MCLC: UN panel urges free elections in HK (1)

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UN panel urges free elections in HK (1)
Magnus Fiskesjö (nf42 at cornell.edu)
A correction of the precise identity of the UN committee that recommended China should grant true universal suffrage to Hong Kong:
There is no Chinese member of the United Nations Human Rights Committee, which recommended China should grant true universal suffrage to Hong Kong (see below). This committee is “the body of independent experts that monitors implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights by its State parties” and has 18 members, who are human rights experts and “are elected for a term of four years by States parties” (http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CCPR/Pages/CCPRIndex.aspx).
– But there IS a Chinese member of the Human Rights Council which is composed of states’ parties (http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/Pages/HRCIndex.aspx), and which has not pronounced itself on the HK issue. This Council is, in turn, itself advised by a Human Rights Council Advisory Committee ALSO composed of 18 experts (http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/AdvisoryCommittee/Pages/HRCACIndex.aspx), including one Chinese. Neither of these two bodies have pronounced on the issue.
The core of the UN system is of course its member states, who can overrule everything, but the UN also has attached independent bodies like the United Nations Human Rights Committee. Someone with better knowledge of the UN system might expand on the flora of committees.
— On this news, see too:
http://chinascope.org/main/content/view/6727/106/
BBC Chinese: UN Human Rights Committee Called for Universal Suffrage in HK
Written by RWZ and AEF
BBC Chinese recently reported that the United Nations Human Rights Committee officially called for the protection of universal suffrage in Hong Kong’s political system. The committee has a working group that includes 18 independent experts who monitor the implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Hong Kong signed. All 18 members agreed to the Committee’s position. The UN Committee expressed the belief that it is crucial to protect universal suffrage, especially for the right to vote and the right to establish candidacy. Over the past month, tens of thousands of Hong Kong residents took to the streets to protest Beijing allowing only yes-men to become candidates for the head of the Hong Kong government. A member of the working group, French judge Christine Chanet, said that the Committee does not want to see a filtering mechanism for candidacy. China signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1998 as well.
Source: BBC Chinese, October 23, 2014
www.bbc.co.uk/zhongwen/simp/china/2014/10/141023_un_human_rights_hk
Last Updated ( Tuesday, 28 October 2014 )
by denton.2 at osu.edu on October 29, 2014
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