Statement by Ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe
at the January 29, 2013
Organizational Meeting of the Human Rights Council
We would like to thank the Human Rights Council President for his hard work and creativity in finding what we hope will be a consensus solution to a very difficult issue facing us today.
The United States believes deeply in the integrity of the Universal Periodic Review and we understand the vital purpose served in providing all member states an opportunity to examine their human rights performance.
The UPR has provided each of us an opportunity for self reflection and engagement with civil society, as well as an opportunity to present our own human rights record to the international community.
The UPR has been a valuable mechanism both because it is universally applicable to all UN member states on equal terms, and because it is conducted in a collaborative and cooperative manner.
The text presented today upholds and protects those principles.
As other states consider this text, we ask that all parties keep in mind that the HRC president has consulted exhaustively with all groups and many individual delegations.
This text reflects his best effort to find common ground and to protect the UPR mechanism going forward.
While each of us could have proposed revisions to the draft decision to move it in a direction preferable to our perspective, we support this proposal as drafted, with no changes, and we urge others to find a way to support the president and the text as presented.
[Note: OM/7 ..”The non-cooperation of a State under Review with the Universal Periodic Review Mechanism” was adopted by the HRC without a vote]