By: Kayhan Int’l Staff Writer
 
Many countries which were forced by the United States and petro-dollar cash to make the immoral decision to back Saudi Arabia’s membership bid on the UN Human Rights Council, particularly on a UN committee on women’s rights, have had a change of heart. The government of Belgium is the latrest:
Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel says he has regrets over a decision by his country to back Saudi Arabia on the UN Committee on Women’s Rights.
While briefing the parliament on Thursday, Prime Minister Michel went on to make clear that the diplomat representing Belgium in the UN was forced into a hasty decision and that he had not properly consulted the government in Brussels.
This is welcome news for the long-suffering people of Yemen. The Saudis and their American masters coerced many UN member states to vote for  the Saudi membership bid on the Council. This means the international civil society has every right to repeal that coerced vote at the General Assembly.
Lest they forget, the UN Charter says the Council is responsible for promoting and protecting human rights around the world. Its seats should be filled by those who defend and adhere to this universal principle; not those like Saudi Arabia which violate it in broad daylight and in contravention to International Human Rights Law.
If that’s not enough, they need to take a good look at numerous reports published by the Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. In these damning reports, they are calling on the UN General Assembly to immediately suspend Saudi Arabia’s membership rights on the Council. They say a two-thirds majority of the General Assembly can and should suspend the membership rights of Saudi Arabia because "it is engaged in gross and systematic violations of human rights.”
And if this is still not enough for them to change course at the UN, there are several other reports by numerous international aid workers and humanitarian agencies in Yemen. In their words, "Saudi Arabia has amassed an appalling record of violations in Yemen while a Human Rights Council member, and has damaged the body’s credibility by its bullying tactics to avoid accountability. UN member countries should stand with Yemeni civilians and suspend Saudi Arabia immediately.”
All this and more should be enough to convince the governments of good conscience like Belgium to voice their current dissatisfaction with the silly idea of giving a Council seat to one of the most brutal regimes, one of the biggest violators of human rights in the world.
It just no longer makes sense to allow this situation, this hypocrisy to continue at the UN. For more than two years, Saudi Arabia has led a brutal war on Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East. U.S.-backed, Saudi-led forces have massacred thousands of civilians in a relentless bombing campaign that has targeted hospitals, funerals, weddings, schools, houses and refugee camps, intentionally destroying food production and exacerbating the mass hunger more than 14 million Yemenis are enduring.
Given that war crimes are still being committed by the Saudis with American support, governments of good conscience in the world should no longer waste time to withdraw support for Riyadh’s membership on the UN Human Rights Council.