US faces first scrutiny by UN rights council
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The United States will come under the spotlight at the UN's top human rights assembly's for the first time over the coming week along with other countries that face scrutiny by the Human Rights Council.
The 12-day session of the 47 member council starting on Monday will include regular "universal periodic reviews" of 16 members of the United Nations, including the United States on November 5.
Several dozen non governmental organisation are expected to lobby the debate on the US human rights record, while Washington will also defend its record.
Some 300 US civil liberties and community groups in the US Human Rights Network on Monday called on the Obama administration to bring "substandard human rights practices" in the United States into line with international standards.
The United States only agreed to join the Council in May 2009, after the Bush administration had shunned the body which replaced its similar though discredited predecessor, the UN human rights commission, in 2006.
The Network produced a 400-page report criticising "glaring inadequacies in the United States? human rights record," including the "discriminatory impact" of foreclosures, "widespread" racial profiling and "draconian" immigration policies.
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