October 3, 2006

Iran's idea of reforming the UN's foremost human rights body: let the members of the Council elect all the "independent" individuals charged with investigating and reporting on human rights situations ("mandate holders"). This way they will be beholden to the very states they are supposed to objectively review. Iran also wishes to abolish country-specific mandates (except in the case of Israel), in order to avoid condemnation on its own human rights abuses.