US fails to block torture treaty

WORRIED about allowing inspectors to visit state prisons and jailed terror suspects, the United States tried, but failed, to block a UN vote on a plan to enforce a treaty on torture.

The protocol to the 1989 treaty was passed on Wednesday by a vote of 35-8 with 10 abstentions in the UN Economic and Social Council. The US abstained.

A US proposal to reopen 10 years of negotiations on the document was voted down 29-15, with the rest abstaining, amid wide criticism of the US stance by European and Latin American allies.

The US argued that language in the protocol could allow for international and independent visits to US prisons and to terror suspects being held by its military at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.

Such inspections are unlikely, because if the US does not adopt the protocol, it will not be bound by its tenets.

Denmark, which read a statement on behalf of the EU, accused the US of intentionally stalling in order to kill the proposal. Costa Rica, which sponsored the plan, urged all delegations to vote against the American request.

Human rights advocates and diplomats argued that the protocol was essential to enforce the international convention on torture passed 13 years ago and since ratified by about 130 countries, including the US.

Countries are supposed to enforce the convention on their own, but rights groups argue that that isn’t working everywhere. People were tortured or ill-treated by authorities in 111 countries last year, according to an Amnesty International report.

Technically, the protocol seeks visits to prisons as a way to help enforce the anti-torture convention, which the US has ratified.

But the US said elements of the plan were incompatible with its constitution. Privately, US diplomats said allowing outside observers into state prisons would infringe on states’ rights.

“The United States greatly regrets being put in the position of abstaining,” US Ambassador Sichan Siv said after the debate.

The protocol was widely supported among Western European and Latin American countries. The US was supported by some countries accused by Amnesty International of torture, including Nigeria and Iran.

Support also came from Japan, China, Cuba, Cyprus, India, Pakistan and Egypt.

The text was accepted in an April vote by the Human Rights Commission in Geneva. The US didn’t participate in that vote because it lost its seat on the commission last year.

The protocol now moves to the General Assembly, where it would need to be approved by a majority of the 190 member states. Then it will require 20 ratifications before it can go into force.

Activists had feared that if the US succeeded in reopening the negotiations it would mean a “death sentence” for the protocol.

Joanna Weschler of Human Rights Watch, said: “This is actually a great vote because the US tried and failed.”

Moves by the Bush administration to back out of the anti-torture plan, a protocol on climate control and talks on biological weapons have greatly frustrated its relationships at the UN.