise the ‘Foreigners’
4. The Economist: Collapse of Talks Was ‘Tragic’
5. “When Abhisit Looks in the Mirror, He Will See Thaksin.”