Saudi Arabia: Human Rights

Описание: Bobbie Mills: What I can't get my head around is how these public beheadings and this kind of brutal capital punishment is allowed to happen with the world turning a blind eye.

Erin O'Halloran: Well not just turning a blind eye I mean only recently Saudi Arabia was appointed the chair of the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights.

Mills: What?

O'Halloran: Yeah! Not just turning a blind eye but apparently applauding Saudi human rights practices.

Sarah Chayes: I think unfortunately most governments are inconsistent in their application of principles that they claim to cleave to. Saudi Arabia is a particularly glaring example.

O'Halloran: The United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia actually swapped votes for one another in order to make sure that they both got seats on that Council.

Newsnight Anchor: You sit on the Human Rights Council, you sit in that role -
Saudi representative to UN Human Rights Council: - Elected, by the way, elected

Newsnight: So just explain, when you say elected, did the British government support you to get that seat? Were you elected by votes from the British government?

Saudi representative: I don't know the answer to that question. But reciprocal agreements of support are very common in the United Nations.

Newsnight: That happened then, as far as you understand Britain supported you to get the seat

Saudi representative: I don't know, I do not know, the balloting is secret, we don't know who voted for us and who didn't. But we received an overwhelming number of votes in that particular election. More than 150 countries, if I remember correctly, voted in favour of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. So it would not be a surprise if our friends in the United Kingdom, or other countries in the West had voted for us.

O'Halloran: So the United Kingdom is largely responsible for the fact that Saudi Arabia ended up on the Human Rights Council and this is something that Prime Minister does not really have a response to, does not have a convincing answer of why the United Nations mission thought that this was acceptable.

Jon Snow: Now this sounds a bit squalid for one of the most human rights abusing regimes on earth.

Prime Minister David Cameron: Well, Saudi Arabia is a member of the United Nations, but we completely disagree with them -

Snow: Well did would you want them inside the Human Rights -

Cameron: - Well we completely disagree with them about the punishment routines, about the death penalty -

Snow: - Well then why did you do this deal with them? I mean they're not the right sort of people to be doing any sort of a deal on human rights.

Cameron: Well we totally oppose their record in this area.

Snow: Why did we do it?

Cameron: We completely oppose their record.

Snow: No, but why did we do it?

Cameron: I've answered your question.

Saudi representative: One of the worst human rights records in the world, and I say "says who?" Who is the arbitrator? Who is the judge who issues such verdicts? They are unknown organisations or unknown individuals. So that is also a blatant or a flagrant assertion.

O'Halloran: There isn't more of a diplomatic response from the West, mainly because of the close economic relationships between Saudi Arabia and governments like the United States and the United Kingdom.

Press TV: David Cameron just can't escape his Saudi Arabia problem. Every week there seems to be fresh pressure on him to explain Britain's relationship with the Kingdom. The latest outcry comes from Amnesty International who say they have evidence Saudi Arabia has been committing war crimes in Yemen, and it's British arms that are providing the weaponry that the Saudi Kingdom is using.

Special Thanks To:
Andrew Hammond
Erin O'Halloran
Alastair Sloan

For more Subscribe to our Youtube page!
For more news decoded head to our website: https://www.scenesofreason.com
Like us   / scenesofreason  
Follow us:   / scenesofreason