Statement at 48th Session of the UN Human Rights Council
Item 5: Interactive Dialogue on the Secretary-General’s report on reprisals
Delivered by Lisa Majumdar
Thank you, Madame President, and thank you Secretary-General for this important report. Civil society engagement is fundamentally necessary to ensure adequate reporting to these mechanisms and to promote human rights, in and outside the UN, and acts of reprisal threaten to weaken this engagement.
Acts of reprisals by members of this Council are particularly egregious. There are multiple allegations against China of intimidation and reprisals against human rights defenders and civil society organisations that cooperated, or were perceived as cooperating, with the UN, in particular through their arbitrary detention. This must be addressed by this Council.
A particularly disturbing trend highlighted in the report is that of legislation affecting the ability of civil society to engage with the UN, such as Nicaragua’s Law 140 on the Regulation of Foreign Agents, which means that organisations now risk their registration for receiving technical assistance or funding for service provision, research, reporting or advocacy. It is essential that a resolution by the Human Rights Council to address reprisals addresses this concerning pattern.
An act of reprisal perpetrated by Cambodia against prominent Cambodian human rights defender and monk, Venerable Luon Sovath, during a debate held in the Human Rights Council’s 45th Session serves to illustrate the lack of political will of Cambodia to engage meaningfully with the Council. We urge States to ensure that this is reflected in any action taken by the Council on Cambodia.
We further urge Member States to go beyond refraining from such acts of intimidation and reprisals, to addressing them. The time is overdue to impose a real political cost for the deliberate weakening of our collective human rights mechanisms.
We thank you.