Human Rights under attack says UN

UN launched call to action against attacks on human rights

United Nations have expressed concern at the rising global trend of curbing the basic human rights. There is growing trend to undermine the human rights-constitutional and democratic rights guaranteed in UN charter and other international conventions.

The right wing populist leaders around the world are eroding the political-human and democratic rights and establishing more authoritarian regimes. The populist regimes are introducing more repressive laws to curb the freedoms of media and expressions. The political dissent has also been made a crime.  

UN secretary general Antonio Guterres launched a “call to action” against rising attacks on human rights, highlighting the persecution of minorities and “alarming levels of femicide”.

The UN chief opened the UN Human Rights Council’s annual session in Geneva while saying that “Human rights are under assault.” “People are being left behind. Fears are growing,” he said, pointing to swelling divisions and political polarisation in many countries.
“A perverse political arithmetic has taken hold: divide people to multiply votes,” he said, warning that “the rule of law is being eroded”.

Guterres launched a “call to action” to “people everywhere” to take action in seven areas — including halting violence against women and girls, boosting protection for people trapped in conflict and recognising the challenges created by the climate crisis and new technologies.
“We see a push back against women’s rights, alarming levels of femicide, attacks on women human rights defenders, and the persistence of laws and policies that perpetuate subjugation and exclusion,” Guterres said.

He said work towards gender equality “starts within”, stressing that the UN had already achieved gender parity across its most senior ranks and promised to achieve the same throughout the UN system by 2028.

Guterres, who mentioned no countries by name, has faced criticism for not speaking out more forcefully against rights violations carried out by powerful countries like the US, Saudi Arabia and China — appearing to opt instead for behind-the-scenes diplomacy.

He also said women and girls were being “enslaved, exploited and abused”, “activists tossed in jail, and religious and ethnic minorities groups persecuted”.

Guterres said civilians were being “trapped in war-torn enclaves, starved and bombarded in clear violation of international law” as well as “human trafficking, affecting every region in the world, preying on vulnerability and despair”.

UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet also stressed the need for urgent action on human rights.

“Let us not deliver to our young people and to their children an uncontrollable firestorm of intersecting and escalating human rights crises,” she told the council.

                                              International desk