While pro-democracy gains and demands for freedom and justice were sweeping the Middle East, threats and attacks against human rights defenders in that region and elsewhere around the world continued at a disturbing rate, according to a report released at Headquarters today by a leading global coalition of rights activists.
In progress at UNHQ
Press Conference
An overhaul of inequitable agricultural business models was needed to reduce global poverty and ensure long-term sustainability for farmers and farm systems, said an independent United Nations food expert at a New York Headquarters press conference today.
In a press conference at Headquarters this morning, the newly elected Maronite Patriarch, His Beatitude Bechara Peter Rai, offered a message of “communion and love” and heralded the 2,000 years of contribution by the Christian community in the Middle East.
While it was crucial that States comply with their human rights obligations while fighting terrorism, the suffering of its victims and the prevention of terrorist acts must also receive attention from a human rights perspective, a United Nations expert told the correspondents at Headquarters this morning.
With a nascent national human rights mechanism and freshly stated commitments to freedom and the rule of law, Myanmar stood poised to end its persistent patterns of rights violations and to consolidate democratic gains, said a top human rights expert at a Headquarters press conference today.
The reported death of former Libyan leader Muammar Al-Qadhafi, who had ruled his country since 1969, marked a key moment in the transition to a “new Libya”, and as soon as the National Transitional Council (NTC) formally declared liberation, the path towards the formation of an interim Government would begin, the United Nations special envoy to that country said today at a Headquarters press briefing.
The prolonged occupation of Palestinian territories presented extraordinary problems for the protection of the human rights and required stronger protection measures, particularly for the welfare of children, a United Nations expert told correspondents at Headquarters this afternoon.
A pattern of violations had emerged regarding Iran’s treatment of civil society actors — including political dissidents – that spoke to unfair trials and the targeting of human rights defenders, and the best strategy for substantially improving those conditions was not to penalize the Government, but rather engage it in dialogue that would evolve over time, said the United Nations special investigator on that country.
Among several concerns about the human rights situation in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Special Rapporteur Marzuki Darusman highlighted today the food security situation there, as well as the situation of asylum-seekers from that country.
To create a true environment of religious tolerance and open dialogue, said the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief this afternoon, the method of communication and connection needed to be diverse and multi-faceted.