UN special rapporteurs

• October 5, 2021

GENEVA — It is time for the United Nations Human Rights Council to take climate change much more seriously than it has been and to treat the issue with the urgency, deliberation and action that it demands. The Council has the tools to do so, and it should use them now. The recent Intergovernmental Panel …

Climate and Environment, Human Rights, WORLDVIEWS

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The US’ Humble Approach to Running for a Human Rights Council Seat, Albeit on a Clean Slate

Lucas Dias Rodrigues dos Santos

• August 5, 2021

GENEVA — The United States is campaigning for election to the Human Rights Council in October for the 2022-24 term, starting a new chapter in its volatile relationship with the Geneva-based body. Its current re-engagement, including more acceptance of criticism about its own country, has been praised by Council members and experts, but its …

Human Rights, US-UN Relations

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THIS WEEK @UN

US Delegation to Haiti Cut Short; Risks for the UN Pension Fund?; an Ex-Guantánamo Detainee May Face Torture in Russia

Ivana Ramirez

• July 24, 2021

A US delegation to Haiti returns early; potential risks for the $87 billion UN pension fund; an ex-Guantánamo detainee may face torture in Russia. You are reading This Week @UN, summarizing the most pressing issues facing the organization. The information is gathered from UN press briefings, PassBlue reporting and other sources. We are inching closer …

Africa, Asia, Human Rights, Secretary-General, This Week @UN, Unesco, US-UN Relations

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UN Human-Rights Experts Raise Alarm Over the Fate of a Russian Ex-Guantánamo Detainee

Clair MacDougall

• July 20, 2021

Yusuf Mingazov met his father, Ravil, for the first time through a videocall between a Red Cross office in Nottingham, Britain, and the Guantánamo Bay detention camp in Cuba, where he had been imprisoned for more than 14 years. “It was kind of difficult to explain the emotions and everything, but it was nice …

Human Rights, Terrorism, US-UN Relations

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THIS WEEK @UN

Receding Ice in Iceland; UN Agencies’ Use of P.R. Firms; Lebanon on the Edge

Ivana Ramirez

• July 16, 2021

Receding glaciers in Iceland; the UN’s use of public-relations firms; South Sudan’s promising women’s soccer league; Lebanon’s “reversal.” You are reading This Week @UN, summarizing the most pressing issues facing the organization. The information is gathered from UN press briefings, PassBlue reporting and other sources. We have reached two-thirds of the way to our important …

Climate and Environment, Gender Violence, Secretary-General, Security Council, This Week @UN

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THIS WEEK @UN

Crucial Aid Into Syria; Will a Feminist Lead UN Women?; Haiti’s Downfall

Ivana Ramirez

• July 9, 2021

Crucial aid into Syria continues; will a feminist head UN Women?; the good and bad of Security Council Arria meetings; Haiti on the edge. You are reading This Week @UN, summarizing the most pressing issues facing the organization. The information is gathered from UN press briefings, PassBlue reporting and other sources. We are closer …

Africa, Asia, Human Rights, Secretary-General, Security Council, This Week @UN, US-UN Relations

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TOPIC: WOMEN

Not All Human Rights Council Specialists Are Perfect: The Latest Controversy

Barbara Crossette

• August 19, 2020

To keep tabs on the lives and rights of people across the world, the United Nations Human Rights Council has the help of 44 independent monitors supposedly chosen for their expertise on a range of themes, from harsh government abuses to often-overlooked individual special needs. A dozen others are assigned specific countries to watch. …

Gender Violence, Human Trafficking, Women

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GEOPOLITICS

Richard Falk on Palestine, Israel and the UN in the Trump Age

Dulcie Leimbach

• July 24, 2018

Richard Falk is a well-known American academic and writer who from 2008 until 2014 was the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in Palestine since 1967, a post that invariably invites controversy. For Falk, who has never been shy of taking provocative stances, the work compelled him to declare, among other things, that …

Geopolitics, Human Rights, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Secretary-General, US Foreign Relations, US-UN Relations

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WORLDVIEWS

Leave the UN’s Human-Rights Treaty System Alone

Bertrand Ramcharan

• January 7, 2018

The United Nations Charter requires each and every member state to discharge its obligations by faithfully carrying out norms of legally binding international human-rights law. These may be norms of international customary law, those contained in treaties or those flowing from general principles of international law. The human-rights provisions in the Charter were amplified …

Human Rights, WORLDVIEWS

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WORLDVIEWS

In Washington, Spotlighting the UN Human Rights Council

A. Edward Elmendorf

• July 3, 2016

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The United Nations Human Rights Council, the highest organ exclusively responsible for human rights in the world body, is now 10 years old. It recently received concentrated attention here in the United States capital. Such concerted focus would have been unthinkable more than a generation ago, when this writer was active …

WORLDVIEWS

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WORLDVIEWS

Haitians’ Rights Were Violated Over Cholera Outbreak, UN Experts Assert

Rosa Freedman

• April 20, 2015

In September 2014, four United Nations human-rights experts wrote to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon alleging that the UN had violated human rights through the cholera epidemic in Haiti, which broke out in October 2010. This is the first time that an allegation letter — a formal complaint procedure typically used against governments — has been …

WORLDVIEWS

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WORLDVIEWS

The Last Throes of the Death Penalty?

Christof Heyns and Juan Mendez

• November 20, 2012

Mores in societies change over the years. While slavery, torture and public executions were once a global phenomenon, and foot binding and deadly duels were deeply entrenched aspects of regional cultures, they are no longer considered acceptable by the international community. In line with what the United States Supreme Court once called “evolving standards …

Human Rights, WORLDVIEWS

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BOOKS

The Human Rights Council Gets More Respect

A. Edward Elmendorf

• September 14, 2012

The visibility of human-rights violations by the Syrian government amid the current turmoil owes much to the United Nations, particularly to its Independent International Commission of Inquiry, led by Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro, a Brazilian lawyer, public official and professor. Such commissions are part of a growing number of tools used by the UN to …