South Africa - UN
South African judge named to UN human rights top job
Thursday 24 July 2008
UN General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon has chosen International Criminal Court judge and former anti-apartheid activist Navanethem Pillay to succeed Canada's Louise Arbour as high commissioner for human rights.
Thursday 24 July 2008
By AFP (text)UN chief Ban Ki-moon has named South African judge Navanethem Pillay to succeed Louise Arbour as high commissioner for human rights.
"It is now up to the (192-member) General Assembly to approve" the choice of Pillay, who currently serves as an appeals chamber judge on the International Criminal Court (ICC), spokeswoman Michele Montas told AFP.
Diplomats said the Assembly was expected to meet next Monday to endorse Ban's choice.
Pillay, who has been with the ICC since 2003, was picked from a short list that also included prominent Pakistani lawyer and human rights activist Hila Jilani and Argentine human rights lawyer Juan Mendez, according to diplomats and UN officials.
The highly respected South African jurist, who was born in 1941 and is of Tamil descent, previously served as a judge of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. In that capacity, she played a key role in landmark decisions defining rape as an institutionalized weapon of war and a crime of genocide.
In 1967, she became the first woman to set up a law practice in South Africa's KwaZulu-Natal Province, and the first woman of color to serve in the High Court in the country.
The US-educated Pillay is to take over from Arbour, a 61-year-old Canadian jurist, who stepped down at the end of June after completing a four-year mandate.
Arbour announced in March that she would not renew her mandate due to personal reasons, after a period that saw her office released damning reports on countries ranging from the United States to Zimbabwe to Sudan.
Pour aller plus loin
Pour aller plus loin
24/07/2008 22:58:32 Alert a moderator
UN Human Righs will be used as a political tool by the US
By Jean-Christophe Nizeyimana - Netherlands/Wilnis
The political nature of the this UN organ is obvious: To protect RPF criminals and the Rwanda Top Nazi and heivyweight criminal Paul Kagame the world has ever hosted after the German Top Nazi Adolf Hitler. This lady shouldn't be chosen for having covered Paul Kagame's crimes. Advised by Hilary Clinton the US first lady to add the rape crime to the presumably Hutu ethnic members detained in Arusha, Pillay has been used to implement Bill Clinton and Paul kagame's scenario about the 1994 tragedy. There is no denying that Bill Clinton, Paul Kagame's best friend has refused to send US and UN troops to Kigali to stop bloodsheds with the only intention : The seisure of power in Rwanda by RPF criminals has been planded with the Rwanda genocide. I would remind readers that up to date, there no one RPF criminals who has been indicted unless more than 8 millions of Hutus and Congolese people were either assassinated and or massacred during the peirod of 1990-1994 and 1995 with Kibeho mass-mureder and 1996-1998 with the mega massacres of Hutu refugees covered by Sadako Ogata granted by the Rwanda Top Nazi Paul Kagame for her role played during the 1996-1998 genocide and gendercide. The key to understanding this is the relationship between the both women Louise Arbour and Pillay as they played a key role in protecting RPF war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes of genocide and in landmark decisions defining rape as an institutionalized weapon of war against Hutus and a crime of genocide institutionalized against the Hutu community members. So this woman has been used and will be used as a tool by UK and US leaders to escape accountability vis-à-vis cirmes of the Rwanda genocide with paul kagame the then mastermind and Architect of the Rwanda genocide.
Nothing but Human rights.
Jean-Christophe, Libre Penseur