Israel is scaling up its information war ahead of a UNHRC session at the end of February that will table a report into last year’s bombing of Gaza
A decade after the photojournalist’s death his family wants his remains found and to know the circumstances in which he died
In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Eswatini, South Africa and Zimbabwe have implemented new rules on disinformation. But these may have unintended consequences
In September, Burundi threatened to quit the rights council altogether after another report pointed to crimes against humanity in the country
The state is using famine as a weapon of war but SA abstained in a UN human rights resolution
There is no system of oppression more fully documented – in UN reports and studies by human rights groups – than Israel’s crimes.
"Not only do the two presidents like each other, but there is also a business connection between their two families."
The country has sanctioned a move to suspend the UN’s first independent gender representative.
Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein has warned that countries risk making the situation worse if their counter-terrorism operations are perceived as unjust.
Once a fence sitter, South Africa has now decided to lead by example on the continent and advocate for laws protecting sexual minorities.
Israel has informed the UN it will refuse to cooperate with a probe of war crimes allegedly committed during the military offensive in the Gaza Strip.
Zimbabwe’s justice minister accused the UN’s top rights official on Wednesday of undermining the African nation’s new unity government.
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/ 12 January 2009
A divided United Nations Human Rights Council on Monday adopted a resolution condemning Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip.
The United Nations independent expert on racism urged South Africa on Friday to bring to justice those responsible for recent xenophobic violence that claimed more than 50 lives this month. ”I condemn these acts in the strongest terms,” special rapporteur Doudou Diene said as he called on South African authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice.
Nobel Peace laureate Desmond Tutu on Wednesday plunged into the harsh reality of the conflict in Gaza, where a tearful Palestinian family recounted losing loved ones in an Israeli attack and the ruling Hamas movement expounded its hard-line stance. The South African cleric is heading a team of United Nations human rights observers.
On the surface, South Africa’s assumption of the presidency of the United Nations Security Council earlier this month has no relevance for the Zimbabwe electoral crisis. Desperate Zimbabweans could call for help from the UN, but this call comes when South Africa is gatekeeper at the Security Council.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Canadian jurist Louise Arbour, said on Friday she will step down when her current term in office expires on June 30. ”It is very much for personal reasons. I’m not prepared to make this commitment for another four years,” said Arbour in Geneva.
Sri Lanka was hit by scathing criticism over its human rights record on Thursday, with its government fingered over hundreds of ”disappearances” and an influential panel storming off the island. The move is a major blow to the image of the island’s government, which pulled out of a truce with Tamil Tiger rebels in January.
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/ 24 January 2008
South Africa will have a second opportunity this year to head the United Nations Security Council, the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Thursday. South Africa, a non-permanent member of the 15-nation Security Council, will take over the presidency of the UN-decision making body in April again.
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/ 19 November 2007
South Africa is a leader in how human rights issues are dealt with at the United Nations, the Department of Foreign Affairs said on Sunday. The department was responding to a Sunday Times report that the country’s human rights reputation was ”in tatters” after a series of ”sell-out” votes.
Burma’s junta arrested more people under the cover of darkness on Wednesday despite a crescendo of international outrage during a keenly watched United Nations mission to bring an end to a bloody crackdown on protests. At least eight truckloads of prisoners were hauled out of downtown Rangoon.