Rights groups condemn election of Saudi Arabia to UN’s new women’s rights agency, laud defeat of Iran

PRESS RELEASE

New York, November 10, 2010 – Human rights groups condemned today’s election of Saudi Arabia to the governing board of the UN’s new women’s rights agency.

“It’s morally perverse to reward a country that lashes rape victims, and that systematically subjugates women in every walk of life, with the power to negatively influence the global protection of women’s rights,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of the Geneva-based UN Watch, who is currently visiting New York to monitor today’s vote. For interviews with Mr. Neuer in New York, contact (347) 497-0803.

UN Watch organized a worldwide internet campaign to mobilize public opinion against the candidacies of Iran and Saudi Arabia: www.facebook.com/stopiran. The non-governmental human rights group lauded the democratic governments who pushed to defeat Iran, but Neuer expressed “deep regret that there has been complete silence on the offensive election of the fundamentalist and misogynist regime in Riyadh. The realpolitik of oil should never justify actions that legitmize the discrimination of women.”