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The Prevention Council
3 February 2020
For the UN’s prevention agenda to work, it is vital to build a business case for placing human rights at its heart.
URG Insights
Building momentum towards the realisation of environmental rights in Africa
by Joseph Burke, Tom Bicko, Universal Rights Group (ALLIED coordinator)
In the powerful words of the global environmental icon, Professor Wangari Maathai, ‘[t]here comes a time when humanity is called to shift to a new level of consciousness so that she stops threatening its life-support system.’ The twin resolutions by the UN Human Rights Council (resolution 48/13, adopted on 8 October 2021) and the UN General Assembly (UNGA) (resolution 76/300, adopted on 28 July 2022) that recognised the universal right of everyone, everywhere, to live in a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment evidenced a growing global consciousness regarding our planet. The landmark resolutions, historic in themselves, were also a new…
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Report of the 35th Special Session of the Human Rights Council on the deteriorating human rights situation in the Islamic Republic of Iran
by Geneva
On Thursday 24 November 2022, the Human Rights Council convened a special session to address ‘the deteriorating human rights situation in the Islamic Republic of Iran, especially with respect to women and children’. The Special Session was requested via an official letter dated 11 November signed by H.E. Katharina Stasch, Permanent Representative of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United Nations Office and other International Organizations in Geneva, and H.E. Einar Gunnarsson Permanent Representative of Iceland to the United Nations Office and other International Organizations in Geneva. This letter, addressed to H.E. Federico Villegas, President of the Human Rights…
Have the 2022 elections produced a stronger or a weaker Human Rights Council?
by Marc Limon, Executive Director of the Universal Rights Group, Joseph Burke
On 11 October 2022, the UN General Assembly (GA) in New York convened to elect new members of the Human Rights Council for the term 2023-2025. As soon as the votes were cast and members elected, diplomats and civil society representatives, as always, began to ask themselves whether the newly composed Council (which will sit from 1 January next year) will be better or worse than the outgoing one? To answer this question objectively, it is instructive to compare the human rights records and commitments of incoming members (as measured against the criteria and election set out in GA resolution…
Report on the 51st session of the Human Rights Council
by the URG team
Quick summary The 51st regular session of the Human Rights Council (HRC51) was held from Monday 12 September to Friday 7 October 2022. With Ms. Michelle Bachelet’s mandate as the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights having come to an end on 31 August 2022, and the incoming UN High Commissioner, Mr. Volker Türk, not taking up his official functions until 17 October 2022, following his appointment by the Secretary General and its approval by the General Assembly on 8 September, Ms. Nada Al-Nashif, opened HRC51, as Acting High Commissioner, by presenting a global update on the situation of human…
Between Principles and Pragmatism: How African states vote at the UN Human Rights Council
by Hassan Shire, Executive Director of DefendDefenders (the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project) and the Chairperson of AfricanDefenders (the Pan-African Human Rights Defenders Network), based in Kampala, Uganda, Nicolas Agostini, Representative to the United Nations for DefendDefenders
What would a comprehensive analysis of the voting record of African states at the UN Human Rights Council look like? The question isn’t easy, but we hope that the answer DefendDefenders and AfricanDefenders formulated will quench the thirst of those—diplomats, human rights advocates, or mere Council observers—who pay attention to the African Group… or worry about its voting patterns. As African human rights NGOs, we watch what African states do in regional and multilateral fora closely. As the Council approached its 50th session, we realised that to date, no one had analysed their voting behaviour in a systematic manner. This…
latest policy report
On 8-9 June 2022, the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (Peace and Human Rights Division, and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation), with the…
previous policy reports
Guide to the 2022 Human Rights Council Elections
The eighth annual yourHRC.org Guide to the Human Rights Council elections provides comprehensive at-a-glance information on the 2022 Council elections (which are scheduled to take…SUPPORTING ENVIRONMENTAL HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS: Developing New Guidance for Donors and Civil Society Organisations
Over the last two years, the Alliance for Land, Indigenous, and Environmental Defenders (ALLIED) worked closely with defenders and local organisations in five countries: Brazil,…Understanding and responding to the protection needs of climate activists and movements
As climate change impacts our everyday lives, livelihoods, and ecosystems, significantly harming the world’s most vulnerable populations, thousands of individuals and groups have raised their…URG next event
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28 Sep 2022
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16 May 2022
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27 Apr 2022
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26 Apr 2022
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12 Apr 2022
The Istanbul Process is the dedicated mechanism for follow-up on the implementation of the action plan set out in Human Rights Council resolution 16/18 on combatting intolerance, negative stereotyping and stigmatisation of, and discrimination, incitement to violence and violence against, persons based on religion or belief.
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