Milei, Argentinian President, Claims UN is Hypocritical in Human Rights
Argentinian President Javier Milei denounced the United Nations for including authoritarian regimes such as Cuba and Venezuela in key human rights bodies in his first U.N. speech. He accused the international organization of human rights hypocrisies and enabling authoritarian regimes.
“I’m here to warn you that we are at the end of a cycle, the collectivism and moral posturing of the woke agenda have collided with reality,” Milei told the United Nations on Sept. 24 in New York City. He specifically criticized the Human Rights Council for granting membership to countries such as Cuba and Venezuela, both of which he said have poor human rights records.
‘Bloody Dictatorships’
“In this very house, which claims to defend human rights, we have allowed access to the Human Rights Council to bloody dictatorships such as Cuba and Venezuela, without the slightest reproach,” he said. Both countries have served multiple terms on the council despite repeated international criticism of their domestic human rights practices.
Milei also turned his attention to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, a U.N. body tasked with monitoring progress on women’s rights globally. Countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Afghanistan have been part of international conversations about women’s rights despite having policies that restrict women’s freedoms.
“In this very House, which claims to defend women’s rights, we have allowed access to the Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women to countries that punish their women for showing their skin,” Milei said.
The Epoch Times contacted the U.N. for comment but didn’t receive a reply by publication time.
The body states on its website that “the idea that all human beings—regardless of race, sex, nationality, ethnicity, language, religion, or any other status—are entitled to human rights is built into the foundation of the United Nations.” It works to “mainstream human rights” within the U.N. system and collaborates closely with governments in the field to identify, highlight, and develop responses to human rights challenges.
For example, earlier this year, the U.N. human rights office said that China still has “many problematic laws and policies” in Xinjiang, two years after reporting serious violations by the Chinese Communist Party against the Uyghur people.
Milei
Milei, a self-proclaimed anarcho-capitalist, was inaugurated as Argentina’s president last year after defeating Sergio Massa, economy minister for Alberto Fernández’s socialist administration. He promised to tackle the country’s inflationary economy by dollarizing the peso and minimizing government spending. Since his win, Milei has announced plans to lay off at least an estimated 70,000 state employees.
Milei said the U.N. has abandoned its founding purpose and now “transformed into a multi-tentacled leviathan that purports to decide not only what each nation state should do but also how all citizens of the world should live.”
2030 Agenda
In his U.N. speech, Milei also criticized the 2030 Agenda’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), calling it a global initiative for sustainable economic growth and environmental protection.
He said that although well-intentioned, the 2030 Agenda is “nothing more than a supranational government program with a socialist slant.”
“If the 2030 Agenda failed, as its own promoters acknowledge, the answer should be to ask ourselves if it was not an ill-conceived program to begin with,” he said.
“Argentina will not support any policy that implies the restriction of individual freedoms, commerce, nor the violation of the natural rights of individuals,” Milei emphasized.
Reuters contributed to this report.
