Report on the Human Rights Council

The Democracy Coalition Project recently issued a report reviewing the effectiveness of the Human Rights Council. They noted that despite concern about the human rights situation in Iran, no country mandate was established to review the situation there.

This is excerpted from the executive summary of the report:

• 288 resolutions were adopted by the Council since 2006, of which 80 were country-specific resolutions and 73 percent were adopted by consensus.
• Different approaches have been used by the Council to address serious country situations. They include fact-finding missions (Occupied Palestinian Territory, Darfur); monitoring mechanisms (Myanmar, North Korea); the provision of technical as- sistance (Cambodia, Kyrgyzstan); and resolutions that express the concern of the Council (Afghanistan, Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners).
• No new country mandates were established by the Council despite calls by NGOs and states for new mandates to monitor situations in Iran, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Afghanistan. The Council maintained existing special procedures mandates on Myanmar, North Korea, Haiti, Somalia, Cambodia, Burundi, Sudan,nd the Occupied Palestinian Territory; it discontinued the mandates on Belarus, Cuba, Liberia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Darfur.