ISLAMABAD, May 10: Pakistan expects the newly established UN Human Rights Council to play a pivotal role in preventing defamation of all religions as well as forging cultural and religious harmony across the globe.

This was stated by Foreign Ministry Spokesperson on Wednesday in a formal announcement of Pakistan’s election as a member of the Human Rights Council by the UN General Assembly in New York a day before.

Pakistan bagged one of the 13 seats reserved for the Asian region by securing 149 votes.

“Pakistan also seeks to promote universal respect for all religious, cultural and social values,” the Spokesperson noted.

Recalling that Pakistan had played a constructive role in the negotiations leading to the establishment of the Human Rights Council, the Spokesperson underlined that Pakistan was committed to promote a cooperative and problem-solving approach in this body.

The first session of the Council will be held in Geneva from June 19. “Pakistan’s election reflects the international community’s confidence in Pakistan’s commitment to and efforts for the promotion and protection of human rights nationally and at the international level,” the Spokesperson said and added: “The elections are an affirmation of Pakistan’s important contributions over the years to the work of multilateral human rights forums.”

A coordinated campaign by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs through its missions abroad, particularly Pakistan’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York and Geneva, contributed to Pakistan’s success in this vital election, the FO Spokesperson maintained.

Meanwhile, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva, Ambassador Masood Khan, said in an interview to PTV that the Human Rights Council’s next task was to come up with a balanced agenda that placed equal emphasis on civil and political rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights.

“It is a new beginning. Let us hope that all members of the council will transcend bickering and divisions of the past to work towards a council that would promote and protect human rights all over the world in an impartial and non-selective manner,” he observed.