DEMARCHE TO EU TO LOBBY FOR SUPPORT FOR UN HUMAN

UNCLAS THE HAGUE 003273 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: NL PHUM PREL SUBJECT: DEMARCHE TO EU TO LOBBY FOR SUPPORT FOR UN HUMAN RIGHTS RESOLUTIONS IN PLENARY REF: SECSTATE 266582 On December 16 Poloff shared reftel points with Guillaume Teerling and Sonja van der Meer (MFA, Human Rights office), who confirmed that Dutch FM Bot had dispatched a personal letter to colleagues worldwide urging their support for UNGA human rights resolutions on Iran and Turkmenistan. According to van der Meer, the Dutch are focusing on former "abstainers." She characterized the 59 responses returned by Dutch embassies so far as "not having achieved much of anything new, as they came from countries whose positions were known." She felt the Dutch demarche had the benefit of "letting everyone know where we stand." She counted ten abstentions on no action motions, 20 opposing them, and two favoring them. She expected the Africa group to support no action motions, while she saw some gains among GRULAC, but they "are being very careful" about revealing their positions. RUSSEL