Sep 16, 2019 | Advocacy, News
Antonio Guterres should publicly condemn China’s widespread violations of the rights of its Muslim minority citizens, especially in Xinjiang Province, the ICJ demanded in a joint letter submitted along with Amnesty International, the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Human Rights Watch, and the World Uyghur Congress.
The joint letter urged the UN Secretary-General to call for an end to widespread arbitrary detention of Muslim and minority communities through the immediate closure of Xinjiang’s ‘political education’ camps. Reports by the United Nations and human rights organizations have estimated that more than one million Muslims have been interned in extra-legal ‘political education’ detention camps.
“In the past few years, China’s violations in Xinjiang, including arbitrary detention, ill-treatment, pervasive surveillance and political indoctrination of Turkic Muslims, have intensified, and continue to worsen,” said Sam Zarifi, ICJ’s Secretary General.
“Quiet diplomacy has not worked. Mr. Guterres must exercise the full extent and power of his mandate as leader of the United Nations to demand and ensure protection of the rights of everyone in China, including all individuals in Xinjiang.”
The joint letter urged the UN Secretary-General to publicly support the creation of a UN fact-finding mission to assess the scale and nature of crimes under international law and human rights violations in Xinjiang. It further called on the UN Secretary-General to refrain from unqualified praise of China’s ‘Belt and Road’ Initiative – an investment initiative in which Xinjiang is a centerpiece – and to meet with representatives from the Uyghur community to hear first-hand of their plight.
“China has exerted immense and often inappropriate political pressure on individuals, governments and organizations criticizing its human rights violations,” said Zarifi. “The United Nations must push back against China’s political pressure and provide principled and steadfast leadership to end China’s political and cultural repression, and ongoing human rights violations in Xinjiang.”
Public criticism of China’s actions in Xinjiang has been growing. In August 2018, a member of the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination noted that China’s treatment of its Muslim minority citizens in Xinjiang had turned the region into a “‘no rights’ zone” with individuals being treated as “enemies of the State based on nothing more than their ethno-religious identity”. In March 2019, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, highlighted the need for her office to gain full access to facilitate independent and impartial investigation into ‘wide patterns of enforced disappearances and arbitrary detentions’ in the region. On 10 July 2019, 25 countries issued a joint statement calling on China to refrain from subjecting Uyghurs and other Muslim and minority communities in Xinjiang to arbitrary detention, surveillance and restrictions on freedom of movement.
Sep 7, 2019
An open letter to the UN Secretary General signed by 16 international NGOs regarding the recent report by Gert Rosenthal, “A Brief and Independent Inquiry into the Involvement of the United Nations in Myanmar from 2010 to 2018.”
The Rosenthal report describes the UN’s failure to stop, mitigate, or even draw attention to violence that the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission found amounted to crimes under international law including crimes against humanity, and warrants an investigation of the crime of genocide against Rohingya.
Download the letter here: Myanmar-Letter UNSG Rosenthal-Advocacy-open letters-2019-ENG.pdf
Aug 30, 2019 | Advocacy, Non-legal submissions
The ICJ has presented information to the UN Human Rights Committee in preparation for the Committee’s examination of the eighth periodic report of Ukraine under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).
In this submission, the ICJ draws the Committee’s attention to the situation with the security and independence of the legal profession and Ukraine’s compliance with and implementation of its obligations under Articles 2, 6 and 14 of the ICCPR, as well as the UN Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers.
The ICJ stresses that attacks on lawyers are likely to lead not only to violations the rights of the individual lawyers concerned, but also to violations of the rights of the clients they represent, including the right to a fair trial (Article 14 ICCPR), the right to liberty (Article 9 ICCPR), the right to freedom from torture or other ill-treatment (Article 7 ICCPR), and the right to an effective remedy (Article 2.3 ICCPR) as attacks on lawyers may, in turn, hinder the provision of effective legal representation.
Ukraine-List of Issues-Advocacy-non legal submission-2019-ENG (full submission, in PDF)
Aug 30, 2019
The ICJ has joined other civil society organisations in calling for increased scrutiny of human rights violations in Cambodia, at the upcoming session of the UN Human Rights Council.
The joint letter to all Member and Observer States of the Council emphasises that the Cambodian government’s actions before and since the July 2018 election demonstrate a comprehensive campaign to use violence, intimidation and courts that lack judicial independence to silence or eliminate the political opposition, independent media, and civil society groups critical of the government.
It calls on the Human Rights Council to adopt a resolution requesting the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to monitor and report on the situation of human rights in Cambodia and outline actions the government should take to comply with its international human rights obligations.
The letter also says that the High Commissioner should report to the Council at its 45th session followed by an Enhanced Interactive Dialogue with participation of the Special Rapporteur on Cambodia, other relevant UN Special Procedures, and members of local and international civil society.
The full letter can be downloaded in PDF format here: Cambodia-UN statement-Advocacy-OpenLetter-2019-ENG
Aug 2, 2019
The ICJ has joined with some 40 other international, African and Burundian NGOs to call on States to extend the mandate of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Burundi, at the September session of the Human Rights Council.
The joint open letter to all delegations ahead of the upcoming 42nd ordinary session of the UN Human Rights Council, highlights the important work and impact of the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) to date, in a context of gross, widespread and systematic human rights violations, which may furthermore escale ahead of elections in 2020.
The NGOs call on Council Members and Observers to, at a minimum, support the extension of the mandate of the CoI on Burundi for a further year, until September 2020, in accordance with the Council’s responsibility to address situations of human rights violations, including gross and systematic violations, to advance accountability, to prevent further human rights violations and abuses, and to follow up on its actions and recommendations.
The Council should also request the CoI to prepare a report with a specific focus on elections and risk factors of human rights violations and abuses and to present it during an enhanced interactive dialogue at the Council’s 43rd session in March 2020.
The letter can be downloaded in full, in PDF format, in English or French.
