William Korey, Ph.D., acclaimed human rights expert and Sovietologist, served as the director of B’nai B’rith International’s United Nations office from 1960 through 1964 and director of policy research from 1977 to 1986. Korey’s participation was crucial to the evolution of events that grew from two milestone days in the U.N.’s humanitarian legacy. In this essay, this leading specialist and authority on human rights treaties examines what has happened in the years following these monumental events.

The U.N. Human Rights Legacy
By William Korey, Ph.D.

Almost 60 years ago, the United Nations gave birth to two revolutionary human rights instruments, with the hope of ending forever the possibilities of horrors reminiscent of the Nazi Holocaust. On December 9, 1948, the U.N. General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. One day later, the same assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; that date, December 10, is commemorated annually as Human Rights Day.

The General Assembly unanimously adopted the genocide treaty during a meeting in Paris at the Palais de Chaillot. Two years in the works, with the United States playing a leading role, the treaty was designed to prevent annihilation of any ethnic, racial, or religious group. It was the first international law of its kind. As Herbert V. Evatt, Australia’s minister of external affairs, explained: “In this field relating to the sacred right of existence of human groups, we are proclaiming today the supremacy of international law—once and for all.”

The excitement was palpable in the grand and impressive Palais. The diplomats and the media knew that a single individual had made the event possible: a Polish-Jewish international lawyer named Raphael Lemkin. From the very name of the crime—“genocide,” a word which he invented—to the text of the treaty, to the lobbying that brought it into reality, it was all Lemkin.

The next day, December 10, at 3 a.m., the exhausted delegates adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by a vote of 48 to 0, with eight abstentions—mainly the Soviet bloc countries—and two absentees. The declaration was comprised of 20 articles concerning political, economic, and social rights—all reflecting traditional democratic aspirations—and was hailed by many as the “Magna Carta of Mankind.”

Eleanor Roosevelt, chairman of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, guided the deliberations. When the voting ended, the delegates rose as one to give her a standing ovation. It was a rare tribute in U.N. annals.

Unlike the genocide convention, the human rights declaration was not a legally binding treaty, and therefore not open to ratification by individual countries. Rather, it was seen as “a standard of achievement”—a banner goal to which countries might aspire. The human rights commission was perceived as the instrument that would chastise countries for abuses or encourage them to comply with the declaration.

However, from the beginning, the Universal Declaration was interpreted as more than a mere standard. It was incorporated into the constitutions of many African states and in the Caribbean, as well as Cyprus. National courts made reference to it in legal decisions and, in 1960, the Soviet Union, an original abstainer, declared that the Universal Declaration was a statement of law.

That same year, after many new independent states entered the U.N., a revised Declaration on Colonialism was approved by a vote of 97 to 0. The climax of the formal interpretation of the Universal Declaration came in March 1968 at a meeting in Montreal of leading world authorities on human rights. The assemblage stated that “the Universal Declaration of Human Rights constituted an authoritative interpretation of the [U.N.] Charter of the highest order and over the years has become part of customary international law.”

But how would the provisions of the Universal Declaration come to be known to masses of people in totalitarian and authoritarian regimes, where the sources of information and documentation were shut off? This was—and is even today—a crucial question.

Roosevelt offered an insightful answer just before the declaration was voted on, telling reporters that a “curious grapevine would carry the words and significance of the declaration to all peoples, even to those cut off by censors of information.”

What she was referring to were non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that might have access to facts about oppression and repression. Roosevelt might have been anticipating that, during the 1960s, B’nai B’rith would help in bringing to Soviet Jews information about Article 13(b) of the Universal Declaration, which spelled out the right of everyone to leave any country, including his or her own. Soviet Jews responded vigorously, demanding that their country’s government permit emigration.

Roosevelt was hardly alone in shaping the provisions of the Universal Declaration. Her commission included brilliant advocates of human rights: René Cassin of France, who would later become a Nobel Peace Prize winner; Charles Malik, the existentialist philosopher from Lebanon; the perceptive and analytical Hernan Santa Cruz of Chile; and several other highly regarded authorities.

The contrast with today’s Human Rights Council, the current outgrowth of the original commission, is staggering. More often than not, members are bureaucrats of limited—and questionable—human rights outlook.

One man’s role
As for Lemkin, he was a sole performer from the beginning: He lobbied everyone at the U.N., mastered every required procedure, and won support from all members.

He also had the support of President Harry S. Truman, but unfortunately not of U.S. lawmakers. When Truman sent the genocide treaty to the Senate, the legislators failed to ratify it.

Meanwhile, the Korean War of 1950 ushered in a new wave of xenophobic nationalism, virulent anti-communism, and hysterical isolationism. Closed sessions of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee were characterized by hostile personal attacks on Lemkin, noting especially his Jewishness and foreign accent.

Lemkin would be horror-struck when Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, on behalf of the Dwight Eisenhower administration, which succeeded Truman’s, promised a Senate panel in April 1953 that the United States would not support ratification of any human rights treaty.

Lemkin died in 1959, but his recognition of the critical importance of U.S. ratification—to truly make the treaty effective—would prove to be prophetic.

Genocidal episodes were rampant in subsequent decades, while the response record of the international community was zero. During the 1960s, there were mass killings of Ibos in Biafra, Nigeria; massacres of Chinese in Indonesia; and the destruction of Acholi Christians in Uganda by Idi Amin.

Little was done.

In the 1970s, mass murder of Bengalis in East Pakistan failed to win significant U.N. attention, although India did come to the assistance of the Bengalis, which led to the creation of the independent Bangladesh. In 1972, the Tutsi rulers of Burundi in Africa engaged in massive slaughter of Hutus. The number killed was a quarter of a million.
Again, the atrocities were greeted with near silence.

That same decade, there was the mass murder of Cambodians, which led to what became known as “The Killing Fields,” in which the Communist Khmer Rouge regime slaughtered some 1.8 million Buddhists, ethnic Vietnamese, Chinese, and large numbers of native Cambodians. Again, little reaction came from the world community or the U.N. Equally stunning a decade later was the international quiet following the gas poisoning of 182,000 Kurds by Iraq in 1987–’88.

BBI takes action
After Lemkin’s death, NGOs took up his aspiration. For B’nai B’rith, it became a central cause: The organization published a dozen op-ed pieces and articles in major journals throughout the country about the need for U.S. ratification of the genocide treaty.

B’nai B’rith also sponsored an exhibit of Lemkin’s papers at the New York Public Library in December 1983. The opening was marked with addresses by the organization’s then-president, Gerald Kraft; New York Mayor Ed Koch; and officials of the U.N. The event received prominent coverage in the New York Times.

The high point in the B’nai B’rith response and resulting initiative came in September 1984, at its convention in Washington, D.C. President Reagan, running for a second term, addressed the gathering and called for ratification of the genocide treaty. At a subsequent news conference, Reagan promised action—a commitment that made the front pages of leading newspapers.

Reagan proved good as his word as the Senate ratified the treaty in 1988. On November 4 of that year, with BBI representatives on hand, the president signed the legislation at a special ceremony in Chicago.

Reagan’s remarks at the event are historic. Lauding Lemkin’s extraordinary achievement, the president said: “We finally close the circle today. I am delighted to fulfill the promise made by Harry Truman to all the people of the world—and especially the Jewish people.”

It was almost 40 years after the U.N. had adopted Lemkin’s treaty. Its ratification gave the United States the legitimacy to use military clout to halt “ethnic cleansing” in Bosnia and Kosovo.

Contemporary concerns remain
Yet today, regrettably, genocide is still part of the international landscape. Since 2004, Sudan’s regime has targeted the ethnic Muslims of Darfur for destruction. More than 200,000 have been killed by the government-supported janjaweed, while another 2.5 million have been forced to flee their homes.

A U.N. commission of inquiry dismayingly concluded that, while destruction of Darfurians’ farmland and cattle constituted “gross violations of human rights,” Sudan had “not pursued a policy of genocide.”

While the commission avoided the charge of genocide, the U.S. Department of State, as early as the fall of 2004, had no such hesitancy. Its team of investigators found a “consistent and widespread pattern of atrocities” conducted against Darfur, which led then-Secretary of State Colin Powell to testify before a Senate panel and publicly accuse Sudan of genocide. This remains the official position of the U.S. government.

The United States has supported proposals at the U.N. Security Council for the enlargement of the small African Union force of 7,000 by 20,000 more soldiers. However, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has insisted that the bulk come from African countries—a virtually impossible goal.

With support from some elements in the U.N., al-Bashir has avoided attempts to halt the genocide and, if anything, has exacerbated the problem. At the beginning of 2008, he appointed Sheik Musa Hilal, who gained notoriety for organizing and leading the janjaweed militias in their rampages against Darfur, as a senior government advisor.
When the appointment of Hilal was raised at foreign news conferences, al-Bashir stated that his appointee had “contributed greatly to stability and security in the [Darfur] region.”

President Bush two years ago declared that “the vulnerable people of Darfur deserve more than sympathy.” He promised that America “will not turn away from this tragedy.” It remains to be seen whether this commitment, which clearly reflected the thinking of Lemkin, Truman, and Reagan, will be kept.

The so-called ‘Human Rights’ Council
If Lemkin’s expectations have turned to ashes, Roosevelt’s hopes for the Commission on Human Rights she chaired (which name was changed to the Human Rights Council in 2006) have become a mockery.

In recent years, council membership could hardly be described as democratic or human rights-oriented. In 2004, Freedom House, an organization that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, said a large number of members did not have governments that could be considered “free.”

Tellingly, blatant undemocratic governments in countries like Saudi Arabia, Libya, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Myanmar, and Belarus have rarely, if ever, been subjected to any form of criticism by the commission.

In sharp contrast, Israel has been a constant target of this body and other U.N. institutions. A large number of all U.N. resolutions on human rights issues have attacked Israel in especially hostile terms. This led a high-level panel of leading statesmen, called together in 2004 by then-U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, to harshly criticize the commission as maintaining a “double standard in addressing human rights concerns.” The commission’s “eroding credibility,” said the panel, leads to such a “legitimacy deficit” that it cannot but cast “doubts on the overall reputation of the United Nations.”

Annan may have strongly welcomed the panel’s report, but his effort at reform came to utter failure. While the commission’s name was changed to the Human Rights Council, the outlook of its membership has not: Recent estimates say only 25 member countries are considered “free,” while 22 are either “not free” or “partly free.”
As votes continue to be allocated on a distinctively regional basis, Asia and Africa have a 26-vote majority, even when the bulk of the countries in these regions lack democracy. In contrast, North America, Latin America, and Europe, which contain far more egalitarian countries, are assigned 21 votes. Among the council’s membership are several countries singled out by Freedom House as major abusers of human rights.

And, once again, Israel has been subjected to hostile resolutions by the council—a total of close to 15. No other country has been singled out. Last year, the Wall Street Journal denounced the council’s “fraudulence,” observing that it “discharges obfuscation like a squid and its ink.”

Roosevelt, Lemkin, and their colleagues must be turning over in their graves. The hope is that the 60th year anniversaries of these two critical instruments will bring about a renewed call to revive their purposes: the safeguarding of worldwide human rights.