Senate debates

Wednesday, 20 June 2018

Adjournment

United Nations Human Rights Council

7:51 pm

Photo of Fraser AnningFraser Anning (Queensland, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | | Hansard source

This is not my first speech. I rise today to highlight the utter failure that is the United Nations Human Rights Council. This worm-eaten body of foreign despots and failing states has lost all moral legitimacy. As a nation that has not committed human right abuses, we should no longer validate it with our membership. For too long Australia has accepted a Human Rights Council that is a case study in human rights violations. The US has called for reform, yet it has refused. While Australia lacks leadership willing to challenge the situation, America is blessed with decisive leadership. Donald Trump and Ambassador Nikki Haley should be congratulated on their courage.

The 47-member council hosts some of the most savage and despotic nations in the world. Let me name a few members of this group: Afghanistan, Angola, China, Egypt, Pakistan, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Ukraine and Venezuela. Does Australia really want to be partners with some of the worst human rights offenders in the world? Are we comfortable standing shoulder to shoulder with such towering paragons of human rights as China, Saudi Arabia and South Africa?

China continues to kill and oppress its own people as well as the Tibetans, whose country is still illegally occupied. The persecution of Christians is widespread. Churches are forced into hiding due to fear of arrest. The restriction on religious freedoms is completely opposed to Australian and Western values. China has continued to bully its neighbours, seizing and fortifying islands in international waters in the South China Sea and threatening neighbour-states.

Saudi Arabia, a Muslim country well known for its complete lack of respect for women, continues to stone women accused of adultery. It sits on a council with the aim of advancing human rights. Saudi Arabia funds the expansion of radical Islam worldwide.

South Africa voted to remove the right to private property from its constitution in February this year. South Africa should have been removed from the council. The right to private property and its secure ownership is a fundamental right, as is the right to life, in regard to which the South African government seems equally nonplussed. I have highlighted in the past the ongoing targeted racial attacks on white farmers by black racist gangs. These are the very nations the Human Rights Council should be targeting for reform; they should not be in the driving seat controlling the agenda.

While there's been criticism of the council in the past, it has taken real leadership from the United States to highlight the complete hypocrisy of the Human Rights Council. Australia needs to find the courage to join the United States in refusing to grant the UN Human Rights Council the illusion of moral legitimacy. A group that apparently believes it is acceptable to suppress Christianity, spread racial Islamic terrorism and butcher white farmers has zero authority on any moral issue and is an organisation that Australia should not have anything to do with.