WIESENTHAL CENTER DENOUNCESCONTROVERSIAL APPOINTMENT TO UN HUMAN RIGHTS BODY
The Simon Wiesenthal Center today denounced the election of Swiss writer Jean Ziegler as one of 18 “expert” counselors to theUnited Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva. Ziegler in the past has not only praised dictators as Libya’s Ghaddafi, Zimbabwe’s Mugabe and North Korea’s Kim IlSung, but also notorious Holocaust denier Roger Gaurady whom he called, “one of the leading thinkers of our time.”
"Ziegler's election represents everything wrong and inherently biased and broken about the UNHRC,” said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Wiesenthal Center.“Today the forces of extremism in the Middle East feel further empowered by a person who has given them a moral free pass to use terror against Israelis,” he added.
Also elected to the Council was Robert Falk, a professor emeritus from Princeton who has compared Israel’s treatment of Palestinians to the Holocaust.
For more information, please contact the Center’s Public Relations Department, 310-533-9036.
