UN Human Rights Council puts abusers in guardian role

"All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights," according to Article 1 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The job of the UN Human Rights Council is to monitor countries' compliance with this fundamental tenet, ensuring that people can live free from persecution, torture and discrimination. 

Several of the countries currently serving as the guardians of global human rights, however, have a poor track record at home — chief among them China, the United Arab Emirates and Eritrea.

In recent years, human rights violations such as reeducation camps, torture and arbitrary arrests, as well as forced labor and suppression of the opposition, have been documented in these countries.

As the number of authoritarian regimes has grown globally, their presence on the Human Rights Council has increased. China, in particular, has exploited this by leaning on allies to vote — or abstain from voting — in favor of its national interests.

Council members becoming less democratic 

In 2023, only 30% of the countries on the Human Rights Council were classified as "free" by the US think tank Freedom House. For its annual Freedom in the World report, the organization examines whether governments provide free elections and meet certain minimum standards for political rights and civil liberties, such as freedom of assembly. A total of 70% of the current council members were classified as "partly free" (such as India) and "not free" (Sudan and other countries). 

Each year, the Human Rights Council elects one-third of its 47 members to three-year terms according to fixed geographic quotas based on the number of UN countries per region: The Asia-Pacific and Africa groups have 13 members each, the Western Europe and North America group has seven, Eastern Europe has six, and the Latin America and Caribbean group has eight. 

Elections for terms running from 2024 through 2026 are anticipated in October. The candidates include Cuba, Kuwait and Russia, which was removed from the council in 2022 following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Researchers from organizations such as Freedom House, V-Dem and Democracy Matrix attempt to quantify members' adherence to minimum international humanitarian standards such as guarantees for civil liberties and compliance with prohibitions on torture. 

The human rights score of the countries that have been sent to the council since its inception in 2006 has declined considerably. In 2023, it is only just above the historic low of 2022.

"This unwelcome development is not only evident in the council but worldwide," said Silke Voss-Kyeck, a research fellow at the German Institute for Human Rights. "Many members are governed in an authoritarian and dictatorial manner." Compliance with human rights obligations seldom plays a role in the election of council members, she said.

'China has Africa in its pocket'

One consequence of the rise of autocratic regimes is that Human Rights Council votes often pit blocs against each other, said Yaqiu Wang, senior researcher on China at Human Rights Watch. Unlike the Cold War, however, the driving factor here is not a shared ideology, she said. 

"It's more interest-based," said Wang. Pakistan, for example, often votes with China because economic ties are strong and Pakistan sees China as an ally against an adversarial India. "It's like a trade: 'If you vote with me, I will go with you.'" 

In addition to Asian countries, Wang said, China has especially relied on African governments for support on the Human Rights Council. "I don't think any particular country has stood up to China — except Somalia, which recently rejected demands," Wang said, referring to the Horn of Africa country's vote for a 2022 resolution that addressed human rights abuses in reeducation camps in Xinjiang. "China has Africa in its pocket."

A unifying element, Wang said, is a rejection of Western dominance. "There's a history of Chinese-African solidarity," Wang said, "an alliance against the Western imperialism." China is building on that — and on economic interdependencies. 

Cultivating unlikely alliances 

China has had less success bringing Latin American governments under its sway. Countries such as Costa Rica are economically more self-sufficient than many African nations. Moreover, South American governments are more democratic, according to the Freedom House Global Freedom Score, and therefore less susceptible to China's influence.

Unlike in many African countries with authoritarian governments, for example, it's not enough to "ensnare" the elites, Wang said. That's because in democracies elites are often replaced through elections.

Unlike the UN Security Council, which is unable to act on the war in Ukraine because Russia has exercised its veto power on votes to address the conflict, the Human Rights Council is not blocked.

Resolutions reprimanding specific countries for human rights violations have increased since the council's founding in 2006. Country-specific resolutions are intended to pressure the respective governments to address the issues or face additional loss of reputation, sparking heated debates among members of the Human Rights Council.

The countries most often mentioned in resolutions brought before the Human Rights Council are Syria, Congo, Israel, Mali, Myanmar, Sudan and Yemen. Despite its own well-documented human rights abuses, China has not been on the losing end of a country-specific resolution. So far, there has only been one such effort: A resolution to condemn the UN-documented reeducation camps for Uyghur Muslims in China's western Xinjiang region failed in 2022, with 17 votes for, 11 abstentions and 19 votes against — including by Indonesia, Pakistan, Namibia and China itself.

'China goes ballistic after the vote'

Wang said China used not-so-subtle coercion to maintain support in the Human Rights Council. "It is intimidating," she said. "It threatens veiled. Before a vote, it's like a Chinese diplomat in another country, let's say Chile, just to give an example, he tells Chile: 'You know, you have to vote this way. Otherwise, you don't want to undermine the economic ties between Chile and China, right?'" Should a country not comply with such demands, Wang said, "China goes ballistic after the vote."

Voss-Kyeck confirmed that China's government uses pressure to get what it wants. "High Commission staff and diplomats are being threatened — personally, but also politically," she said. "It's all well-documented. People are getting evening phone calls to private numbers." No country, she said, is as aggressive as China in attempting to avoid criticism.

The efforts of China and its allies to prevent critical resolutions are evidence of their desire to avoid censure by the council. Only Russia has given up on trying to evade condemnation. "They've become such an outsider," Voss-Kyeck said. "They don't care about the council."

Though countries such as China are able to use alliances to diminish the Human Rights Council's oversight efforts, the work of the UN body is important, Voss-Kyeck said, and its "impact is great." One example is its importance to domestic civil society movements and Indigenous groups.

"That doesn't exist in any UN body: that Indigenous people are allowed in the room, that they have the right to speak, to make statements," said Voss-Kyeck. "That's a thorn in the side of many states."

Limited options for reforming Human Rights Council

Despite the stated purpose of the council, the body's current structure prevents it from being effective in the fight against human rights violations. Too often, countries are both the defendants and judges in the cases of their own violations — and they have little interest in judging themselves.

Though critics of the council agree that changes are needed to restore the body to its intended purpose, many have long been skeptical about specific proposals — such as limiting membership to countries that have ratified certain human rights treaties. "Of course, you can make a court only by the good guys, who then judge the bad guys," said Voss-Kyeck. "But the question is: What effect does that then still have on the 'bad guys'? And who decides who are the bad guys, who are the good guys?" 

Wang also worries that making changes to the structure of the Human Rights Council could ultimately weaken the body. "Reforming the HRC can be risky," she said, "given we do not know the outcome of putting it all back on the negotiation table." 

Edited by: Milan Gagnon, Peter Hille & Gianna Grün

For data, code and methodology behind this analysis, see this repository. You can find more data-driven stories by DW here.