That seat can be officially reserved for brutally repressive Arab and Islamic regimes. There are lots of those, and the various Arab and Moslem states can take them in turn, round-robin. It appears we really have gone through the looking glass ....

According to the UN Human Rights Council, the only violations that have ever occurred in the history of their reign of terror is Israel's infractions. Libya sat on the council under a stale and senile dictatorship, I see no reason to not hand off the baton to Syria. If you didn't allow some of the world's worst violators of human rights into the club, who would be left in the race to blame Israel for the world's ills?

There should also be an honorary seat for Osama Bin Laden, and the U.S. should continue to fund the U.N.; after all, it is money well spent.

I think a nice symbolic gesture would be to give Assad a toilet seat and see if he can take a hint.

So if no one brings up Hama (and no one will...in the UN), Syria will continue to look like a West-leaning reformer who is just out of his element, with the goofy face of Alfred E. Neuman from MAD Magazine. Recalling all of the flurry at the UN these days over Libya (with nothing really getting done), I found it impossible to find a piece about a similar UN rush regarding Syria's decimation of Hama and its 30,000 people in 1982. Guess that means it didn't happen.

It makes perfect sense. If the UN Human rights commission does not ensure continuity of representation by repressive regimes on its board/committees and alike they might actually end up focusing on human rights and balanced focused - that just can't be. It would invalidate the entire ethos of the UN. It just want do. Not only should they invite Syrian but seek, with a forward looking view, to strengthen the line up of repressive states. They caught off guard with loosing one repressive state - that is bad. So the only way to avoid this happening again it to beef-up the line up - both quantitatively and qualitatively - one option to sift through applicants is - how many political prisoners have you got and how much pain inflicted - this would cover quantity and quality.... I am sure the Human Rights commission would have no problems producing a weighting system which will unearth and favour the most repressive regimes.

The UNHRC is fundamentally flawed in that dictatorships have an equal right to serve on it, and in fact have much more motivation to do so (to cover themselves) than other nations.

But not nearly as quite, so I guess that's progress.

Then again, perhaps the head of a Baath Party state is the perfect replacement for a seat once occupied by Libya. Truly a moment to roll one's eyes over.

Iran is on the UN Women Rights Commission, so why not put Syria on the UN Human Rights Group. Maybe the Congo could be next? Then Burma. As I've always said the UN is nothing now. It just provides a false International legitimacy to thug nations and dictators.

He would be a "worthy successor" to the "best predecessor" !

Fits right in with all the other blood thirsty crazies there. Zimbabwe, North Korea, China, Russia and Syria. That is a winning line up.

SO WHY IS IRAN STILL ON THE UN BODY?

I assume that the UN Human Rights Council is a group of people that don't actually respect human rights. I think we should also nominate: Kim Jong Il The Saudi royals Osama Bin Laden Its a shame Stalin isn't still alive because he would have made an ideal member. Like every other pathetic UN body the UNHRC is just exists to eat US taxpayer money and do very little. In times of budget cuts then maybe its time to close this pointless group and maybe even the entire UN itself that never gets anything done other than pass resolutions to condemn Israel for something.

The Human rights council of the UN is one big joke. It's worth NOTHING. It's just a pity to see so much public money wasted on this council, money that could do much to alleviate lots of true suffering in the world.

Hooray for the UN. The same Sh..t who appointed and honored Libya for his contribution to world peace, are now lining up another piece of garbage for this illustrious position reserved for thugs, deviants, criminals." A wasted decade ", the report on a worthless 10 years, should be about the UN who single handed wasted ALL it's time on ONE single job-- how to demonise Israel and praise the likes of a Kaddafi, Abbas, Abdullah, Mubarak, ben Ali, Abdullah, Chavez and more.Their main contribution to mankind "" how to rip-off trillons$$ from their BELOVED BROTHERS, while they slave for them.

.... North Korea or an esteemed Black African dictator, they are all high on human rights, demo-crazy and free-press and the (w)helfare of their people. If UN plenary asssembly thinks this is a special seat for islamists and islamic terror supporters Assad would be a natural choice, as I assume Ahmadi's Iran is already there in this council. So he is in good company.

Good one, UN.