Latest tweets
Urgent Debate on the #HumanRights situation in #EasternGhouta now under way at #HRC37 in Geneva! Follow live here twitter.com/URGthinktank/s…
reply
retweet
favoriteLatest policy reports
Corruption, especially grand corruption, has enormous implications, both direct and indirect, for the enjoyment of human rights. Corruption undermines – perhaps even violates – a wide array of economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to development. Where governments fail to respect and protect civil and political rights, it in turn creates governance conditions…
Reform of the UN human rights petitions system
by Marc Limon (URG)In this groundbreaking new policy report on the UN human rights petitions system, Marc Limon offers a first-ever comparative analysis of the visibility, accessibility, responsiveness and effectiveness of all the…
Reform of the UN human rights petitions system
by Marc Limon (URG)The human rights communications procedures are central to the purpose, effectiveness and credibility of the United Nations – representing the only direct link between the victims of human rights violations…
Human Rights Council strengthening conference
There is a growing recognition that as the Human Rights Council (HRC) approaches its twelve year anniversary there is a need to undertake an inclusive, cross regional and structured dialogue…
Human Rights and the Sustainable Development Goals – Pursuing Synergies
If the 2030 Agenda is to be realised in a way that truly does ‘leave no one behind,’ then human rights obligations and commitments must be applied, implemented and protected…
The Human Rights Council in 2017
The ‘Human Rights Council in 2017’ report provides a critique of the main events, developments, successes and failures of the Human Rights Council in 2017. The review includes: – A quantitative…
Media coverage of the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2016
Global human rights crises and concerns are never far for the front pages of the world’s major newspapers, nor far from the screens of our TVs and iPads. Yet this…
Operationalizing the Council’s ‘prevention’ mandate (Glion IV)
by the URG teamThe Human Rights Council’s mandate to respond to human rights violations, including gross and systematic violations – as set down in operative paragraph 3 of GA resolution 60/251 – is…
URG Insights
Time for a ‘Universal Magnitsky Act’?
by Marc Limon, Mary Grace Carey, Universal Rights Group
In 2009, Russian tax accountant Sergei Magnitsky died in a Moscow prison after investigating a $230 million tax fraud involving Russian officials. A subsequent investigation into his case by the Kremlin’s own human rights commission, ordered and endorsed (in July 2011) by the-then Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev, found that in order to silence Magnitsky, corrupt…
Human rights treaty bodies in the field: The experience of the African regional system
by Geneva
In a 2017 post on this site, Christof Heyns and Willem Gravett proposed the idea of external sessions for the UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies – they should meet at least once a year for part of the session outside Geneva, in order to ‘bring the system closer to the people’. This idea generated considerable interest, including…
The UN Secretary-General’s human rights crisis can be solved
by Dr Bertrand G. Ramcharan
There is a crisis in the United Nations human-rights system. Secretary-General António Guterres can lead the way out of it. Indeed, the world continues to look to the UN secretary-general to stand up for the principles of the organisation. One of the highest responsibilities of the incumbent is to help steer a course toward realising…
It is time for the United Nations to recognise the human right to a healthy environment
by Professor John H. Knox, UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment
Earlier this month, on World Environment Day, the Executive Director of UN Environment, Erik Solheim, and I jointly stated that the historic moment has arrived for the United Nations to recognise the human right to a healthy environment at the global level. The fundamental UN human rights treaties do not include this right because the…
US departure from the Human Rights Council: what really happened and what will happen next?
by Marc Limon
On 19th June, the US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, flanked by the Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, announced that the US would resign its membership of the UN Human Rights Council. The news rocked the Council and the wider UN, with many delegations, especially Western delegations, visibly shaken by the news and its implications…