In a statement issued on the occasion of the Human Rights Council debate on the latest report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association, the ICJ denounces the ongoing crackdown on civic space and on the right to freedom of association in Libya, with recent rulings severely hindering the work of human rights NGOs.
The Human Rights Council should urgently address the deterioration of the human rights situation in Tunisia, four human rights organizations said today as the 53rd Council’s session is underway.
In a letter sent to UN Member States’ Representatives on 5 June 2023, the undersigned organizations warned against the rapidly worsening situation in Tunisia, and urged States to seize the opportunity of the ongoing Human Rights Council’s session to address it. The organizations called on the Council and Member States to press the Tunisian authorities to comply with their obligations under international human rights law particularly those guaranteeing the rights to fair trial, freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly and association, and non-discrimination.
The letter in Arabic here.
Signatories:
On 26 June 2023, the UN Human Rights Council heard the reports by the UN Special Rapporteurs on independence of judges and lawyers, and on summary executions. The ICJ welcomes the two reports and raised concerns about the situation in various countries, in particular in Guatemala, Tunisia, Viet Nam, Thailand and Egypt.
On 20 May 2023, under the auspices of the Civil Committee for the Independence of Justice – a Tunisian civil society initiative created in 2022 to defend judicial independence – the International Commission of Jurists, jointly with Tunisian and international civil society organizations, held an international seminar to highlight the attacks on the independence of the judiciary in the country since President Kais Saied’s institutional power grab in July 2021.
Since President Kais Saied’s institutional power grab of July 25, 2021, followed by his decree of September 22 of the same year, which implicitly repealed the constitutional order, and the adoption of a tailor-made Constitution a year later, the judicial system has been subjected to constant attacks aimed at crushing its independence and sweeping away the right to a fair trial.
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