UN Committee Blocks 34 of 35 NGOs from Acquiring UN NGO Status, Including NGOs Critical of Iran

A UN committee charged with allowing NGOs to gain greater access to the organization, but whose members include states infamous for denying freedom of association, has just derailed another 34 of 35 NGO requests for UN NGO "status" or "accreditation." The NGOs denied access on February 2, 2017 include an NGO dedicated to human rights in Iran. The "Iran Human Rights Documentation Center," has not made it out of the UN NGO committee since 2010.

NGOs seek UN accreditation because it normally permits NGOs to attend meetings, circulate documents, sometimes hold events inside the UN and even address UN sessions. However, undemocratic states - the ones that compose the majority of UN members - dominate the UN NGO committee and even include China, Iran, Sudan, and Venezuela. Their standard operating procedure is to defer applications session after session with inappropriate, specious or repetitive questions and demands of the NGO. After years of deferrals, Western state occasionally force applications to a vote, but are simply outvoted.

In the case of the "Iran Human Rights Documentation Center," Iran concocted a question on the breakdown of funding from the U.S. and Canadian governments. The US delegate challenged Iran's question, pointing out that the same question had been asked and answered already in 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2015. In response, Iran withdrew that question and formulated another - causing the application to again be deferred and effectively denying the NGO status.

In another case, Cuba successfully derailed NGO status for the "National Democratic Institute for International Affairs," with a question the US delegate pointed out was answered in its application.

Two Estonian NGOs were also blocked by Russia, despite the support of the United States and committee observers Estonia, Hungary, Finland, the European Union, each pointing out the dozens of "repetitive" questions that had been blocking the NGOs, creating, in the Estonian representative's words, a "constant loop of deferral."