UN Human Rights Council makes progress in country monitoring and work on climate change, despite efforts by some States to limit the work of independent mandates
As the 57th session of the UN Human Rights Council has come to a close, the ICJ reaffirms its view that the UN’s main human rights institution continues to serve as an indispensable body for advancing the promise of human rights for the world’s population. The effectiveness of the Council is often undermined by political sabotage and instrumentalization of human rights by certain spoiler States and a failure to bring sufficient resources to its work.
Yet despite its numerous shortcomings, the Council has shown that it can act to address many of the world’s most human rights pressing situations where there is a will to do so.
At the 57th session, which took place from 9 September to 11 October 2024 in Geneva, the Council was able to renew critical mandates including on Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, the Russian Federation, Venezuela and Sudan, and address such issues as climate change, the rights of migrants and of Indigenous Peoples, the rights to water and sanitation, domestic violence or terrorism.
The ICJ staff from around the world, together with partner organizations, participated actively in the work of the Council, bringing the attention of its members to systematic and widespread human rights situations and gaps in international protection. This critical engagement of civil society is essential if the Council, which is made up of 47 States elected by the UN General Assembly, is to be responsive to the needs of those on whose behalf they purport to act.
Country situations
The ICJ welcomes the adoption by a majority vote of the resolutions renewing the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Russian Federation, and of the Fact-finding mission on Sudan. While we deplore the negative efforts of those States that did not consider the patently atrocious human rights situations in these countries worthy of Council monitoring, we appreciate that the results of this year’s vote show an increase support for both resolutions.
The ICJ also welcomes the adoption by consensus of resolutions on the human rights situations in Afghanistan and Sri Lanka. On Afghanistan, we note the importance of the renewal for one year of the mandate of the Special Rapporteur, with strengthened resources. However, it is a real failure of the Council to have omitted any provision for a robust accountability mechanism, especially when more than half of the country, namely Afghanistan’s women, are under systematic persecution and treated as second-class citizens. The ICJ joins Afghan and international civil society allies in deploring the lack of concrete action to establish an international investigative mechanism that can gather and preserve evidence with a view to holding perpetrators accountable and provide redress for the many victims and survivors of human rights atrocities in the country. The ICJ will remain mobilized to advocate for the establishment of such a mechanism.
While Sri Lanka underwent presidential elections on 21 September 2024, the HRC adopted by consensus a resolution renewing for one year both the enhanced monitoring and reporting mandate of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) addressing
reconciliation and accountability, as well as the mandate of the Sri Lanka Accountability Project of the OHCHR tasked to collect, analyse and preserve evidence for gross violations of international human rights and humanitarian law. While the length of the mandate is too short, many civil society groups, especially victims of the internal armed conflict which ended in 2009, remain unconvinced that the new political situation will allow for legitimate and credible accountability processes at the domestic level. The international scrutiny and support thus continue to be crucial to achieve justice.
On Venezuela, the ICJ welcomes the renewal, with increased support, for two years of the mandates of the independent international fact-finding mission and of the OHCHR to monitor the situation of human rights in the country. These mandates should work in complementarity, especially to combat impunity and ensuring full accountability for perpetrators and justice for victims. We condemn the attempt to undermine the resolution and the mandate of the fact-finding mission by Cuba, Belarus, Eritrea and the Russian Federation.
Thematic work of the HRC
The facilitation of enhanced participation of Indigenous Peoples in the work of the Council is a welcome step, as individuals representing Indigenous Peoples are now able to participate in their own right without going through an NGO with official consultative status for debates that concern them directly. This is critical to allow for engagement in such Council activities as the dialogue with the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of Indigenous Peoples and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The Council continued to address a number of general human rights themes, by adopting resolutions to guide States on what their responsibilities are in tackling the greatest human rights challenges of the day. These included consensus resolutions on the rights to water and sanitation; on the human rights of migrants; on the elimination of domestic violence; on the promotion, protection and enjoyment of human rights on the internet; on youth and human rights; on human rights and Indigenous Peoples; on terrorism and human rights and a new initiative on biodiversity and human rights.
The ICJ welcomes especially the renewal of the mandate of Special Rapporteur on climate change and human rights eventually by consensus, in the face of attacks in the form of hostile amendments led by Saudi Arabia. While we regret that some compromises which diluted the resolution needed to be made, the result was positive. Tensions on how to address climate change have revolved around the question of the role of standards from the international environmental law framework, such as the principle of equity between States and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. The last-minute compromise requests the Special Rapporteur to give due consideration to these principles, which is arguably overly prescriptive and may place undue constraints on the work of the mandate that is and must be independent, by imposing a legal framework that goes beyond the human rights law and standards.
More divisive still were the resolutions addressing racism and the right to development, which revealed an unfortunate divide, generally, though not entirely, among “global north” and “global south States”. The resolutions entitled “From rhetoric to reality: a global call for concrete action against racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance”, and the resolution on the right to development both were adopted by vote, respectively with votes of 30 in favour, 12 against and 5 abstentions for racism; and 29 in favour, 14 against and 4 abstentions for development. On racism, which remains a scourge that impedes the enjoyment of human rights of many around the world it is disappointing to see that a consensus approach cannot be arrived at. The nature and scope of the right to development also remains highly contested, with questions as to whether it is an individual right that can be claimed by an individual or is rather being conceived as an entitlement of States pursuing development.
Last, but not least, the ICJ is encouraged by the elections at the UN General Assembly on 9 October 2024 of the new HRC membership that saw the candidacy of Saudi Arabia, a country with an extremely poor human rights record at home and abroad, defeated to the benefit of the Marshall Islands in the Asia-Pacific group. The ICJ is disappointed, however, that most regional groupings continue to put forth a “clean slate” of pre-negotiated fixed list of candidates so that there can be no competitive voting.
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ICJ statements and events at the 57th session:
https://www.icj.org/hrc57-icj-oral-statement-on-the-situation-in-venezuela/
Side event with Oxford on investigative mechanisms
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7246890367340396546
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7249046564466307073
Joint initiatives around the 57th session:
https://www.icj.org/sri-lanka-joint-letter-to-the-un-human-rights-council/ https://www.icj.org/afghanistan-joint-appeal-to-un-hrc-to-advance-accountability-for-crimes-under-international-law/ https://www.icj.org/cambodia-implement-un-recommendations-and-ensure-the-independence-of-the-judiciary/ https://www.wilpf.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/HRC57-Joint-side-event-on-Afghanistan.jpeg https://www.instagram.com/forumasia.humanrights/reel/DAATGsftpDj/
Joint statement on Afghanistan:
Final_HRC57_IBAHRI_Joint_Oral Statement EID OHCHR Rep Afghanistan
Mexico event
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7239181321854464000
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7239237522466254849
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7239218293801193473