HUMAN RIGHTS - STATUS OF WEOG CHR ELECTION ROTATION

C O N F I D E N T I A L THE HAGUE 002156

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/30/2014
TAGS: PHUM AORC PREL NL UN
SUBJECT: HUMAN RIGHTS - STATUS OF WEOG CHR ELECTION ROTATION

REF: A. THE HAGUE 1793


B. SECSTATE 172297

C. TRAUB/MEHRA E-MAIL OF 8/25

D. RUBIN/SCHOFER E-MAIL OF 8/25

Classified By: Andrew Schofer, PolCouns, for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (C) Since ref A discussions in mid-July, the Dutch have
failed to make much progress on their offer to restart
negotiations on a WEOG election rotation scheme for the UN
Commission on Human Rights, according to Karel van Kesteren,
MFA Human Rights Director with whom Poloff spoke on August

23. We provided him a copy of the Secretary's letter (ref b)
on August 27 (received via e-mail, ref c). Van Kesteren said
that immediately after the meetings here with IO DAS Lagon
and DRL AA/S Kozak in July, he had e-mailed Canadian MFA
official Marie Gervais-Vidricaire to tell her the USG had
offered one more year to the package (meaning we would sit
out 19 of 21 years). According to van Kesteren, she replied
that if the USG were indeed ready to be more flexible then it
might be possible to try again to reach a compromise. He
took the opportunity to remind us that his solution requires
that the US relinquish three out of 21 years, not just two.


2. (C) Post understands (ref d) that there have been
discussions with Canadian counterpart Gervais-Vidricaire, who
proposes starting discussions with WEOG in New York before
moving on to capitals. Van Kesteren (protect) volunteered
earlier that negotiations would work better if they are not
based in New York at all. "Microstates" (his word) and
smaller states (Luxembourg, and particularly Austria, for
example) make working in the open New York forum impossible,
he said, noting that such states joined hands in the last
round and blocked consensus in an effort to squeeze more
votes for themselves.


3. (C) Comment: We had left it in July with Van Kesteren
to move this initiative ahead, after he seemed enthusiastic
to keep control of a project in which he has already invested
much effort. The lack of progress since July is not
surprising given other pressing UN business and the summer
break, now ending. The Dutch would still prefer to minimize
WEOG meetings in New York, leaving the real brokering to the
Dutch and the Canadians in capitals. Consensus will likely
require getting one WEOG member at a time to sign on, thereby
building momentum.
RUSSEL