US snubs UN meeting on its rights record
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GENEVA: The United States became only the second country on Friday to ever boycott a United Nations review of its human rights record, triggering outrage against the Trump administration over mounting abuses.
Seats were left empty at the world body’s European headquarters in Geneva for the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), which all 193 UN member states have to undergo every four to five years.
Some countries have requested postponements since the UPR began in 2008, but Israel was the only previous no-show in early 2013, although it eventually underwent a delayed review 10 months later.
As the review was set to begin, UN Human Rights Council president Jurg Lauber looked at the empty seats behind the US nameplate and said: “I note that the delegation of the United States is not present in the room.”
The only other country to have boycotted the periodic review was Israel in 2013
The US absence was not a surprise after the Trump administration decided early this year to halt Washington’s cooperation with the rights council, and announced in August it would also boycott the UPR process.
But it still angered a number of US officials and rights groups who had come to Geneva to list their growing concerns since Trump returned to power in January.
‘Shocking’
“It’s shocking that the US decided not to participate,” Carolyn Nash of Amnesty International said, accusing Washington of “walking away from even the impression of caring about the safety and security of people in the US and around the world”.
This is “really an abdication of US multilateral and human rights leadership,” Uzra Zeya, head of Human Rights First, said.
Speaking at one of several events at the UN connected with the aborted US review, she warned the government had created an “unprecedented reprisal environment” with infringements on free speech, government “weaponisation of federal funds” and Trump’s “massive deportation operation”.
Others listed the crackdowns on universities, the media and art institutions, as well as lethal strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and Pacific, among alarming developments.
Larry Krasner, who was re-elected district attorney of Philadelphia earlier this week, said he was not surprised that Trump “wants to escape accountability”.
But he voiced hope the “moral authority” of the people would help “rein in a rough president … who wants to be Adolf Hitler”.
The side events were taking place in a room of the UN’s European headquarters where former US first lady Eleanor Roosevelt helped draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights before its adoption in 1948.
“It’s tragic and deeply ironic that we helped to create the norms as well as this (UPR) process that we are now backing out of,” a former senior US official said.
Need for ‘sunlight’
Many urged the international community to speak out and support their work to hold the US government in check.
“It’s the Human Rights Council, the United Nations system and a community of nations committed to human rights and democracy who can bring necessary sunlight to these abuses,” said Chandra Bhatnagar, head of the American Civil Liberties Union’s southern California branch.
Published in Dawn, November 8th, 2025
