Two Human Rights Organizations: Suspend Saudi Arabia's Membership in the Human Rights Council

Two leading human rights organizations have called on UN member states to suspend Saudi Arabia's membership in the UN Human Rights Council due to civilian killings in Yemen and domestic repression. According to AFP, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch announced on Wednesday, July 9, that they would lobby at the UN General Assembly for the suspension of Saudi Arabia from the Human Rights Council. Philippe Bolopion, Deputy Director of Human Rights Watch, stated, "Saudi Arabia has violated norms and regulations in recent months and is no longer deserving of a place in the Human Rights Council." Human Rights Watch has accused Riyadh of multiple offenses, including attacks on civilians in the Yemen war, the use of banned cluster bombs, and the blockade of ports to prevent essential goods from entering Yemen. Riyadh leads a coalition of Arab countries formed against Houthi rebels and their allies in Yemen. This coalition also supports Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi, the President of Yemen, in a war that, according to UN estimates, has left over 6,400 dead in the past 15 months. However, Bolopion claims that Saudi Arabia "has gone ahead of all others" and "is committing killings to an extent that no other country can match." Previously, human rights groups had accused Saudi Arabia of using its position as a member of the Human Rights Council to obstruct international investigations into war crimes in Yemen. Riyadh has also pressured Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary-General, leading him to ultimately remove the Saudi-led military coalition from the blacklist of child-killing perpetrators in Yemen. However, Riyadh's policies have not only drawn protests from human rights groups regarding the Yemen war but also its treatment of domestic dissenters. In this context, Amnesty International on Wednesday accused the Saudi government of repressing domestic opponents and executing criminals whose crimes do not warrant the death penalty under international law. According to Richard Bennett, Amnesty International's representative at the UN, all prominent human rights activists in Saudi Arabia have either been imprisoned and threatened to remain silent or have fled the country in the past three years. Saudi Arabia was elected as a member of the UN Human Rights Council three years ago, and now a two-thirds majority of the assembly is required to remove it from the Human Rights Council. The only country that has been removed from the Human Rights Council so far is Libya in 2011 during Muammar Gaddafi's leadership.