Category: Human Rights

The Unbox Me campaign was launched by UNAIDS ahead of the International Transgender Day of Visibility, observed this Thursday, 31 March.  The goal is to raise awareness among parents, teachers, and the wider community about gender identity during childhood.  Expressing identity freely  “Many of us take our gender identity for granted, but for many children it is not so easy. It’s a… Read More

After a month of war, local authorities have reported that more than 733 educational institutions have been damaged or destroyed. Beyond learning, education offers a protective environment that is even more relevant to crisis-affected populations, particularly children, the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) said in a press release. UNESCO has also announced that it is mobilizing support for learning… Read More

“This report is a wakeup call”, said UNFPA Executive Director Natalia Kanem, adding that the “staggering number of unintended pregnancies represents a global failure to uphold women and girls’ basic human rights.”   The ground-breaking Seeing the Unseen: The case for action in the neglected crisis of unintended pregnancy, warns that this human rights crisis has “profound consequences for societies, women… Read More

In a commemorative event in the General Assembly Hall that included remarks from Member States from around the world, top UN officials denounced racism and discrimination. In his opening remarks, the President of the General Assembly, Abdulla Shahid, called for greater commitments to social justice, and the celebration of all communities, irrespective of caste, creed or skin colour. Standing in solidarity He… Read More

In paying tributed to those who “relentlessly – and courageously – fight racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance,” she outlined to the Human Rights Council that progress was being made. “Powerful global movements against racism are shifting the status quo”, the UN right chief said, pointing to the “worldwide protests against racism and racial discrimination” prompted by the murder… Read More

On the sidelines of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, head of the Fact-Finding Mission on Libya, Mohamed Auajjar, told journalists that investigators had uncovered further evidence of serious rights violations, which they first made public last October. These abuses against migrants, refugees and asylum seekers are detailed in a report which will be presented to the Council on Wednesday,… Read More

For more than 400 years, over 15 million men, women and children became the victims of the tragic transatlantic slave trade, in one of human history’s darkest chapters.   On #RememberSlavery Day we pay tribute to the millions of Africans who were torn from their homelands during the Transatlantic Slave Trade. People of African descent confront racial discrimination to this… Read More

The UN Special Rapporteur’s report echoes recent findings by Palestinian, Israeli and international human rights organisations who analized Israel’s 55-year occupation of the Palestinian Territory. “There is today in the Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967 a deeply discriminatory dual legal and political system, that privileges the 700,000 Israeli Jewish settlers living in the 300 illegal Israeli settlements in… Read More

Members of the Internal Security Agency (ISA) of the internationally-recognized Government in Tripoli, and State-affiliated armed groups, have, in recent months, arbitrarily detained some human rights defenders and civil society activists, Liz Throssell, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), told a media briefing in Geneva. Under the pretence of protecting “Libyan and Islamic values”, she said,… Read More

In a press release issued by the UN human rights office, OHCHR, the group of four Human Rights Council-appointed special rapporteurs said that Professor Colin Harvey, the former Commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, and a member of civic nationalist group, Ireland’s Future, has been targeted by a “vicious online campaign”, connected with his work as a leading… Read More