Prominent Labor senator Kimberley Kitching has blasted Beijing for retaliating against Australia’s push for an independent coronavirus inquiry and accused United Nations agencies of being anti-Israel, warning it is not doing enough to stand up to growing authoritarianism around the world.
She accused the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) of being turned into “a forum for anti-Western and anti-Israel propaganda” under the influence of a ‘non-aligned’ bloc of countries.
A number of United Nations bodies, including the Human Rights Council, were unfairly critical of Israel despite being a beacon for democracy in its region, Senator Kitching said.
“Israel is the only country in the Middle East with free elections, free media, free trade unions, free civil society, freedom for all religions, and freedom for women and for LGBTI people,” she said.
“Yet it is regularly condemned by a Council dominated by countries which have none of these things and which demand a far higher moral standard by other states than they do of themselves.”
Read the article by Anthony Galloway in The Sydney Morning Herald.