Ironies and failures, not least concerning Australia, surround the 70th anniversary of the United Nations’ Declaration of Human Rights, a noble response to the Holocaust perpetrated by Hitler’s Germany during World War II. It was created at a time the world was seeking a way to prevent future wars and genocides.

The UN was formed at the end of the war, replacing the weak and ineffectual League of Nations. The declaration came three years later, and was presented to the world by the elected UN president, Australian judge and politician Dr Bert (Doc) Evatt, who had also helped draft the UN founding charter. The non-binding declaration was intended to lead to binding human rights agreements in nation states.

Australia is wrong on rights. Credit:Angela Wylie

Since then, there have been several genocides, some ongoing. The number of people fleeing war and persecution has never been higher – close to 70 million, compared with 11 million at the end of the war. Australia is now the only industrialised democracy without a human rights charter. And despite Australia’s pivotal role in the UN charter and as a founding signatory of the UN’s 1951 refugee convention, a legally binding agreement, our nation has abused fundamental human rights of refugees and people seeking asylum.

Australia risks being seen as recalcitrant; it has followed the US, which has been undermining the UN, in refusing to participate in the organisation’s efforts to generate a global refugee policy. Most refugees are in poor nations, while Australia has been demonising the minuscule number of displaced people accepted here. There is no domestic legal solution to Australia’s inhumane treatment of some of the world’s most needy people, because no domestic law has been broken, but our nation could be liable in an international court.