Russia was defeated in its bid to be re-elected as a member of the UN’s Human Rights Council. But only just: Russia lost to Croatia by just two votes with Hungary claiming the Eastern Europe region’s other remaining seat. Many human rights groups had campaigned against the membership of Russia, China and others such as Saudi Arabia, but the problem is that the UN General Assembly only has a choice when the regional allotment has more candidates than seats. Saudi Arabia was re-elected as one of the four Asia-Pacific region countries to run for that region’s four allocated slots. Human Rights Watch’s UN director, Louis Charbonneau said that the vote “also shows how important it is to have competitive slates in UN elections. Countries should have a chance to reject those whose candidacies are so severely compromised, as they did today.“
Posts Tagged ‘General Assembly’
Surprise: Russia loses seat on UN Human Rights Council by 2 votes
October 29, 2016Michel Forst on protecting defenders who work on business and human rights
December 1, 2014At the start of the 3rd UN Forum on Business and Human Rights, today 1 December, the ISHR publishes a series of articles by key human rights defenders and experts in this field. [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2014/11/17/register-for-the-3rd-annual-forum-on-business-and-human-rights-1-to-3-december-2014/] The Special Rapporteur on HRDs, Michel Forst, goes first:
Reprisals against Human Rights Defenders breach obligations as Human Rights Council member
April 29, 2014In a post dated 13 March 2014, I suggested the possibility of suspending the membership of countries in the Human Rights Council in case of serious reprisals against human rights defenders who coöperate with the UN. [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2014/03/13/zero-tolerance-for-states-that-take-reprisals-against-hrds-lets-up-the-ante/]. The backdrop to this admittedly far-reaching proposal Read the rest of this entry »
UN General Assembly indeed defers UN focal point on human rights defenders
January 8, 2014On 4 December 2013 I reported on the setback in the establishment of a focal point against reprisals in the United Nations. The disappointing vote in the Third Committee could theoretically have been reversed by the General Assembly but that miracle did not happen. On 19 December the General Assembly also put on hold a Human Rights Council initiative to strengthen the protection of human rights defenders from attacks and reprisals. A group of African States, together with China, Cuba, and Russia, successfully put forward a resolution to defer the appointment of a senior UN official tasked with coordinating the protection of human rights defenders. This is despite the Human Rights Council overwhelmingly passing a resolution in September calling on the UN Secretary-General to appoint ‘a United Nations-wide senior focal point’ to combat reprisals and intimidation.‘ The vote had a narrow margin of only three votes: 83 – 80.
[In the face of an African Group position, only two African States had the courage to abstain from the vote: Chad and Morocco.]
via UN General Assembly turns its back on human rights defenders | ISHR.
Special Rapporteur’s next report focuses on HRDs and large-scale development projects: you can contribute!
June 14, 2013The next thematic report of the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, Margaret Sekaggya, to the General Assembly in October 2013 will focus on the links between large-scale development projects and a safe and enabling
- environment for human rights defenders, with a particular emphasis on the challenges of the human rights-based approach to development and the role of human rights defenders. This is indeed – as also shown in this blog – a growing area of concern with many HRDs working on e.g. land grabbing, forced evictions, environmental issues or the protection of indigenous minorities under constant threats and many having been killed .
To this end, the Special Rapporteur is requesting Member States, national human rights institutions, non-governmental organizations and regional human rights mechanisms to answer a questionnaire. If you would like to contribute to this exercise, kindly complete the questionnaire and send it to defenders@ohchr.org. Deadline: 24 June 2013!. Should you have any question, please send an e-mail to the same address. Questionnaire to be found via Questionnaire on large-scale development.
Syria: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights does not mince words before General Assembly
February 16, 2012While many of us are in despair over the inaction by the Security Council due to the exercise of a veto on geopolitical grounds, one high level official, Mrs Pillay, at least speaks out relentlessly, recently at the General Assembly of the UN in New York. The short video here embedded was uploaded by the UN:
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 