Human Rights and Refugees

Promoting the rule of law at national and international level is at the very heart of the global mission of the United Nations. The rule of law is fundamental to achieving a durable peace in the aftermath of conflict to the protection of human rights and to economic progress and development. The basic concept that drives our work is the principle that everyone – from the ordinary citizen to the State and its leaders – is accountable to laws that are publicly promulgated equally enforced and independently adjudicated and which are consistent with international human rights norms and standards. As a lawyer and a former professor of law I retain a deep personal interest in this area of UN engagement.

The financing of terrorism is often difficult to detect because it follows only few fixed patterns. For instance an investigation into the financial transactions of some high profile terrorists and hijackers showed that most of the individual transactions were not that unusual. The account holders appeared to be foreign students receiving money to fund their studies; in such a way the transactions then would not be flagged as suspicious transactions needing a special scrutiny by the financial institutions involved.

In 1947 and 1948 UNESCO conducted a worldwide survey of a diverse group of intellectuals political leaders theologians social activists and other personalities to gather their opinions on the philosophical foundations of human rights. A survey that was not widely publicized at the time but one that is surprisingly relevant today.

« L'homme doit s'acquitter de ses devoirs envers les autres plutôt que de revendiquer ses droits tel est le fondement moral des relations sociales et politiques en Chine. La notion d'obligations mutuelles constitue l'enseignement essentiel du confucianisme » affirme le philosophe chinois Lo Chung-Shu (1903-1985) dans son texte intitulé « Les droits humains dans la tradition chinoise » envoyé à l’UNESCO le 1er juin 1947 dont nous publions des extraits.

Le droit à l’éducation est souvent tenu pour acquis… jusqu’à ce qu’on nous le retire. Outil indispensable pour défendre la liberté et la dignité de tous les migrants l’éducation est une condition sine qua non pour qu’ils deviennent membres à part entière de la société qu’ils intègrent. Une aspiration légitime qui se heurte à des obstacles sur le terrain.

in Angola Mozambique Sierra Leone the Democratic Republic of Congo the Central African Republic Liberia and Côte d’Ivoire warlords and leaders of militias and rebel movements prospered from the pillaging of their nation’s natural wealth as much as financiers of crime rackets dishonest civil servants corrupt politicians or national and international corporations. This impromptu alliance of stakeholders in Africa’s wars and violence could be broken down only with tens of thousands of peacekeepers targeted sanctions against the most persistent looters and with billions of Dollars invested in rebuilding governmental capacities. Still many nations are far from safe. Too heavy is the toll of war violence and corruption to rebuild these countries in a few short years. With global demand for most commodities reaching record heights and while most of these resource rich states’ oversight and law enforcement institutions are still in shambles it is as easy as ever - and much more profitable - to gain access to natural resources. Adhering to legal standards continues to be a minor consideration. For warlords and leaders of militias who have successfully transformed themselves into elites by joining political parties or by becoming businessmen it’s business as usual. Sadly these elites are greatly assisted by the apparent disinterest or inability of leading global companies – the ultimate users of raw materials - to reign-in the continued illegal exploitation of the developing world’s natural resources. Just in the last few months several investigations have revealed once again how criminal behavior is still pervasive in the natural resource business and how it affects each consumer around the world in unexpected ways. For at least four years it has been known that thousands of artisan diggers are exploiting cassiterite deposits (a tin oxide) around Walikale in Eastern DRC. A report by Nicholas Garrett in the Financial Times (6th March 2008) confirmed again that these artisans are laboring under the dictate of the renegade 85th brigade of the Congolese army led by Colonel Samy Matumo. The production not only enriches these bands of soldiers and their commanders but for years the cassiterite has been bought and traded through Western metals exchanges and brokers. Eventually it is used for the production of electronic products made by largest companies in this sector.

In February 2018 UNESCO launched a major project to strengthen the resilience of people living in the Lake Chad basin who have been affected by a devastating drought for the last four decades.

Afghanistan is a male-dominated society. It is also a society where authority and power mean a lot. I think that the fact that I am a guest in their country a foreign woman representing the United Nations – a respected organization – works in my favour. Afghanistan is very different from my own home country Sweden but beyond the surface we are all surprisingly alike. Daily life in Kabul is not very comfortable; I lived in one room for more than a year before I found a small flat in a securitycleared compound. The security situation is very worrying and limits your personal life as well as the work of the United Nations. The suicide attack on a UN convoy in Kandahar province in the south of the country on 14 September which killed two WHO colleagues was a terrible blow to all of us. It is getting increasingly difficult and dangerous. Half of the country is at least partially out of reach for us because of lack of security. The costs of operations are going up because of the volatile situation.

How can individual rights be reconciled while respecting the cultural sensibilities of different human groups? For the American anthropologist Melville J. Herskovits (1895-1963) this is the main difficulty facing the formulation of a world declaration of human rights. He elaborates on this dilemma in this excerpt from the text with the title "Statement on Human Rights" which he sent to UNESCO in 1947.

“The same is true of the right to information as of all other rights: its legitimate content must be defined in terms of real needs” wrote the French philosopher René Maheu (1905-1975) adding: “Conditionally of course on the word 'needs' being understood to mean the needs of human development and not of self-interest or passion.” This is an excerpt of his contribution to UNESCO’s survey on the philosophical foundations of human rights which he submitted on 30 June 1947 under the title “Right to Information and to the Expression of Opinion”.