Campaigners at the September 2014 NYC Climate March say, “We need a cooperative model for climate justice.” Credit Roger Hamilton-Martin/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 16 2015 (IPS)

The United Nations, which is tasked with the protection of the global environment, has asserted that climate change affects people everywhere – with no exceptions.

Still, one of the greatest inequities of our time is that the poorest and the most marginalised individuals, communities and countries — which have contributed the least to greenhouse gas emissions — often bear the greatest burden, says the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights.“Our climate-impacted communities have a moral and legal right to defend our human rights and seek Climate Justice by holding these big carbon polluters accountable." -- Tuvalu delegate Puanita Taomia Ewekia

With an increasing link between climate change and human rights, Greenpeace Southeast Asia, which is conscious of the growing threat of rising sea levels to Pacific island nations, is seeking “climate justice,” including both redress and accountability.

“For the first time anywhere in the world,” says Greenpeace, it will submit a petition to the Philippines Commission on Human Rights asking the Commission to investigate the responsibility of the world’s biggest polluters for directly violating human rights or threatening to, due to their contribution to climate change and ocean acidification.

Anna Abad, climate justice campaigner for Greenpeace Southeast Asia, told IPS: “The filing of the human rights petition before the Philippine Commission on Human Rights is a first step to investigate the responsibility of the Carbon Majors (a.k.a. big carbon polluters) for their human rights violations or threatened human rights violations resulting from climate change and ocean acidification impacts.”

Asked whether there is a possibility of the issue being taken up either by the Security Council or the International Court of Justice, she said Greenpeace Southeast Asia is also exploring other avenues – both legal and transnational – to amplify the urgency of climate justice and to ensure that those responsible for the climate crisis are held accountable for their actions.

“This is a collective effort between our partners and allies. With the climate justice campaign, we have certainly begun the trial by public opinion,” Abad said.

Zelda Soriano, legal and political advisor from Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said climate change is a borderless issue, gravely affecting millions of people worldwide.

“The U.N. Human Rights Council has recognised that climate change has serious repercussions on the enjoyment of human rights as it poses an immediate and far-reaching threat to people and communities around the world.”

In this light, she said, “We view climate change as a social injustice that must be addressed by international governments and agencies, most especially those responsible for contributing to the climate crisis.”

Last week, the President of Vanuatu Baldwin Londsdale joined climate-impacted communities from Tuvalu, Kiribati, Fiji and the Solomon Islands, as well as representatives from the Philippines, at “an emergency meeting” in Vanuatu vowing to seek ‘Climate Justice’ and hold big fossil fuel entities accountable for fuelling global climate change.

The Climate Change and Human Rights workshop was held on board the Greenpeace ship, Rainbow Warrior, with the participation of about 40 delegates and civil society groups from Pacific Island nations.

“It is now more important than ever before that we stand united as affected communities in the face of climate change, rising sea-levels and changing weather patterns. Let us continue to stand and work together in our fight against the threats of climate change,” Londsdale told delegates.

The workshop concluded with participants signing on to the ‘People’s Declaration for Climate Justice,’ which was handed over to the President of Vanuatu.

According to Greenpeace, human-induced climate change is forecast to unleash increased hardship on the Philippines and Pacific Island nations due to stronger storms and cyclones.

A new study, Northwestern Pacific typhoon intensity controlled by changes in ocean temperatures, suggests that with climate change, storms like Haiyan, which in 2013 devastated Southeast Asia and specifically the Philippines, could get even stronger and more common.

It projects the intensity of typhoons in the western Pacific Ocean to increase by as much as 14 percent – nearly equivalent to an increase of one category – by century’s end even under a moderate future scenario of greenhouse gas emissions.

Greenpeace says it believes that those most vulnerable will continue to suffer, representing a violation of their basic human rights.

According to Greenpeace, recent research has shown that 90 entities are responsible for an estimated 914 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (GtCO2e) of cumulative world emissions of industrial CO2 and methane between 1854 and 2010, or about 63 percent of estimated global industrial emissions of these greenhouse gases.

Abad said: “These big carbon polluters have enriched themselves for almost a century with the continued burning of coal, oil and gas. They are the driving force behind climate change.”

She said time is running out for these vulnerable communities and the world’s big carbon polluters have a moral and legal responsibility for their products and to meaningfully address climate change before it is too late.

Tuvalu delegate Puanita Taomia Ewekia was quoted as saying: “Climate change is not a problem for one nation to solve alone, all our Pacific Island countries are affected as one in our shared ocean.”

She said governments must stand up for their rights and demand redress from these big carbon polluters for past and future climate transgressions.

“Our climate-impacted communities have a moral and legal right to defend our human rights and seek Climate Justice by holding these big carbon polluters accountable and to seek financial compensation,” she declared.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@aol.com

By Kinda Mohamadieh
GENEVA, Apr 6 2015 (IPS)

The world’s attention turned to the practices of vulture funds after the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed a lower court opinion in the NML Capital vs Argentina case, which forbids the country from making payments on its restructured debt.

Argentina had defaulted in 2001 and went through two rounds of negotiations to restructure its debt, both in 2005 and 2010. In June 2014, the court ordered Argentina to pay the ‘vulture funds’ that held out and did not accept the terms of the debt swaps.

Kinda Mohamadieh

The vulture funds had held out with the aim of achieving what amounts to a 1,600 percent return on their original investment. The funds concerned had purchased the Argentinian bonds in 2008 at 48 million dollars and the court ruling ordered Argentina to pay them 832 million dollars.

Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz noted that this was “the first time in history that a country was willing and able to pay its creditors, but was blocked by a judge from doing so”.

While this case brought the term ‘vulture funds’ into the public sphere, the predatory practices of these entities did not start with Argentina.

According to a former U.N. independent expert on the effects of foreign debt and other related financial obligations of states on the full enjoyment of all human rights, the term ‘vulture funds’ describes “private commercial entities that acquire, either by purchase, assignments or some other form of transaction, defaulted or distressed debts, and sometimes actual court judgments, with the aim of achieving higher returns.”

Basically, vulture funds are hedge funds whose modus operandi focuses on three main steps including: (1) purchasing distressed debt on the secondary market at deep discounts far less than its face value; (2) refusing to participate in restructuring agreements with the indebted state; and (3) pursuing full value of the debt often at face value plus interest, arrears and penalties, including through litigation, seizure of assets or penalties.“The African Development Bank has reported that at least twenty heavily indebted poor countries have been threatened with or have been subjected to legal actions by commercial creditors and vulture funds since 1999”

Many developing countries have been exposed to the predatory practices of vulture funds, especially African and Latin American countries.

The African Development Bank has reported that at least twenty heavily indebted poor countries have been threatened with or have been subjected to legal actions by commercial creditors and vulture funds since 1999. These countries include Sierra Leone, Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, as well as Angola, Cameroon, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Liberia, Madagascar, Mozambique, Niger, Sao Tome and Principe, Tanzania, and Uganda.

Peru was targeted by NML Capital in the year 2000. According to media reports, the fund spent almost four years in the courts to win a ruling that forced Peru to settle for almost 56 million dollars on distressed debt, which the fund had initially bought for 11.8 million dollars.

The African Development Bank has documented that up until the year 2007, 25 judgments in favour of vulture funds had yielded nearly one billion dollars. Out of this amount, 72 percent of the judgments have been against African countries. The reported number of outstanding cases against debtor countries has doubled since 2004.

According to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), 54 court cases were instituted against 12 heavily indebted poor countries between 1998 and 2008. The IMF estimates that in some cases claims by vulture funds constitute as much as 12 to 13 percent of a country’s gross domestic product.  The World Bank estimates that nearly one-third of countries that are eligible for debt relief and other poverty alleviation programmes are the targets of nearly 26 vulture funds.

Concerned about the extent of the threat posed by such predatory practices and their systemic implications, several international authorities and multilateral institutions have voiced their concern about the matter.

The African Development Bank has warned that by precluding debt relief and costing millions in legal expenses, these vulture funds undermine the development of the most vulnerable African countries.

In June 2014, the heads of state and government of the Group of 77 and China, in their declaration issued on the occasion of the ‘For a New World Order for Living Well’ summit held in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia, reiterated the importance of “not allowing vulture funds to paralyse the debt restructuring efforts of developing countries” and stressed that “these funds should not supersede the state’s right to protect its people under international law.”

The IMF had cautioned that upholding the decision against Argentina would harm future sovereign debt restructuring attempts. In 2013, the IMF stated that “if upheld, [the Court of Appeals decision] would likely give hold-out creditors greater leverage and make the debt restructuring process more complicated”.

In 2007, G8 finance ministers had expressed concern about actions of some litigating creditors against heavily indebted poor countries, and agreed to work together to identify measures to tackle this problem based on the work of the Paris Club.

In September 2014, a resolution on the activities of vulture funds and the effects of foreign debt and other related international financial obligations of states on the full enjoyment of all human rights, particularly economic, social and cultural rights, was presented by Argentina and adopted at the 27^th session of the U.N. Human Rights Council which took place in Geneva.

It is also worth noting that the 26^th session of the Human Rights Council in June 2014 had adopted a resolution titled ‘Elaboration of an international legally binding instrument on Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with Respect to Human Rights’.

This resolution sets in place a process of negotiations towards an international legally binding instrument on transnational corporations and their liability in the area of human rights. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

Edited by Phil Harris   

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

* This column is based on a longer version published in published in the South Centre’s South Bulletin 83 of 12 February 2015.

Excerpt:

Protestors gather outside the White House to demonstrate against torture on the 10th anniversary of the opening of the U.S. prison facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Charles Davis/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Mar 2 2015 (IPS)

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein has criticised member states for ‘cherry-picking’ human rights – advocating some and openly violating others – perhaps to suit their own national or political interests.

Despite ratifying the U.N. charter reaffirming their faith in fundamental human rights, there are some member states who, “with alarming regularity”, are disregarding and violating human rights, “sometimes to a shocking degree,” he said.

“One Government will thoroughly support women’s human rights and those of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community, but will balk at any suggestion that those rights be extended to migrants of irregular status. Another State may observe scrupulously the right to education, but will brutally stamp out opposing political views." -- United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein
Addressing the opening session of the Geneva-based Human Rights Council (HRC) Monday, Zeid faulted member states for claiming “exceptional circumstances” for their convoluted decisions.

“They pick and choose between rights,” he pointed out, without identifying any member state by name.

“One Government will thoroughly support women’s human rights and those of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community, but will balk at any suggestion that those rights be extended to migrants of irregular status.

“Another State may observe scrupulously the right to education, but will brutally stamp out opposing political views,” he noted.  “A third State will comprehensively violate the political, civil, economic, social and cultural rights of its people, while vigorously defending the ideals of human rights before its peers.”

Asked for her response, Peggy Hicks, global advocacy director at Human Rights Watch (HRW) told IPS, “Prince Zeid has hit the nail on the head.”

If every government that professed a commitment to human rights followed through consistently, she added, “we’d have a much different – and better – world.”

In an ironic twist apparently proving Zeid’s contention, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry lashed out at the “appalling human rights record” of several nations, blasting Syria and North Korea while singling out human rights violations in Crimea and by separatists in Ukraine.

But he did not condemn the devastation caused by Israel’s 50-day aerial bombardments of Palestinians in Gaza last year nor the rocket attacks on Israel by Hamas.

The death toll in the Gaza bombings was 1,976 Palestinians, including 1,417 civilians and 459 children, according to figures released by the United Nations, compared with the killing of 66 Israelis, including two soldiers.

The Palestinians have accused Israel of war crimes and are pushing for action by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague: a move strongly opposed by the United States.

Kerry told the HRC the United States believes that it can continue to make progress and help the U.N. body fulfill its mandate to make the world a better and safer place.

“But for that to happen, we have to get serious about addressing roadblocks to our own progress. And the most obvious roadblock, I have to say to you, is self-inflicted,” he said.

“I’m talking, of course, about HRC’s deeply concerning record on Israel,” Kerry added.

“No one in this room can deny that there is an unbalanced focus on one democratic country,” he said, as he openly advocated the cause of Israel, one of the closest political and military allies of the United States.

And no other nation, he said, has an entire agenda item set aside to deal with it. Year after year, there are five or six separate resolutions on Israel, he told delegates.

This year, he said, there was a resolution sponsored by Syrian President Bashar al Assad concerning the Golan (which has been occupied by Israel since the 1967 war).

“How, I ask, is that a sensible priority at the very moment when refugees from Syria are flooding into the Golan to escape Assad’s murderous rule and receive treatment from Israeli physicians in Israeli hospitals?”

Kerry referred to the Council’s “obsession” with Israel, which, he argued, “actually risks undermining the credibility of the entire organisation.”

Zeid told the HRC the only real measure of a Government’s worth is not its place in the “solemn ballet of grand diplomacy” but the “extent to which it is sensitive to the needs – and protects the rights – of its nationals and other people who fall under its jurisdiction, or over whom it has physical control.”

Some policy-makers persuade themselves that their circumstances are exceptional, creating a wholly new reality unforeseen by the law, Zeid said, adding that such logic is abundant around the world today.

“I arrest arbitrarily and torture because a new type of war justifies it. I spy on my citizens because the fight against terrorism requires it. I don’t want new immigrants, or I discriminate against minorities, because our communal identity is being threatened now as never before. I kill without any form of due process, because if I do not, others will kill me,” he noted.

“And so it goes, on and on, as we spiral into aggregating crises,” Zeid declared.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

By Mandeep S.Tiwana
JOHANNESBURG, Nov 25 2014 (IPS)

Nabeel Rajab, president of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights, an advocacy NGO, is facing criminal charges for sending a tweet that said: “many Bahrain men who joined terrorism and ISIS have come from the security institutions and those institutions were the first ideological incubator”.

Yara Sallam, a young Egyptian woman activist, is in prison for protesting against a public assembly law declared by United Nations experts to be in breach of international law.

In Nigeria, it is illegal to support the formation of `gay clubs and institutions’.

Mandeep S. Tiwana

In Bangladesh, civil society groups are subjected to rigorous scrutiny of their project objectives with a view to discourage documentation of serious human rights abuses.

In Honduras, activists exposing the nexus between big business owners and local officials to circumvent rules operate under serious threat to their lives.

In South Sudan, a draft law is in the making that requires civil society groups to align their work with the government-dictated national development plan.

With barely a year to go before finalisation of the next generation of global development goals, civil society groups are facing increasing challenges as they seek to assume their rightful role as partners in development.

Back in 2010, when the United Nations organised a major summit to take stock of progress on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a number of civil society groups lamented that“too little partnership and too little space” was marring the achievement of MDG targets.“With barely a year to go before finalisation of the next generation of global development goals, civil society groups are facing increasing challenges as they seek to assume their rightful role as partners in development”

They pointed out that, in a large number of countries, legal and practical limitations were preventing civil society groups from being set up, engaging in legitimate undertakings and accessing resources, impeding both the service delivery and watchdog functions of the sector, thereby negatively affecting development activities.

Since then, there has been greater recognition at multilateral levels about the challenges faced by civil society. In 2011, at a high-level forum on aid and development effectiveness, 159 national governments and the European Union resolved to create an “enabling environment” for civil society organisations to maximise their contributions to development.

In 2013, the U.N. Secretary General’s expert High Level Panel on the Post-2015 Development Agenda recommended that a separate goal on good governance and effective institutions should be created. The experts suggested that this goal should include targets to measure freedoms of speech, association, peaceful protest and access to independent media and information, which are integral to a flourishing civil society.

The Open Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has also emphasised the importance of ‘partnership with civil society’ in the post-2015 agenda. Even as restrictions on civil society activities have multiplied around the world, the U.N. Human Rights Council has passed resolutions calling for the protection of civic space.

Senior U.N. officials and experts, including the new High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, have spoken out against state-sanctioned reprisals against activists highlighting human rights abuses at home and abroad.

Yet, despite the progress, civic space appears to be shrinking. The State of Civil Society Report 2014 issued by CIVICUS points out that following the upheavals of the Arab Spring, many governments have felt threatened and targeted activists advocating for civil and political freedoms.

In Ethiopia, bloggers and journalists speaking out against restrictions on speech and assembly have been targeted under counter-terrorism legislation for “inciting” disaffection.

Additionally, the near total dominance of free market economic policies has created a tight overlap between the economic and political elite, putting at risk environmental and land rights activists challenging the rise of politically well-connected mining, construction and agricultural firms.

Global Witness has pointed out that there has been a surge in the killing of environmental activists over the last decade.

Notably, abundant political conflicts and cultural clashes are spurring religious fundamentalism and intolerant attitudes towards women’s equality and the rights of sexual minorities, putting progressive civil society groups at serious risk from both physical attacks as well as politically motivated prosecutions.

In Uganda, concerns have been expressed about the promotion of homophobia by right-wing religious groups.

In Pakistan, indiscriminate attacks on women’s rights activists are seriously impairing their work.

Countering these regressive developments will require greater efforts from the international community to entrench notions of civic space in both developmental as well as human rights forums.

A critical mass of leading civil society organisations has written to U.N. Secretary General Ban ki-Moon urging him to ensure that the post-2015 agenda focuses on the full spectrum of human rights, with clear targets on civil and political rights that sit alongside economic, social and cultural rights.

It is being argued that explicit inclusion of the freedoms of expression, association and peaceful assembly which underpin a vibrant and able civil society should be goals in themselves in the new global development agenda.

It is equally vital to make parallel progress on the human rights front. Many governments that restrict civic freedoms are taking cover under the overbroad provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

They argue that the provisions of the ICCPR on freedom of association and assembly, which are short on detail, are open to multiple interpretations on issues such as the right to operate an organisation without formal registration or to spontaneously organise a public demonstration.

The global discourse on civil society rights would be greatly strengthened if the U.N. Human Rights Committee, the expert body of jurists responsible for interpreting the ICCPR, could comprehensively articulate the scope of these freedoms.

This would complement progress made at the U.N. Human Rights Council and support implementation of comprehensive best practice guidelines issued by the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedoms of peaceful assembly and association.

For now, the odds seem to be heavily stacked against civil society groups fighting for economic, social and political justice. Many powerful governments do not subscribe to democratic values and are fundamentally opposed to the notion of an independent sector. And many democracies have themselves encroached on civic space in the face of perceived security and strategic interests.

Civil society around the world must remain vigilant and act collectively to ensure that the fundamental rights of freedom of expression, association and assembly are protected. We have come too far to let those with vested interests encroach on the space for citizens and civil society to thrive. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

Amid escalating conflicts and rampant violations of human rights all over the world, spreading “human rights education” is not an easy task. But a non-governmental organisation from Japan is beginning to make an impact through its “global citizenship education” approach.

At the current annual meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which began on Sep. 8, two side events marked the beginning of what promises to be a sustained campaign to spread human rights education (HRE).

Alongside the first, the launch of the web resource “The Right to Human Rights Education” by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, a special workshop was also convened on HRE for media professionals and journalists.

The workshop was an initiative of the NGO Working Group on HRE chaired by Soka Gakkai International (SGI), a prominent NGO from Japan fighting for the abolition of nuclear weapons, sustainable development and human rights education.“It is important to raise awareness of human rights education among media professionals and journalists who are invariably caught in the crossfire of conflicts” – Kazunari Fujii, Soka Gakkai International

“This is the first time that the NGO Working Group on Human Rights Education and Learning and a group of seven countries representing the Platform for Human Rights Education and Training have organised a workshop on human rights education for media professionals and journalists,” said Kazunari Fujii, SGI’s Geneva representative.

Fujii has been working among human rights pressure groups in Geneva to mobilise support for intensifying HRE campaigning. “Through the promotion of human rights education, SGI wants to foster a culture of human rights that prevents violations from occurring in the first place,“ Fujii told IPS after the workshop on Tuesday (Sep. 16).

“While protection of human rights is the core objective of the U.N. Charter, it is equally important to prevent the occurrence of human rights abuses,” he argued.

Citing SGI President Daisaku Ikeda’s central message to foster a “culture of human rights”, Fujii said his mission in Geneva is to bring about solidarity among NGOs for achieving SGI’s major goals on human rights, nuclear disarmament and sustainable development.

The current session of the Human Rights Council, which will end on Sep. 26, is grappling with a range of festering conflicts in different parts of the world. “From a human rights perspective, it is clear that the immediate and urgent priority of the international community should be to halt the increasingly conjoined conflicts in Iraq and Syria,” said Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, the new U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights.

“In particular, dedicated efforts are urgently needed to protect religious and ethnic groups, children – who are at risk of forcible recruitment and sexual violence – and women, who have been the targets of severe restrictions,” Al Hussein said in his maiden speech to the Council.

“The second step, as my predecessor [Navanetham Pillay] consistently stressed, must be to ensure accountability for gross violations of human rights and international crimes,” he continued, arguing that “impunity can only lead to further conflicts and abuses, as revenge festers and the wrong lessons are learned.”

Al Hussein, who comes from the Jordanian royal family, wants the Council to address the underlying factors of crises, particularly the “corrupt and discriminatory political systems that disenfranchised large parts of the population and leaders who oppressed or violently attacked independent actors of civil society”.

Among others, he stressed the need to end “persistent discrimination and impunity” underlying the Israel-Palestine conflict – in which 2131 Palestinians were killed during the latest crisis in Gaza, including 1,473 civilians, 501 of them children, and 71 Israelis.

The current session of the Human Rights Council is also scheduled to discuss issues such as basic economic and livelihood rights, which are going to be addressed through the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, the worsening plight of migrants around the world, and the detention of asylum seekers and migrants, including children in the United States.

“Clearly, a number of human rights violations and the worsening plight of indigenous people are major issues that need to be tackled on a sustained basis,” said Fujii. “But it is important to raise the awareness of human rights education among media professionals and journalists who are invariably caught in the crossfire of conflicts.”

During open discussion at the media professionals and journalists workshop, several reporters not only shared their personal experiences but also sought clarity on how reporters can safeguard human rights in conflicts where they are embedded with occupying forces in Iraq or other countries.

“This is a major issue that needs to be addressed because it is difficult for journalists to respect human rights when they are embedded with forces,” Oliver Rizzi Carlson, a representative of the United Network of Young Peacebuilders, told IPS.

Commenting on the work that remains to be done in spreading global citizenship education, Fujii noted that tangible progress has been made by bringing several human rights pressure groups together in intensifying the campaign for human rights education.

“Solidarity within civil society and increasing recognition for our work from member states is bringing about tangible results,” said Fujii. “The formation of an NGO coalition – HR 2020 – comprising 14 NGOs such as Amnesty International and SGI last year is a significant development in the intensification of our campaign.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

By Mandeep S.Tiwana
JOHANNESBURG, Sep 2 2014 (IPS)

The killings of hundreds of civilians, including scores of children, in Gaza – whose only fault was to have been born on the wrong side of the wall – was a major point of contention at the United Nations Human Rights Council at the end of July.

The high death toll caused by indiscriminate bombing of civilian areas by the Israeli military has resulted in what may very likely be war crimes. The United Nations has said that 70 percent of those killed in Gaza were civilians.

Mandeep Tiwana

Yet Western democracies, normally proactive on human rights issues at the Council, chose to withhold their vote when a resolution urging immediate cessation of Israeli military assaults throughout the Occupied Territories, including East Jerusalem, and an end to attacks against all civilians, including Israeli civilians, was brought forward.

Notably, the resolution sought to create an independent international commission of inquiry to investigate all violations of international human rights and humanitarian law in the context of military operations conducted since June 13, 2014.

When asked to vote on the above, Austria, France, Ireland, Italy, Germany and the United Kingdom chose to abstain. The United States, whose foreign policy mission is to “shape and sustain a peaceful, prosperous, just and democratic world and foster conditions for stability and progress for the benefit of the American people and people everywhere,” was ironically the only country in the 47 member U.N. Human Rights Council to have voted against the resolution.“Institutions of global governance should be able to offer a source of protection and support for people who are being repressed, marginalised or excluded at the national level. Yet, too often, they are captured by state interests which override genuine human rights concerns.”

Essentially, each country standing for election to the Human Rights Council is required to “uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights.” By any yardstick, looking at the wanton death and destruction that has rained down on the people of Gaza, destroying the homes and livelihoods of tens of thousands as well as vital public infrastructure, is a blatant abdication of responsibility.

In 2006, when the Human Rights Council was created, then U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan poignantly remarked that the true test of its ability would be the use that member states make of it. Eight years down the line, sadly the Council remains a house divided on the great human rights matters of the day.

Earlier this year in March, when the Human Rights Council passed a resolution aimed at addressing impunity for the widespread violations of international law committed during and after the Sri Lankan civil war, many of the countries strongly in favour of accountability for crimes committed in the Gaza conflict – such as Algeria, China, Cuba, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and Viet Nam – voted against the Sri Lanka resolution. Conversely, Western democracies that abstained on the Gaza vote robustly supported action to tackle impunity in Sri Lanka.

This double standard represents perhaps the greatest challenge to the world’s premier human rights body.

Notably, the Human Rights Council was established in response to well-founded criticism of rampant politicisation of human rights issues by its predecessor, the Commission on Human Rights.  At the Human Rights Council too, geopolitical interests of the more powerful states are driving selective blocking and support for human rights causes by elected member states, weakening respect for international standards. 

Notably, the formation of blocs presents a grave threat to the Council’s work. Its members have unfortunately slotted themselves into various informal groups such as the Western European and Others Group (WEOG),  African Group, Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) countries, and even a motley ‘Like-Minded Group’ that shares little in political culture and world view except that it largely opposes whatever the Western group comes up with.

These unfortunate political dynamics have weakened the ability of the Council to be a beacon for the advancement of human rights discourse. Tellingly, the issue of discrimination against and violations of the personal freedoms of sexual minorities including lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual (LGBT) individuals remains another hotly contested area.

A regressively worded June 2014 resolution on the ‘protection of the family’ – which excludes LGBT individuals from the ambit of the family – witnessed en-masse voting in favour by the African, OIC and ‘Like-Minded Group’.

Worryingly, far too many countries are caught up in the herd mentality of en-masse voting coupled with advancement of strategic interests at the Human Rights Council. Too often, principle is being abandoned at the altar of politics. Every time this happens, the legitimacy of the global governance institution suffers, further exacerbating conflict.

A report by the global civil society alliance, CIVICUS, points out that in an ever more complex governance environment, where large problems are acknowledged to cross national borders, international level decision-making is starting to matter more.

Institutions of global governance should be able to offer a source of protection and support for people who are being repressed, marginalised or excluded at the national level. Yet, too often, they are captured by state interests which override genuine human rights concerns.

Civil society and the media have their work cut out to expose the hypocrisy and inconsistency that mars action on gross human rights violations in international forums like the Human Rights Council. States need to be held accountable and practice what they preach – on principle, and not only when it suits them. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

(Edited by Phil Harris)

Excerpt:

A U.N. Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva. Credit: Jean-Marc Ferré/U.N.

By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA, Mar 28 2014 (IPS)

The bloody events that marked the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war between government and Tamil separatist forces will be the focus of an independent international investigation, according to a United Nations Human Rights Council decision.

The serious human rights violations denounced by U.N. agencies are blamed on both sides. The inquiry will cover the abuses committed during the final period of the 1983-2009 war and after the government’s victory.

Juliette de Rivero, Geneva director of Human Rights Watch, told IPS that nearly five years on, the victims are still awaiting justice and for those responsible to be held to account.

“There are still no answers for the up to 40,000 civilian deaths for the last months of the fighting in Sri Lanka, nor for the 6,000 forcibly disappeared,” she said.

The Sri Lankan government rejected the Human Rights Council resolution adopted Thursday Mar. 27 on the argument that it erodes the sovereignty of the people of Sri Lanka and the core values of the U.N. Charter, the Universal Declaration on Human Rights and the basic principles of law that postulate equality among all people

The resolution was approved with a 23 to 12 vote, with 12 abstentions.

Tamil leaders following the debate in Geneva, where the Council is based, were not completely pleased with the resolution either.

One of the leaders, Visvalingam Manivannan, told IPS that “Our most pressing concern is that the High Commissioner’s (Navi Pillay) report or the resolution say nothing to halt the ongoing genocide against the Tamil nation.

“We are of the opinion that this can only be achieved through the establishment of a U.N.-sponsored transitional administration (in Sri Lanka) established through the aegis of the U.N. Security Council,” said Manivannan, who represents Vigneshvssu Vssu Vssu, an NGO in Special Consultative Status with the U.N. Economic and Social Council.

The case of Sri Lanka has been unusual in terms of the alignments it triggered among the Human Rights Council’s 47 member countries.

The resolution was sponsored by the United States and co-sponsored by the United Kingdom, Macedonia, Mauritius and Montenegro, with strong support from the European Union countries in the debates.

Alongside Sri Lanka, Pakistan took the lead in protesting the resolution, with outspoken support from China and Russia.

This time, Colombo lost the backing of three key Asian nations: India, Indonesia and Japan, which abstained from voting.

The North-South divide that persists in the Council, as in other multilateral bodies, was blurred in this case. Of the 13 African nations, three voted in favour of Sri Lanka, four voted for the U.S.-sponsored resolution and the remaining six abstained, including South Africa.

Among the Latin American members, there was no middle ground. Cuba and Venezuela voted against the resolution and defended the arguments set forth by the Sri Lankan ambassador.

Meanwhile, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico and Peru aligned with Washington. “We did it to end the impunity,” a diplomat from one of these countries told IPS.

Sri Lanka ambassador Ravinatha Arayasinha reached a different conclusion.

“A majority of the 47 members of the Human Rights Council -12 countries opposing and 12 other countries abstaining – has made it clear that they do not support the action taken by the United States, the UK and the co-sponsors of this resolution to impose an international inquiry mechanism concerning Sri Lanka.”

The resolution noted that in her report, the high commissioner had concluded that Sri Lanka’s national justice system and human rights mechanisms had systematically failed in their duty to discover the truth and deliver justice.

The Council thus accepted Pillay’s recommendation that an international inquiry be launched to carry out an in-depth investigation.

A leader of the Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF), Gajendrakumar Ponnampalan, told IPS that “The remedy for violations at the level of gravity that occurred ultimately cannot be anything short of a credible international investigation and a judicial process through the ICC (International Criminal Court) or an Ad Hoc special tribunal.”

A group of experts appointed by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon concluded that Sri Lankan government troops were involved in widespread abuses, including indiscriminate bombing of civilians, summary executions and rapes.

From 80,000 to 100,000 lives were claimed by the civil war between the Sri Lankan army and separatists demanding a Tamil state in the north of the island.

The conflict came to an end when the leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Velupillai Prabhakaran, died in the fighting.

The U.N. experts accused the Tamil separatists of using civilians as human shields, recruiting child soldiers, and killing families trying to flee the fighting.

The U.N. Council resolution called on the Sri Lankan government to carry out a credible independent investigation of the allegations and to put an end to human rights abuses in the South Asian country.

Ponnampalan said “There is an ongoing genocide carried out by the Sri Lankan state, whose goal is the de-Tamilisation of Sri Lanka.

“Any reconciliation project has to include the Tamil nation – smaller in number on the island – and the Sinhala nation – a majority within the current configuration of the Sri Lankan state,” the TNPF leader said.

But “The Sinhala nation has no intention of ‘reconciling’ with the Tamil nation and wants it to assimilate into its vision of a Sinhala Buddhist Sri Lanka,” he maintained.

“Indeed, the only ‘remedy’ for the Tamil people in Sri Lanka is fleeing or assimilation,” he argued.

U.N. Special Rapporteur Ahmed Shaheed presents his report to the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Mar. 14, 2014. Courtesy of Mr. Shaheed's office.

By Omid Memarian
GENEVA, Mar 14 2014 (IPS)

Following the release Friday of his report to the Human Rights Council on the situation in Iran, U.N. Special Rapporteur Ahmed Shaheed urged Tehran to engage with U.N. mandates – firstly by permitting him to enter the country.

“Nobody has been able to go to Iran as a U.N. mandate-holder for nine years now,” Shaheed told IPS in Geneva, Switzerland, where the council is based."Personal attacks are nothing new...just think what Iranian citizens in Tehran or elsewhere might get if they speak out.” -- Ahmed Shaheed

“The next step would be Iran engaging with my mandate or if they wish with the other mandates as well,” said Shaheed, who was appointed to his post in June 2011 and has issued two earlier reports.

The 104-page report is based primarily on interviews with 72 Iranians living in three European countries in December 2013 and 61 statements by Iranians inside Iran and Turkey between September and December 2013.

The special rapporteur also examined reports compiled by organisations focusing on ethnic and religious minority rights in Iran.

While welcoming “positive overtures” made by the Iranian government since Hassan Rouhani became president in August 2013, the report states “they currently do not address fully the fundamental human rights concerns” raised by the U.N. and other human rights-focused bodies.

An estimated 1,539 individuals have been executed, including at least 955 for drug trafficking, since the establishment of the special rapporteur’s mandate in 2011, according to the report.

Some 687 individuals are also believed to have been executed in 2013, 369 of which were announced by official or semi-official government sources.

At least 57 individuals were publicly hanged (one of whom was pardoned after surviving the execution), including at least 28 women, in 2013, according to the report.

In addition to focusing on allegations of the abuse and imprisonment of activists, ethnic and religious minorities and members of the press, the special rapporteur estimates that 900 political prisoners are currently being held in Iranian jails.

Sarah Leah Whitson, the executive director for Middle East & North Africa at Human Rights Watch, told IPS the report’s “findings are consistent with what we’ve been documenting in Iran.

“If Rouhani really wants to make an impression as a leader who is serious about reform in Iran, the first thing he should do is call for a moratorium on executions,” she said.

“The gruesome numbers in a patently unfair justice system cry out for careful review and scrutiny of the evidence against all those facing death sentences in Iran,” added Whitson.

On Wednesday, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Rouhani has not delivered on his human rights promises after the release of his own report on Iranian human rights to the General Assembly.

His remarks were met with sharp condemnation from Tehran.

Ali Akbar Velayati, an advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called Ban “the weakest secretary-general [in the history] of the U.N.”

Speaker of the Iranian Parliament Ali Larijani said the report was “dictated by Mossad and the CIA.”

Ban also called for Iran to allow Shaheed, who previously served two terms as the foreign minister of the Maldives, to visit Iran and investigate the charges that have been laid against it.

Last January, when a draft of the special rapporteur’s report was presented to Iran for feedback, Iran’s judiciary head Sadegh Larijani publicly spoke about the report, which violated a U.N. protocol requiring Iran to keep the report confidential until its release to the Human Rights Council.

“It is clear to all that preparing biased reports about the situation of human rights in Iran is aimed to exert more pressure on the Islamic Republic, and the Westerners don’t really have any human rights concerns,” said Larijani at a meeting of high-ranking judicial officials.

“Personal attacks are nothing new,” Shaheed told IPS, adding that “If a U.N. mandate holder, or the U.N. secretary-general, or other officials can be attacked so much for what they say, just think what Iranian citizens in Tehran or elsewhere might get if they speak out.”

“Iran is much better served if it engages in a debate,” he said.

The special rapporteur’s findings criticise the Iranian Supreme Leader’s extensive influence on the judiciary and the fact that his judgments can supersede judicial rulings.

The report also states that most reported violations of human rights in Iran occur during pre-trial stages, in detention centres or in court.

“The situation in Iran is not as bleak as Mr. Shaheed reflects in his report, but so long as there is no constructive dialogue between the two sides, nothing can be resolved,” a member of the Iranian delegation who asked not to be named told IPS.

The judiciary is constitutionally independent from the executive branch in Iran, but since the election of Rouhani, who campaigned on a platform of moderation, there has been a growing expectation for him to implement reforms.

But apart from the release of 80 political prisoners last year under Rouhani’s watch, which is noted by the report, hardline conservatives who dominate the Judiciary and the security establishment have shown little flexibility on the issue of reforms .

“Every country has issues, and Iran has a large share of that and it should address it by engagement,” Shaheed told IPS.

The Human Rights Council will vote on the renewal of his mandate following the report’s review on Mar. 17.

Everyday life for women and girls in Saudi Arabia depends on the goodwill of male guardians at all times. Credit: Rebecca Murray/IPS

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 30 2013 (IPS)

When Saudi Arabia permitted women to vote but not drive, a newspaper cartoon last year captured the double standard with dark irony.

As a group of women in burqa wait in line to vote at a polling station in Riyadh, an aggressive-looking polling agent tells the women, “We have a small problem here. We need your driver’s licence as identification.”"Saudi Arabia stands out for its extraordinarily high levels of repression." -- HRW's Joe Stork

The only country in the world where women are still not permitted to drive is in the running for a seat on the Geneva-based Human Rights Council (HRC) for a three-year term, beginning January 2014.

The elections for the four vacant seats in the Asia-Pacific group, based on geographical rotation, are scheduled to take place in the General Assembly Nov. 12. The five candidates in the running are China, Jordan, the Maldives, Vietnam and Saudi Arabia.

Since Saudi Arabia rejected its Security Council seat after being voted into office last week, there is speculation whether it will do the same in the 47-member HRC, if it wins the seat.

Adam Coogle of Human Rights Watch (HRW) told IPS, “Our Geneva team has asked around and no one apparently has heard that Saudi Arabia may not accept the HRC seat. Obviously that doesn’t mean it can’t happen, but we won’t comment on it at this point.”

Suad Abu-Dayyeh of the New York-based Equality Now told IPS that Saudi Arabia, like many countries around the world, needs to make substantial improvements to its provision and protection of the rights of women and girls.

“These fundamental human rights abuses such as the lack of a minimum age of marriage and an effective ban on women driving have been well-documented and are extremely damaging,” she said.

Everyday life for women and girls in Saudi Arabia depends on the goodwill of male guardians at all times – a predicament which utterly limits freedom of movement for the Kingdom’s women and girls and something which needs to be urgently changed, she said.
Recent indications that Saudi Arabia has been making very tentative steps to address this situation are positive, but much more is needed, she added.

“We encourage the Kingdom to use all opportunities for positive engagement as stepping stones towards making transformational advancements in its treatment of women and girls,” she added.

Last week, scores of women defied the government by driving through the streets of Saudi Arabia. According to published reports, the police detained several women drivers and asked them to sign pledges not to drive in the future.

Sheik Mohammed al-Nujaimi, a Saudi cleric, said last week the campaign to permit women drivers in Saudi Arabia would lead to ruined marriages, a low birth rate, spread of adultery, more car accidents and “excessive spending on beauty products.”

Last week, Saudi Arabia was one of the countries whose human rights record came under the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) undertaken by the HRC.

But HRW’s Coogle told IPS Saudi Arabia’s engagement in its UPR was little more than delivering prepared statements that failed to respond to detailed criticism on its rights record.

“Saudi Arabia took the UPR as a routine foreign policy obligation, not as an opportunity to commit to urgently needed reform,” he said.

In a statement released last week, HRW singled out a litany of human rights violations by Saudi Arabia.

Since the beginning of 2013, Saudi Arabia has convicted seven prominent human rights and civil society activists on broad, catch-all charges, such as “trying to distort the reputation of the kingdom,” “breaking allegiance with the ruler,” and “setting up an unlicensed organisation.”

Joe Stork, HRW’s deputy Middle East director, said many countries have problematic records, “but Saudi Arabia stands out for its extraordinarily high levels of repression and its failure to carry out its promises to the Human Rights Council.”

Despite longstanding reform promises, the government of Saudi Arabia has failed to make substantive changes, said a statement released by HRW. “In particular, it should improve its arbitrary criminal justice system, abolish the system of male guardianship over women, and throw out discriminatory aspects of its sponsorship system for foreign workers, which leave workers vulnerable to abuses including forced labour.”

Saudi Arabia also stands out for its failure to heed the recommendations of its most recent Human Rights Council review in February 2009.

HRW said Saudi Arabia should sign and ratify core U.N. human rights treaties and agreements such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and the Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.

Hillel Neuer, executive director of the Geneva-based U.N. Watch, a strongly pro-Israeli non-governmental organisation (NGO), was quoted as saying, “Making Saudi Arabia a world judge on women’s rights and religious freedom would be like naming a pyromaniac as the town fire chief.”

Edward Snowden’s revelations have given rise to criticism of the governments of many countries, including Mexico. Credit: The Guardian/Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras

By Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Sep 13 2013 (IPS)

Non-governmental organisations are urging the United Nations Human Rights Council to demand explanations from the Mexican state for the weak protection it provided its citizens from large-scale spying by the United States.

On Oct. 23, the U.N. Human Rights Council will review Mexico’s human rights record at its Universal Periodic Review, during its 17th session, to be held Oct. 21-Nov. 1 in Geneva.

The other countries to be reviewed in the session are Belize, Central African Republic, Chad, China, Congo, Jordan, Malaysia, Malta, Mauritius, Monaco, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Senegal.

“The issue is on the radar now more than ever due to Edward Snowden’s revelations and the recent developments,” said Carly Nyst, head of international advocacy at Privacy International (PI), a UK-based registered charity that defends and promotes the right to privacy across the world.

She was referring to Snowden, the low-level employee of Booz Allen Hamilton who blew the whistle on the U.S. National Security Agency’s (NSA) global electronic surveillance.

“The U.N. is slowly acknowledging the implications of the surveillance,” she told IPS. “Mexican civil society has the best opportunity to ask the Council to hold its government accountable.”

In March, PI presented the report “The Right to Privacy in Mexico”, warning of the risks of government meddling in this country’s electronic communications.

“Despite Mexico’s efforts to strengthen and embed protection of personal data both in its constitutional and legislative framework, there are concerns over certain surveillance practices and laws that have come into force since Mexico’s last UPR,” the report says.

“However, there is in general a lack of information and transparency surrounding the purchase and use of surveillance software by the Mexican government,” it adds.

The British newspaper the Guardian reported in June that the NSA was collecting the telephone records of millions of customers of the Verizon phone company, both within the United States and between the U.S. and other countries.

The source of that information was Snowden, who is wanted by Washington on charges of espionage and has been granted temporary asylum in Russia.

Since then, a river of ink has flowed on the U.S. surveillance of private communications around the world, including Mexico.

Mexico has also acquired software to monitor telephone calls, email, chats, social media activity and browsing history.

“The [U.N. Human Rights] Council could hold it accountable for failing to react,” said Cédric Laurant, one of the four founders of the Mexican NGO Son Tus Datos (It’s Your Information), which has been advocating protection of privacy since 2012.

“It would be good if it did so. It would be good if pressure were put on the Mexican government,” he told IPS.

In its report to the Human Rights Council, Mexico makes no mention of protecting privacy or personal information.

The Federal Law on the Protection of Personal Data, which went into effect in 2010, guarantees privacy and regulates the collection, use and disclosure of personal data, applying to both private and public entities.

But the law’s guarantees were undermined when a Law on Geolocalisation entered into force in 2012. This legislation allows the government to gather, without notification and in real time, geographic data from cell-phone users.

In its March report “You Only Click Twice: FinFisher’s Global Proliferation”, the
Citizen Lab – an interdisciplinary laboratory at the University of Toronto, Canada – identified command and control servers for intrusive surveillance technology called FinFisher, sold by Gamma International UK Ltd, in a number of countries, including two in the networks of private Mexican phone companies.

After the report was released, two Mexican organisations, Propuesta Cívica and ContingenteMX, asked the Federal Institute of Access to Information (IFAI) in June to investigate the use of the FinFisher spyware.

U.S. journalist Glenn Greenwald reported on Sept. 1 that the NSA monitored the communications networks of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, including telephone, Internet and social network exchanges, during their election campaigns.

Only then did the Mexican government react sharply, calling on the U.S. administration of Barack Obama to conduct a thorough investigation, although in a less strongly worded statement than the one issued by the Brazilian government.

“I’m not sadly surprised, because governments have one perspective when it’s about the citizens and another about the politicians,” Nyst said.

“It’s important Mexican society takes this opportunity and targets the government so that it doesn’t create more insecurity. We’re not going to get rid of surveillance, but we can ask for more transparency and accountability,” she added.

PI, which also drew up reports on Senegal and China, is preparing a legal offensive against Gamma International for exporting FinFisher.

It is working with Mexican civil society organisations to get the IFAI to take in-depth action on intrusive surveillance by the government and private parties.

The issue will also be raised at the 35th International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners, to take place Sept. 23-26 in Warsaw with the participation of civil society.

PI warns that “without adequate safeguards, such legislation, which endows government authorities with broad surveillance powers, compromises Mexican citizens’ right to privacy, and is in any event an inappropriate and disproportionate response to the intended purpose.”

It also recommends ensuring “that the use of surveillance software is strictly regulated and monitored by the Department of Defence and overseen by judicial and other independent authorities.”

In addition it calls for ensuring “that appropriate mechanisms and reviews are put in place to guarantee that use of surveillance software is and remains necessary, legitimate and proportionate…[and demonstrating] transparency with respect to the purchase and use of surveillance software by government authorities.”

Civil society “can demand to be allowed active participation in legislative processes, and ways for different sectors to be represented. They can send letters to the Mexican state, the presidency, Congress, as people do in the United States,” Laurant said.

The U.N. declaration on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas would protect farmers like this woman weeding a field in South Sudan's Eastern Equatoria state. Credit: Charlton Doki/IPS

By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA, Jul 27 2013 (IPS)

Staunch opposition by the U.S. delegation and, to one extent or another, by European countries has blocked the approval this year of a draft multilateral declaration on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, which is backed by the developing world.

Bolivian diplomat Angélica Navarro, chair of the intergovernmental working group tasked with drafting the declaration, recommended that it meet again in mid-2014.

Navarro said that in the meantime, she would hold consultations with representatives of governments, civil society and the United Nations, which is promoting the initiative through its Human Rights Council.

“From the start we knew the process would be difficult, because the positions of some countries clashed with certain provisions in the declaration,” said Malik Özden, representative of the Europe-Third World Centre (CETIM), a Geneva-based NGO that is behind the draft declaration.

Özden told IPS that industrialised nations critical of the draft document wanted to remove some fundamental elements from the text, such as references to land grabbing and intellectual property rights over agricultural technologies and inputs, especially seeds.

The draft declaration seeks to protect peasants who work the land themselves and rely above all on family labour in agriculture, cattle-raising, pastoralism, and handicrafts-related to agriculture.

The term peasant also applies to landless people in rural areas engaged in various activities such as fishing, making crafts for the local market, or providing services.

Besides the human rights and fundamental freedoms of peasants, the document recognises their right to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, as well as their right to define their own food and agriculture systems.

The declaration also upholds their right to land and territory and to benefit from land reform, as well as their right to determine the varieties of seeds they want to plant and to reject varieties of plants which they consider to be dangerous economically, ecologically and culturally – aspects that collide with the interests of transnational agribusiness corporations.

Christophe Golay, from the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights, said the draft declaration guarantees individual rights that can be collectively exercised.

But in the case of seeds and ecological diversity, the document includes completely new rights, he told IPS.

However, Golay pointed to a few gaps in the draft declaration, such as the lack of references to social security for peasants and to their protection in conflict zones.

The working group, which met Jul. 15-19 in Geneva, heard reports from experts, academics and delegates of peasant organisations.

In the meeting, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food Olivier de Schutter and his predecessor Jean Ziegler (2000-2008) did not hesitate to support the draft declaration.

But the United States raised jurisdictional objections, arguing that the Human Rights Council and its subsidiary bodies were not the right forum for discussing many of the issues proposed by the declaration.

A U.S. delegate even noted that the Council’s Advisory Committee, where the peasants’ right initiative first emerged, frequently mentioned the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in its report.

For that reason, he maintained, many of these debates should also take place in the FAO Food Security World Committee.

“The Advisory Committee final study admits that the draft declaration enumerates new rights, but many of these proposed new rights are not human rights,” the U.S. delegate said. “That is, they are not universal rights, held and enjoyed by individuals and that every individual may demand from his or her own government.”

He also said the draft declaration proposed to afford peasants collective human rights. But “we believe that efforts to create human rights for groups instead of for individuals are inconsistent with international human rights law,” he said, adding that “I want to be clear that we are not prepared to negotiate a draft declaration on the rights of peasants.”

The European Union also criticised the Council’s creation of the working group, and said it would not participate in negotiations of the draft declaration, although it left open the possibility of discussing improvements in the conditions of peasants in other forums.

The developing countries said they would continue backing the draft declaration, but conceded that certain points could be modified in order to reach a consensus.

Navarro told IPS that the working group was authorised by the Human Rights Council to hold sessions for three years in a row, and mentioned the possibility of the negotiations dragging on, even for decades, as has occurred in the case of international treaties in other areas.

But Özden was optimistic, even though he agreed with Navarro that the process could take years. “We hope the representatives of the states will be sensitive to the arguments of citizens and not just those of transnational corporations,” he said.

The number of peasants worldwide has not been stated in the documents presented to the working group.

In 2010, FAO estimated the number of people involved in agriculture at 1.394 billion, 1.357 billion of whom were in the developing world.

The U.N. agency noted that since 1950, the proportion of people dedicated to farming had steadily gone down, as the percentage of people involved in other economic activities had grown.

U.N. Human Rights Council president Laura Dupuy. Credit: United Nations

By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA, Dec 14 2012 (IPS)

The first woman to preside over the United Nations Human Rights Council, Uruguayan diplomat Laura Dupuy, has made it with flying colours through one of the periods of greatest tension and conflict since the council replaced the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in 2006.

It has fallen to Dupuy to preside over regular and special sessions this year with heated debates over the dramatic events in Arab countries like Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, and especially Syria.

The Permanent Representative of Uruguay to the United Nations Office at Geneva has won recognition from her colleagues and from non-governmental organisations for getting occasionally stormy sessions back on track.

Dupuy told IPS that being a woman was not an obstacle to fulfilling her role, which concludes Dec. 31. “Luckily I did not encounter hurdles,” she said. “In fact, I think that countries that could have put difficulties in my way were very careful not to do so.”

Q: What reactions have you observed since the annual sessions commenced last March?

A: It’s possible that some people had doubts about what might happen with a president they did not know. But they soon saw that I stuck to the rules and was firm. After that they respected me.

Q: But did you run across any stumbling blocks because you are a woman?

A: I had some problems, but…I don’t think they were very serious. The most difficult moment was when we discussed the case of Bahrain, because there were protests about my intervention and complaints about the intimidation being suffered there by human rights defenders who attended the debate in Geneva for the Universal Periodic Review on the situation in that Arab country.

Q: Were there any other tough times?

A: Yes, but they weren’t personal. What I have unfortunately seen in the chamber is that some countries, basically the Islamic nations, still have a fairly retrograde discourse. In fact, I am worried that there may be a regression with respect to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, approved in 1948.

I am also concerned that something similar may happen among the Islamic states in regard to the Vienna Declaration, adopted in 1993 by the World Conference on Human Rights, which reaffirmed that women’s rights are human rights.

Q: Have you noted this regressive tendency at any other time?

A: We see it when they continue to question or attempt to limit the scope of the new Working Group on Discrimination against Women in law and in practice. The fact that, although they did not vote against it, they expressed discontent with the new mandate, is an indication of the situation.

Q: Do you think this bias still persists?

A: It does. Unfortunately, it is being confirmed. For instance, in Egypt now, with the draft constitution. The Egyptian expert has just told me that the paragraph referring to non-discrimination for any reason, including gender, has been eliminated from the draft. This is serious. It is a central principle of human rights.

Q: Is this issue restricted to a single region?

A: No, it also arises in the declaration of human rights approved in November by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). The text was negotiated merely between governments, without consulting civil society, and there was a major problem with women’s rights in the drafting of the text.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay was not satisfied. But after the ASEAN declaration was approved, another resolution was added, saying that the declaration would be implemented in accordance with the 1948 Universal Declaration.

We hope that this will be the case, and that as matters develop they will comply with this aspect. To sum up, from the point of view of women’s rights, I think there is still much that remains to be done.

Q: What have been the highlights of your presidency of the Council?

A: The period has been marked, unfortunately, by all the serious and urgent human rights situations that the Council has examined, with the willingness to listen to all the parties, including the voices that are often silenced, such as the victims of rights abuses.

In future periods, the U.N. Human Rights Council will have to discuss the best ways to tackle these crises, and ways to prevent them.

Q: Are there any indications of how the Council can deal with the problem?

A: When the Council reviewed its work and operations in 2011, among other issues it addressed the ways in which it can deal with serious cases of human rights violations.

Among other proposals, the draft suggested establishing mechanisms that would act as external, objective and independent triggers, in the case of urgent situations. The initiative was discarded, and as a result the Council continues to face critical situations mainly through the means of holding special sessions of its members.

Q: What results have these special sessions had?

A: To an extent, the special sessions have proved quite successful at dealing with urgent situations. We have always managed to reach the minimum number of 16 member states to sign the request to convene such a session, as seen by the 19 special sessions held so far.

However, it must be acknowledged that the results of these sessions always depend on negotiations.

Q: This year, what stands out is that the situation in Syria called for four special sessions of the Council.

A: Some people may think that holding four special sessions did not really help to improve the situation on the ground in Syria.

However, by holding so many special sessions as well as an urgent debate, the Council has fulfilled its political responsibilities, keeping a close watch on events and sending a commission of inquiry charged with gathering information and evidence, with a view to potential future criminal proceedings in respect to the current conflict.

Q: What are your conclusions about this case?

A: After many months of crisis and armed conflict, there is mounting pressure not only to come up with political solutions, but also to hold accountable those responsible for crimes against human rights and against international humanitarian law.

As a consequence, the priority that emerges is a political solution with peace, justice and an end to impunity.

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