UNITED NATIONS: The United States will announce it is withdrawing from the UN Human Rights Council, which it accuses of bias against Israel, UN officials said on Tuesday.

US Ambassador Nikki Haley will make the announ­cement at a press conference with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Washington at 5pm (2200 GMT).

Take a look: US pulls out of Unesco over ‘anti-Israel’ bias

Haley has repeatedly thr­e­a­tened to quit the Geneva-ba­sed body, established in 2006 to promote and protect hum­an rights worldwide. UN officials privately confirmed they were expecting the US decision to quit the rights body.

Human Rights Watch criticised the move, warning that Washington’s absence at the top UN body would put the onus on other governments to address the world’s most serious rights problems.

US criticism stems from the fact that Israel is the only country with a dedicated agenda item, known as Item 7, at the rights council, me­aning its conduct in the occupied Palestinian territories is discussed at each of the body’s three annual sessions.

The United States refused to join the body when it was created in 2006, when George W. Bush was in the White House and his ambassador to the UN was John Bolton, Trump’s current hawkish and UN-skeptic national security advisor.

It was only after Barack Obama came to power that Washington joined the council in 2009. Since Trump took office, the United States has quit the UN cultural agency Unesco, cut UN funding and announced plans to quit the UN-backed Paris climate agreement.

Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2018