Human Rights Council at 10: Civil society recommendations
In a joint briefing paper published on the occasion of the anniversary of the Human Rights Council, 20 leading national, regional and international human rights NGOs have outlined a series of concrete steps and proposals that would strengthen the impact of the Council’s work.
The civil society paper outlines a broad vision of a Council that directly guides the actions of State and non-state actors, addresses serious rights violations head on, provides space for civil society, and demands better adherence to basic membership standards.The paper was coordinated by the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR) with the input of global NGOs including the ICJ, as well as organisations from all regions.
The paper can be downloaded here (in PDF): http://www.ishr.ch/HRCat10
ICJ submission to EU consultation on preventing and combating hatred
The ICJ called today on the EU institutions to bridge the final implementation gaps to ensure an effective access to justice to victims of violent hate crimes.
The contribution of the ICJ was submitted as input for the European Commission’s first annual fundamental rights colloquium to be held next October and focused on “Tolerance and respect: preventing and combating antisemitic and anti-Muslim hatred in Europe”.
In its submission, the ICJ finds that the greatest weakness in addressing violent hate crime currently lies primarily in the failure of effective national implementation, which has meant that, despite development of the law, and despite authoritative recommendations from international and EU human rights bodies, the frequency of commission of violent hate crimes appears to have increased, and impunity for such crimes has persisted.
The ICJ considers that there are two main reasons for this lack of implementation: 1) lack of political or institutional will in Member States; 2) lack of implementation tools tailored to the laws, legal institutions and culture of the single national legal system.
The ICJ concluds, in its contribution, that it is the time for the European Union institutions to take up the opportunity to unite the efforts of all those concerned in the administration of justice – judges, court administrators, lawyers, civil society, judicial organizations, bar associations and government officers – throughout the EU to work together on the detailed technical assistance needed for an effective implementation of the right to an effective remedy for victims of crimes motivated by discrimination.
EU-Colloquium2015-ICJContribution-ViolentHateCrimes-Advocacy-non legal submission-2015-eng (download the submission)
Discussion of “protection of the family” at UN Human Rights Council must reflect diversity and focus on human rights
The ICJ and other NGOs have issued a joint statement urging the UN Human Rights Council to ensure that a discussion of “protection of the family” in September will reflect diversity and focus on human rights.
The ICJ is concerned, due to the way the resolution to establish the Panel discussion has been pursued, that some States will seek to exploit it as a vehicle for promoting a narrow, exclusionary and patriarchal concept of “the family” that denies equal protection to the human rights of individuals who belong to the various and diverse forms of family that exist across the globe.
Previous UN resolutions on the family include language, agreed by all States, that recognized that “various forms of the family exist”. The authors of the resolution deliberately omitted this language, despite this issue being consistently raised by other States throughout the negotiations.
A wholly inappropriate procedural tactic was used by some states to block discussion of a proposed amendment that would have restored the “various forms” language.
Efforts to ensure that the resolution clearly acknowledged and addressed the fact that the family is also a setting in which human rights abuses sometimes take place were partially successful.
The Panel topic will be “on the protection of the family and its members to address the implementation of States’ obligations under relevant provisions of international human rights law and to discuss challenges and best practices in this regard” (emphasis added).
The resolution reaffirms “that States have the primary responsibility to promote and protect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all human beings, including women, children and older persons”. Unfortunately, however, the text of the resolution still does not give enough emphasis to this important aspect.
The organizations affirm that they will continue to insist on recognition that various forms of the family exist, and that individuals should not be discriminated against as a result of the form of family to which they happen to belong.
States should not fail to promote and protect the rights of persons because they belong to particular forms of family.
The organizations will continue to insist that the promotion and protection of the human rights of individuals within all families must be of the paramount importance to the UN Human Rights Council.
The joint statement may be downloaded in PDF here: HRC26-Joint statement family resolution-Advocacy-Position paper-2014
ICJ urges Senate to reject ‘Protection of Pakistan’ Bill
The ICJ today called on the Pakistan Senate to reject a Bill that would grant the military and law enforcement authorities sweeping powers to detain individuals, in contravention of international human rights standards.
ICJ calls for more human rights protection in EU home affairs
The ICJ submitted today its contribution to the public consultation of the European Commission on the future of home affairs policies in the European Union.
In its contribution, the ICJ highlighted the need to increase human rights protection in EU home affairs legislation and in its implementation.
The ICJ submission recommends an increased monitoring of the human rights compliance of draft legislation; calls for increased transparency in the legislative process; and for a better use of infringement proceedings by the European Commission to ensure the effective implementation of EU home affairs legislation with particular attention to the protection of human rights.
The ICJ addressed, in its contribution, the importance of a correct and human rights compliant implementation of the new Common European Asylum System, and the need of further reforms in the EU legislation on asylum, migration and border control.
Finally, the ICJ stressed the poor record of the EU institutions, besides the European Parliament, in ensuring accountability for human rights violations committed in countering terrorism, for example in the cases of the National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance programme scandal and in the cases of alleged complicity of European States in the US-led system of renditions and secret detentions.
EU-PublicConsultation-ICJ-FutureHomeAffairs-2014-Final (download the contribution)
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