U.S. elected to U.N. rights council for first time

[Scurrilous]

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"The United States won election to the U.N. Human Rights Council for the first time on Tuesday, joining 17 other nations picked for the body, after the Obama administration ended a U.S. policy of boycotting it.

U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice told reporters the United States still believed the body to be flawed, but said: "We are looking forward to working from within with a broad cross-section of member states to strengthen and reform the Human Rights Council."

The United States was one of 18 countries elected to three-year terms on the 47-seat Geneva-based council in a vote by the U.N. General Assembly, joining 29 others already on the body. Some nations that have faced criticism for their own human rights records, including China, Cuba and Saudi Arabia, also were elected to the body."

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"The Bush administration, which left office in January, considered the Human Rights Council -- created only three years ago to replace a discredited predecessor -- as biased against Israel, and did not seek election to it."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/12/AR2009051201597.html