On her first day in her new post in Geneva former president Mrs Mary Robinson pledged yesterday to be the voice of victims of abuse around the world and to raise the profile of human rights. The new UN High Commissioner for Human Rights told journalists it was her intention to make human rights a cornerstone of the world organisation.
"I. . . will be a voice for those who are victims of injustice, cruelty and issues of human rights around the world," said Mrs Robinson.
She said her priority would be to establish effective leadership and to "fulfil the intention of the reform package of the Secretary General that human rights will be very central to the work of the United Nations".
UN Secretary-General Mr Kofi Annan has pledged to give a higher profile to the body, which diplomats say has been ineffective in monitoring and reacting to rights abuses because of an institutional vacuum in Geneva and bureaucracy.
There are great expectations that Mrs Robinson's energetic and forthright approach will revitalise what in the past has been a moribund section of the UN organisation, say diplomats. The human rights centre employs 150 people in Geneva and some 250 observers in 12 field offices.