MORNING - Human Rights Council Holds an Interactive Dialogue with the Advisory Committee and a General Debate on Human Rights Bodies and Mechanisms
Council Concludes Interactive Dialogue on the Secretary-General’s Report on Cooperation with the United Nations, its Representatives and Mechanisms in the Field of Human Rights
The Human Rights Council this morning held an interactive dialogue with the Advisory Committee. It also held a general debate on human rights bodies and mechanisms and concluded its interactive dialogue on the Secretary-General’s report on cooperation with the United Nations, its representatives and mechanisms in the field of human rights.
Ajai Malhotra, Chairperson of the Advisory Committee, presented reports by the Advisory Committee on a comprehensive analysis of the current situation regarding gender representation in United Nations human rights organs and mechanisms; new technologies that had great potential to support the exercise of individual rights and freedoms; an overview of international normative instruments outlining the obligations of States to respect and protect the right of every person not to be discriminated against on racial grounds; and the negative effects of terrorism on the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural human rights.
In the discussion, speakers commended the report of the Advisory Committee on racial equality, which raised important questions about the challenges affecting progress toward racial equality. Some speakers highlighted the Advisory Committee’s report on new and emerging digital technologies, saying that a human rights-based approach, including human rights due diligence for the whole lifecycle of technologies, was necessary in order to leverage the positive potential of new and emerging technologies for all. Some speakers applauded the report’s recommendation to provide guidance on the human rights of victims of terrorism. One speaker regretted that the authors went beyond their mandate by attempting to formulate a definition of "terrorism".
Speaking during the discussion were: Republic of Korea, European Union, Brazil, Israel, Spain, Egypt, Mexico, South Africa, Venezuela, Cuba, Russian Federation, Morocco, Sri Lanka, India, Namibia, China, Libya, Panama, Armenia and Syria.
Also taking the floor were the following non-governmental organizations: International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism, Institute for NGO Research, Maat for Peace, Development and Human Rights Association, China Foundation for Human Rights Development, Integrated Youth Empowerment - Common Initiative Group, International Commission of Jurists, China Society for Human Rights Studies, Association pour la défense des droits de l'homme et des revendications démocratiques/culturelles du peuple Azerbaidjanais-Iran , International Council of Russian Compatriots and iuventum e.V.
The Council then held a general debate under agenda item 5 on human rights bodies and mechanisms.
In the general debate, speakers called on the various mechanisms to deepen their work on the rights of indigenous people in the Human Rights Council. Concerns were expressed about the lack of regular and predictable funding for the United Nations’ human rights bodies and mechanisms. Speakers noted that cooperation between States and mandate holders was essential for these tools to deliver their full potential. Satisfaction was expressed at the increase in the number of States issuing standing invitations to Special Procedures and a decrease in the number of States that had never received a visit by a mandate holder. A number of speakers were concerned that some Special Procedures mandate holders had gone beyond their mandates and interfered in the sovereignty and internal affairs of States. Speakers further requested that Special Procedure mandate holders respect the information provided by governments so as to ensure that their statements, reports, actions and recommendations complied with the principles of impartiality and objectivity.
Speaking during the discussion were: Slovenia on behalf of the European Union, Brunei Darussalam on behalf of the Association of South-east Asian Nations, Uruguay on behalf of a group of countries, Pakistan on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Azerbaijan on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement, Latvia on behalf of a group of countries, Cuba on behalf of a group of countries, Portugal on behalf of a group of countries, Luxembourg on behalf of a group of countries, China on behalf of a group of countries, Venezuela, Indonesia, Cuba, Russian Federation, Nepal, China, Pakistan, India, Armenia, Iraq, Belarus, Syria, Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan and Tunisia.
The following non-governmental organizations also took the floor: International Commission of Jurists, Prahar, Commission africaine des promoteurs de la santé et des droits de l'homme, Sikh Human Rights Group, iuventum e.V., Association pour l'Intégration et le Développement Durable au Burundi, Khiam Rehabilitation Center for Victims of Torture, International Action for Peace and Sustainable Development, Amnesty International, World Barua Organization, Liberation, Center for Organisation Research and Education, Mother of Hope Cameroon Common Initiative Group, Integrated Youth Empowerment - Common Initiative Group, African Green Foundation International, International Budhist Relief Organization, Association des étudiants tamouls de France, Village Unis, Ingigenous People of Africa Coordinating Committee, Action of Human Movement, African Development Association, Association pour la défense des droits de l’homme et de démocratiques culturelles du people Azerbaidjanais , Community Human Rights and Advocacy Centre, Association Thendral, Tamil Uzhagam, Le Pont, Society for Development and Community Empowerment, Centre for Africa Development and Progress, Maloca Internationale, Jeunesse Etudiante Tamoul, Reprieve, Association Culturelle des Tamoul, ABC Tamil Oli, AssociationBharathi Centre Culturel Franco-Tamoul, World Muslim Congress, and Global Appreciation and Skills Training Network.
Turkmenistan, Cuba, Indonesia, Iran and China spoke in right of reply.
At the beginning of the meeting, the Council concluded its interactive dialogue on the Secretary-General’s report on cooperation with the United Nations, its representatives and mechanisms in the field of human rights.
In the discussion, speakers said that the United Nations, the Council and Member States needed to do more to hold accountable States that undermined the Council’s legitimacy by committing reprisals, including publicly naming perpetrators and taking measures to raise the political cost of their actions. Some speakers said that States that systematically perpetrated reprisals should be called out. Calls were made on States to put an immediate end to all acts of intimidation and reprisals, investigate allegations, and push for accountability by raising specific cases at the Human Rights Council.
Speaking in the discussion were: Yemen and Andorra.
Also taking the floor were the following national human rights institutions: Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions and National Human Rights Commission India. The following non-governmental organizations also took the floor: International Service for Human Rights, Human Rights House Foundation, Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development, Institute for NGO Research, Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development, Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Right Livelihood Award Foundation, Asian Legal Resource Centre, CIVICUS - World Alliance for Citizen Participation and East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project.
The webcast of the Human Rights Council meetings can be found here. All meeting summaries can be found here. Documents and reports related to the Human Rights Council’s forty-eighth regular session can be found here.
This morning the Council held the election of a new Vice-President and Rapporteur of the Council from the Group of Western European and Other States for the period from 1 October to 31 December 2021. Paul Bekkers, incoming Permanent Representative of the Netherlands to the United Nations Office at Geneva, was elected as Vice-President and Rapporteur of the Council.
The Council will resume its work at 1 p.m. to start its consideration of the Universal Periodic Review outcomes of Namibia, Niger and Mozambique.
Interactive Dialogue on the Report of the Secretary-General on Cooperation with the United Nations, its Representatives and Mechanisms in the Field of Human Rights
The interactive dialogue on the report of the Secretary-General on cooperation with the United Nations, its representatives and mechanisms in the field of human right, started on 29 September and a summary can be found here.
Discussion
Speakers encouraged the Office of the High Commissioner to make available all communications, including letters alleging retaliation or intimidation and responses or verbal notes from States. Some speakers said that the United Nations, the Council and Member States needed to do more to hold accountable States that undermined the Council’s legitimacy by committing reprisals, including publicly naming perpetrators and taking measures to raise the political cost of their actions. Some speakers said that States that systematically perpetrated reprisals should be called out. States were urged to put an immediate end to all acts of intimidation and reprisals, investigate allegations, and push for accountability by raising specific cases at the Human Rights Council. Council Member States were also urged to uphold their moral obligation to prioritise the safety and protection of human rights defenders by responding to reprisals, including by assisting in their relocation, where necessary, and making prison visits to defenders detained for engagement with the United Nations. One speaker was disappointed that, unlike the two previous reports, this report did not include any mention of communications sent to States exhibiting ‘patterns’ of intimidation and reprisals.
Concluding Remarks
ILZE BRANDS KEHRIS, Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights, said that all the allegations in the report had been subjected to a thorough verification process. Information had been documented by United Nations field missions, human rights mechanisms, and civil society where appropriate. Governments had been given the opportunity to respond to allegations, which were also published in the report. The report offered technical measures to improve the participation of underrepresented persons in the United Nations, and it also discussed the greater participation that had been made possible by the hybrid or online format. The United Nations must encourage participation in its activities while ensuring the safety of the online spaces it provided, Ms. Brands Kehris noted. The choice of platforms was important in this regard, as was the security of connections. The United Nations systematically documented acts of intimidation, to avoid normalising the fear of participating in dialogues in difficult contexts. There was also a need to systematise the collection of information on acts of intimidation or retaliation: the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights had trained 95 staff in several countries to do so. Several Member States had taken proactive steps to protect those who worked with the Security Council, Ms. Brands Kehris said. She regretted the misuse of counterterrorism laws to muzzle civil society. At the same time, States must ensure that the legal environment allowed for civil society participation and they must avoid any slippage, the Assistant Secretary-General said.
Interactive Dialogue with the Advisory Committee
Presentation of Reports
AJAI MALHOTRA, Chairperson of the Advisory Committee, said that despite the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Advisory Committee had effectively responded to requests arising from Council resolutions. Four thematic reports had been submitted at the forty-seventh and forty-eighth sessions of the Council.
The first report provided a comprehensive analysis of the current situation regarding gender representation in United Nations human rights organs and mechanisms. It concluded that women generally remained underrepresented in treaty bodies, among Special Procedure mandate holders, and in the Advisory Committee. It recommended that States made commitments to identify more female candidates; promote public and participatory selection processes that included gender as a specific criteria; promote research and mentoring to ensure that obstacles for full participation were overcome; nominate and elect more female candidates to fill vacancies in United Nations human rights organs and mechanisms; and report regularly on implementing these recommendations, to ensure compliance with their obligations on gender equality.
The second report presented recognised that new technologies had great potential to support the exercise of individual rights and freedoms. It concluded that the impact of new technologies on human rights could be effectively shaped through the joint efforts of multiple stakeholders and that the conceptual and operational gaps in the existing human rights framework could best be tackled by adopting an approach based on three pillars: a holistic understanding of technology, a holistic approach to human rights, and holistic governance and regulatory efforts.
The third report provided an overview of international normative instruments outlining the obligations of States to respect and protect the right of every person not to be discriminated against on racial grounds as well as of programmatic sources guiding States’ actions towards racial equality, namely the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action and its follow-up. The report concluded that there was an urgent need to find common understandings to tackle racism and to achieve racial equality and justice in a sustainable manner, including enhancing efforts to mainstream the anti-racism agenda within the United Nations; supporting the implementation and development of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights’ “transformative agenda on racial equality and justice”; taking concrete measures to foster political will to fully implement the obligations related to racial equality and ensuring increased support for the programmatic commitments under the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action; improving and strengthening national frameworks in order to facilitate the implementation of the principle of racial equality; adopting detailed action plans with concrete targets, monitoring mechanisms and sufficient resources; and addressing structural racial and ethnicity-based discrimination through COVID-19 pandemic recovery plans.
The fourth report focused on the negative effects of terrorism on the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural human rights. It recommended that States elaborate and adopt a universal definition of terrorism in a legally binding instrument; finalise and adopt a comprehensive convention on international terrorism; further enhance international cooperation to counter the actions of those who aid, abet, sponsor, finance or otherwise support terrorism; and elaborate and adopt an international instrument providing guidance to States on the rights of victims of terrorism that should be enshrined and protected through national legislation.
Mr. Malhotra concluded by saying that the Committee had submitted four research proposals for the Council’s consideration: “Pandemics and human rights: lessons for the future”, “Protection of academic freedom and free flow of research: lessons learned from the pandemic”, “Climate protection technologies and human rights”, and “Practices negatively affecting the human rights of migrants”. He hoped the Council would favourably respond to these research proposals.
Discussion
Speakers commended the report of the Advisory Committee on racial equality, which raised important questions about the challenges affecting progress toward racial equality. They highlighted the issue of racial equity, with a valuable focus on systemic and structural racism, and on the multiple challenges to the effective implementation of the Durban Declaration. Some speakers highlighted the report on new and emerging digital technologies, which underscored the importance of a holistic human rights approach to their design, development and use. They were convinced that a human rights-based approach, including human rights due diligence for the whole lifecycle of technologies, was necessary in order to leverage the positive potential of new and emerging technologies for all. They said that some of the new applications could be used to fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Some speakers applauded the report’s recommendation to provide guidance on the human rights of victims of terrorism. They stated that as the report highlighted, addressing the negative effects of terrorism and human rights violations that were brought upon by and through counter-terrorism measures were complementary and not competing objectives of human rights protection. One speaker regretted that the authors went beyond their mandate by attempting to formulate a definition of "terrorism" and that they departed from the original intent of the Council's mandate. Calls were made for the Advisory Committee to continue to develop its work as a "think tank" of the Council, with the primary function of providing expertise as well as formulating suggestions and proposals for further studies and research on topics of importance and topicality to the international community in support of the work of the Council.
Concluding Remarks
AJAI MALHOTRA, Chairperson of the Advisory Committee, said that it was up to the Member States to decide on the mandates of the Committee. He agreed that scientific knowledge was needed to develop a study on new technologies and climate change. The Committee would use the work of the IPCC as a basis for this potential study, he explained. The research proposals submitted by the Advisory Committee had no financial implications as it was a volunteer effort on the part of the experts.
General Debate on Human Rights Bodies and Mechanisms
In the general debate, speakers said that human rights were fundamental in ensuring the success of all United Nations pillars and that they were universal, indivisible, interrelated, interdependent and mutually reinforcing . Some speakers reiterated the importance for Special Procedures, in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, to continue to address racism, racial discrimination and hate speech, as well as the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights. United Nations bodies and mechanisms should deepen their work on the rights of indigenous people in the Human Rights Council. Further calls were made to invite all States to continue to cooperate with and assist the Special Procedure mandate holders in the performance of their tasks and to promote an open, constructive and transparent dialogue in the Council. Concerns were expressed about the lack of regular and predictable funding of the United Nations’ human rights bodies and mechanisms and the impact that the liquidity and COVID-19 crises were having on all the human rights mechanisms. Cooperation between States and mandate holders was essential for these tools to deliver their full potential. Satisfaction was expressed at the increase in the number of States issuing standing invitations to Special Procedures and a decrease in the number of States that had never received a visit by a mandate holder.
Some speakers regretted that the treaty body chairs had not been able to make meaningful progress, neither with the establishment of a predictable calendar of review cycles, nor with the introduction of harmonised, streamlined and modern working methods. They supported all endeavours to improve trust between the States and Special Procedures, and to avoid practices that promoted hierarchisation and politicisation of human rights, mandates, and of human rights mechanisms. Concerns were expressed that some Special Procedure mandate holders had gone beyond their mandates and interfered in the sovereignty and internal affairs of States. Speakers further requested that Special Procedure mandate holders abide by the code of conduct, carry out constructive dialogues with States, and respect the information provided by governments so as to ensure that their statements, reports, actions and recommendations complied with the principles of impartiality and objectivity. Calls were made for equitable geographic representation and appropriate representation of different legal, cultural and political systems to be reflected in Special Procedure mandate holders.
Some speakers stressed that 20 years after the introduction of anti-terrorist policies, there were numerous violations of human rights still occurring and they remained unaddressed. Governments were expected to show genuine response and compliance with the Special Procedures and international human rights mechanisms. Projects like mining and construction of dams were severely affecting the rights of indigenous groups. There were encouraging reports about people around the world using complaints procedures, but there were hundreds of thousands of complaints not lodged. As it was clear that many people were unaware of their rights, the Council should work on rising public awareness on complaints procedures. In addition, complaints’ mechanisms should be made fit for purpose in today’s social media and digital world and more work was needed to simplify the mechanisms so that people would use them more. Civil society space continued to shrink, and several speakers raised concerns on reprisals and intimidations of human rights defenders; States were called on to cooperate more with human rights mechanisms.
Some speakers raised concerns about the rise of numbers of vulnerable people affected the most by consequences of COVID-19, particularly those living in camps affected by quarantine. A systematic worsening of the human rights of refugees under COVID-19 crisis was happening at a large scale. Some speakers spoke of the worsening human rights situation in some countries and regions. They noted that some countries were violating their international human rights obligations and were not complying with the Council’s recommendations, as they were carrying out reprisals against minors and child defenders and carrying out arbitrary detention against minors. Harassment against journalists and their activities continued on a daily level, including forced disappearances and crimes perpetrated by security forces, all leading to grave human rights violations. The Council and Special Rapporteurs were urged to pay more attention to these situations, including constant monitoring of the deterioration of human rights.
HRC21.132E