The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Brian Cowen, has welcomed the election this week of Irishman Michael O'Flaherty to the United Nations Human Rights Committee in New York.
The UN Human Rights Committee comprises experts, serving in their personal capacity, who assess how states are meeting their obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Mr Cowen said Mr O'Flaherty's election represented the first occasion on which an Irish national had been elected to a major UN treaty body.
