Mar 5, 2018 | News
The ICJ has welcomed last Thursday’s judgment of the Pretoria High Court which declares the South Africa’s involvement in shutting down the South African Development Community Tribunal “unlawful, irrational, arbitrary and therefore unconstitutional”.
ICJ’s Africa Director, Arnold Tsunga described the judgment as a “triumph for the rule of law in Southern Africa and an opportunity for governments in the SADC region to commit to immediate restoration of the Tribunal”.
The SADC Tribunal has been inactive since 2012, when SADC Member States suspended its operations and removed individual access to the Tribunal, including in cases involving human rights violations.
The action was widely seen as a backlash for several judgments against Zimbabwe in relation to land programmes implemented during the administration of former President Robert Mugabe.
In a unanimous judgment delivered by High Court Judge President D Mlambo, the Court held that “any act which detracted from the SADC Tribunal’s exercise of its human rights jurisdiction at the instance of individuals, was inconsistent with the SADC Treaty itself and violated the rule of law”.
Describing former President Zuma’s decision to sign the replacement 2014 Protocol of the SADC Tribunal as one such act, the Court held that the rule of law in South Africa’s constitutional dispensation required prior Parliamentary approval for the Executive to lawfully participate in a decision to curb the powers of the Tribunal or withdraw South Africa from its obligations under the SADC Treaty and the Protocol establishing the Tribunal.
“A restoration of the SADC Tribunal to its original character will facilitate individual access to a much needed accountability mechanism and greatly enhance regional confidence in human rights and the rule of law”, said Arnold Tsunga.
In line with articles 14 and 15 of its 2000 Protocol, the SADC Tribunal had exercised supervisory jurisdiction over the human rights commitments of SADC Member State under the SADC Treaty.
The ICJ called on the governments of Southern Africa’s other 14 SADC Member States to take immediate and concrete steps to restore the SADC Tribunal and recommit to rebuilding, staffing and funding it to ensure its effectiveness.
Contact
Arnold Tsunga, ICJ Africa Director; t: +27716405926, or +254 746 608 859 ; e: arnold.tsunga(a)icj.org
Solomon Ebobrah, Senior Legal Adviser, ICJ Africa Regional Programme, t: +234 8034927549; e: solomon.ebobrah(a)icj.org
Mar 3, 2018 | Agendas, Events, News
Today begins in Istanbul (Turkey) a two-day training for lawyers and CSO practitioners representing and working with migrants, refugees and asylum-seekers.
This event is organized by ICJ, in cooperation with its partners Refugee Rights Turkey, the European Council on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE), Mülteci-Der (MD) and ICJ-EI, as part of the EU co-financed project Fostering Access to Rights for Migrants, Refugees and Asylum-Seekers in Turkey.
30 lawyers and civil society practitioners – representing nine different bar associations and relevant organisations from the Ankara area and other nearby key migration and asylum locations – are taking part in the training on 3 and 4 March.
The training aims to update lawyers and CSOs on the international and national law on the rights of refugees, migrants and asylum-seekers in order to be effective in their work at both the national and international levels. It aims at an effective implementation of the Turkish legal framework on asylum and migration.
The main thematic areas to be discussed will be the principle of non-refoulement, international protection, detention and access to economic, social and cultural rights.
The training will use as a basis the draft training materials prepared by the ICJ and its partners (to be published an the end of 2019) and, among other sources, the ICJ Practitioners Guide no. 6: Migration and International Human Rights Law.
The project “Fostering Access to Rights for Migrants, Refugees and Asylum-Seekers in Turkey” is funded by the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) of the European Union.
Turkey-Training-Istanbul2-MigrationAsylum-Agenda-2018-tur (download the agenda in Turkish)
Mar 1, 2018 | Events, News
This side event at the Human Rights Council takes place on Friday, 2 March, 10:00-11:30, room XXI of the Palais des Nations. It is organized by the World Organization Against Torture (OMCT) and co-sponsored by the ICJ.
On January 18 Turkey extended the state of emergency for the sixth time since it was initially imposed following a failed coup attempt in July 2016.
Current emergency measures grant highly discretionary powers to the executive and its administrative authorities in many areas, in derogation from human rights safeguards and rule of law principles, posing great challenges for the protection from torture.
On the occasion of the release of the Special Rapporteur on Torture’s country visit report on Turkey, this side-event, organized by the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) in partnership with Human Rights Watch (HRW) and the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), aims to discuss the implications of the state of emergency on the fight against torture in Turkey and to provide recommendations to ensure that the emergency measures do not become permanent.
The panel discussion will be followed by a Q&A session with the public.
Panelists:
UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment
Human Rights Association in Turkey (IHD)/Euromed Rights’s Executive Committee Member
Senior Legal Adviser, International Commission of Jurists (ICJ)
Moderator:
Stella Anastasia
Human Rights Adviser World Organization Against Torture (OMCT)
Turkey – Protection from Torture – News – Events – 2018 – ENG (flyer in PDF)
Mar 1, 2018 | Events, News
This side event at the 37th session of the Human Rights Council takes place on Friday, 2 march, 15:00-16:30, room XI of the Palais des Nations. It is organized by the Civic Space Initiative (CSI) and co-sponsored by the ICJ.
In recent years, the use of exceptional national security and emergency powers to combat terrorism has become increasingly common.
The international instruments recognize that respect for human rights and rule of law are the basis of the fight against terrorism.
However, counterterrorism measures and emergency powers have increasingly resulted in or been used to restrict fundamental freedoms, including the rights to assembly, association and expression.
In this context, it is necessary for states and civil society to increase their understanding of the relationship between entrenched emergency powers and sustained human rights violations and to further elaborate guidelines and good practices that will return respect for human rights to the center of state efforts to combat terrorism.
This event aims to elevate attention and further explore the pernicious effects of states of emergency and emergency powers on human rights and fundamental freedoms with particular attention to the rights of freedom of association, assembly, and expression. It will also address how states of emergency often facilitate targeting and undermining the work of human rights defenders.
Speakers:
- Professor Fionnuala Ni Aolain, UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human
rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism
- Kerem Altiparmak, Ankara University, Faculty of Political Science
- Yared Hailemariam, Director, Association for Human Rights in Ethiopia
- Lisa Oldring, Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
- Sonia Tanic, Representative to the United Nations, International Federation for Human Rights
Moderator:
- Nicholas Miller, International Center for Not-for-Profit Law
Coffee/croissants served at 14:45
For more information contact: nmiller@icnl.org, vanja@ecnl.org
The event will be livestreamed on the @CIVICUS Facebook page
Universal – Counterrorism and Civic Space – News – Events – 2018 – News (Event flyer in PDF)
Feb 27, 2018 | Advocacy, News, Non-legal submissions
The head of the ICJ’s Centre for the Independence of Judges and Lawyers, Matt Pollard, highlighted the role of judges, lawyers and prosecutors in preventing human rights abuses, at a UN expert workshop in Geneva.The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) organised the expert workshop, 21 to 22 February 2018, to discuss the role and contribution of civil society organizations, academia, national human rights institutions and other relevant stakeholders in the prevention of human rights abuses, drawing on the conclusions and recommendations of OHCHR’s study on the prevention of human rights violations.
The workshop, mandated by the Human Rights Council resolution 33/6, covered topics such as: a framework approach to prevention; human rights education; abuses by private actors, national and regional practices, planning and monitoring tools; human rights impact assessments; and the role of UN institutions.
The presentation on the role of judges and lawyers can be downloaded in PDF format here: UN-ExpertMeeting-JudgesLawyersPrevention-2018
More information about the expert workshop is available by clicking here.
Feb 27, 2018 | Events, News
The ICJ, in collaboration with the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Regional Office for South-East Asia (OHCHR), and the Centre for Civil and Political Rights, organised a workshop for lawyers from southeast Asia, on engaging with UN human rights mechanisms.
The two-day workshop provided some thirty lawyers from Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Lao PDR with knowledge, practical skills and expert advice about UN human rights mechanisms, with the participants themselves sharing their own experiences and expertise.
In addition to explaining what the UN mechanisms are and how they work, the workshop discussed how lawyers can use the outputs of UN human rights mechanisms in their professional activities, as well as how to communicate with and participate in UN human rights mechanisms in order to ensure good cooperation and to best serve the interests of their clients.
Sessions were introduced by presentations by the ICJ’s Main Representative to the United Nations in Geneva and OHCHR officials, followed by discussions and practical exercises in which all participants were encouraged to contribute questions and their own observations.
A special discussion of effective engagement of lawyers with Treaty Bodies was led by Professor Yuval Shany, a member of the Human Rights Committee established to interpret and apply the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
The workshop also aimed to encourage the building of relationships and networks between the lawyers from across the region.
The workshop forms part of a broader project of awareness-raising and capacity-building for lawyers from the region, about UN mechanisms.
A similar workshop was held in January 2017 for lawyers from Myanmar.
The project has also published (unofficial) translations of key UN publications into relevant languages, and is hosting lawyers in a mentorship programme in Geneva.
More details are available by contacting UN Representative Matt Pollard (matt.pollard(a)icj.org) or by clicking here: https://www.icj.org/accesstojusticeunmechanisms/
