Everyone is asking how did this happen and what happens now. Speculation about why the United States lost its seat on the U.N. Human Rights Commission centred quickly on anonymous quotes from European diplomats that it was payback for Bush's unilateral renunciation of the Kyoto Protocol on global warming and for his insistence that the decades-old framework of arms control be swept aside for his planned missile defence shield. The same reasons were cited for Washington losing its seat on the U.N.'s International Narcotics Control Board, which oversees legal and illegal trade in drugs. The votes, in which the United States lost to European candidates, are also seen as a harbinger of a rising European Union that could act as a competing influence to Washington on any number of global issues. That opinion was echoed by officials in former president Bill Clinton's administration who were all too willing to criticize the new directions of Bush's foreign policy.
People are concerned about several unilateral moves the United States has taken recently.
Koh cited the Bush administration's opposition at a recent Human Rights Commission session to resolutions supporting low-cost medications for HIV and AIDS patients, acknowledging a human right to adequate food and placing a moratorium on the death penalty. Congressional reaction reflected the distrust many lawmakers hold for the United Nations. The United States will remain active in both U.N. bodies, pressing its values and interests on human rights and narcotics issues, he said. While the State Department tried to shrug off its humiliation, some officials there quietly pointed the finger back at Congress. With key Bush appointments still working their way through the plodding confirmation system in the Senate, the department was ill- prepared for the wheeling and dealing of the U.N. votes.