Rejecting obstructionism

Despite John Bolton's best efforts to make sure that any U.N. reform would occur on the U.S.' terms or not at all, the U.N. has agreed to the structure for a new human rights body. And now that it can't keep the council out of existence, even the U.S. plans to play along:

UN member states ignored U.S. opposition and overwhelmingly approved a new Human Rights Council on Wednesday, attempting to strengthen the world body's machinery to deal with major human rights offenders.

The vote in the 191-member General Assembly was 170 in favour, with four against, and three abstentions...

U.S. officials said Washington nonetheless will give its financial backing to the new council and seek a seat on it.

We'll see how long it takes before the U.S. begins actively undermining the new council as it did the previous one. It seems all too likely that ew attacks will start the earlier of whenever the U.S.' actions come under any scrutiny, or whenever the U.S. decides that not enough of the seats are held by itself and its allies.

But it's still a relief to see that the U.N. isn't allowing itself to be paralyzed by the U.S.' unwillingness to work toward consensus solutions. Moreover, if the Council serves as an effective enough example of a reform brought about despite the U.S.' objections, then future reforms may be based all the more on global needs rather than U.S. demands. And at best, the U.S. may even be forced to start bringing a more reasonable position to the table.