UN Body To Fight Race Bias Plays Key Role In Holding US Accountable - Human Rights Group

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 17th April, 2019) The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) will continue to play a key role in holding the United States accountable for racial discrimination abuse even though Washington refused to appoint a member to it, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Tuesday.

The Trump administration has decided not to nominate anyone to serve on CERD, the Washington newspaper Politico reported on Saturday, citing a State Department official.

"Against this troubling backdrop, CERD's role in holding this US Administration, like all of those prior, accountable for racially discriminatory abuses, is especially critical," HRW said in a press release. "CERD ... will continue to review the practices of the US regardless."

The rights group emphasized that the US move comes after CERD warned the Trump administration over its failure to denounce racisim following a 2017 deadly race riot in Charlottesville, Virginia.

The White House has also failed to address persistent problems such as racism and xenophobia in the country, and has in fact fueled such sentiments, HRW charged.�

At the US land border with Mexico, asylum-seekers have been returned to await their hearings under unsafe and unhealthy circumstances while others have been subjected to abusive regimes of family detention or family separation, the release noted.

The administration's failure to nominate a representative to CERD was just the latest in series of US withdrawals from international treaties and from organizations pledged to uphold them, Human Rights Watch added.