Russia vows to support UN human rights activity

Russia considered the U.N. Human Rights Council (UNHRC) a highly important body and would support its work, the Foreign Ministry said Wednesday. On Tuesday, U.N. General Assembly voted to co-opt Russia into the UNHRC for a three-year term by 176 votes out of 192 U.N. member states present at a secret ballot. "This is sound evidence that the international community supports our country's policy of strengthening the collective base of the U.N. work in encouraging and protection of the human rights," the ministry said in a statement. The UNHRC, based in Switzerland's Geneva, was set up by the U.N. General Assembly on March 15, 2006 to replace and build upon the achievements of the 60-year-old Commission on Human Rights. The ministry said Russia had paid special attention to the work of the UNHRC, which it described as "a key U.N. tool of human rights protection." Russia believed the base of the 47-member Council's work must be equal cooperation of all states, with respect to their sovereignty and taking into account their cultural and historical differences, it said. Moscow vowed to uphold constructive cooperation with the U.N. human rights mechanisms and with the U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights in particular, the ministry said. Other new UNHRC members include China, Algeria, Cuba, France, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Britain and Vietnam. The first session of the newly elected UNHRC is planned for March 2014.