ABSTRACT
The United Nations did create a Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, but its parent bodies soon made it clear that they preferred that the Sub-Commission focus on the first aspect of its mandate. The Sub-Commission eventually expanded its work to the whole range of human rights issues but it never regained its initial focus on discrimination and minority issues. The United Nations and human rights advocates believed that the norms of equality and non-discrimination—combined, eventually, with the norm of self-determination in the form of decolonization—would suffice to protect the interests of groups in preserving their culture. The Sub-Commission eventually expanded its work to the whole range of human rights issues, but it never regained its initial focus on discrimination and minority issues. As human rights standard-setting expanded during the 1960s, several international texts were adopted that addressed aspects of minority rights.
