HRW Files Complaint with UN Human Rights Council

The Amsterdam News reported on Human Rights Watch’s complaint with the Human Rights Council.   “When one thinks of complaints to the United Nations Human Rights Council, over human rights, one almost always assumes the accused nations are dictatorial regimes carrying out xenophobic agendas.” 

Now the complaint of human rights violations is filed against the United States, which withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council last year.  HRW alleges that the “United States has failed to implement recommendations it agreed to in its 2015 Universal Periodic Review of protection of human rights in the domestic sphere reviews, including those involving treatment of immigrants, criminal justice and policing, access to health care, women’s rights and privacy.” In 2015 the United States agreed to implement UN recommendations that followed the 2015 Periodic Review. 

As to immigration, the most immediate concern, the petition, among its recommendations, request that the Council recommend that the US:

    Stop separating child migrants from their family members except where a trained child welfare     professional has determined separation is in the child’s best interest;

    End the Migrant Protection Protocols program and ensure broad access to US asylum procedures;

    Guarantee access to adequate medical care for all detained immigrants and ensure effective and       appropriate oversight, including public release of investigations into detainee deaths;

    End the use of expedited removal procedures at the border and in the interior of the country.

While the recommendations are unlikely to prompt any change in US policy, the petition is important for documenting US human rights failures.  And to document resistance.