Declaration on Human Rights Defenders

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Small Flag of the United Nations ZP.svg
UN General Assembly
resolution 53/144
Date: December 9, 1998
Meeting: 53
Identifier: A / RES / 53/144 ( document )
Object: Declaration on Human Rights Defenders
Result: Adopted without a vote

The Declaration on human rights defenders a ( English Declaration on Human Rights Defenders ) was on 9 December 1998 by the Resolution 53/144 of the UN General Assembly adopted by consensus and set international standards for the protection of human rights defenders / -Innen represents.

In view of the persecution and suppression of human rights defenders that continue to exist in many parts of the world, the resolution's concern has not lost its relevance to this day: The achievement of the declaration lies in the fact that it defines a right to defend human rights for the first time .

The declaration is not legally binding, but it is a basis for international political pressure on governments, all of which are obliged to protect human rights defenders. A human rights defender is defined as any person who nonviolently campaigns for the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms.

The negotiations on the Declaration on Human Rights Defenders should spark a debate on how civil society actors could be recognized and supported as active defenders of human rights.

History of origin

The declaration on human rights defenders was adopted in 1998, as part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights . It was the result of almost two decades of negotiations. The growing attention of the world public towards human rights activists had its origin indirectly in the CSCE Final Act of Helsinki , in which states of both blocs declared human rights to be a principle of international relations during the Cold War . This explanation turned out to be particularly tricky for the Eastern bloc states of the time ; After the final act was declared, Soviet dissidents succeeded in establishing contacts with activists and governments in the western hemisphere and thereby denouncing political oppression in the former Soviet Union . As a result, there was a wave of arrests there in 1977. After that, the CSCE follow-up conferences were increasingly used by Western governments to publicize Soviet human rights violations - also by naming the names of persecuted activists in Eastern Europe . As a result of this process, the sensitivity of the UN to the fact that the implementation of international human rights standards was and are crucially dependent on activists in autocratic states, who put themselves in great danger for their commitment to human rights in their own homeland, increased as a result of this process .

 In 1984 the UN Human Rights Commission set up a cross-bloc working group that was to exist until 1998 - and thus until the declaration on human rights defenders. The working group consisted of state representatives with a seat on the Human Rights Commission, but was also open to representatives of non-governmental organizations or observers from other states. Networks developed between human rights NGOs in the West and local oppositionists from the Eastern Bloc and from Latin America and South Africa through which information about human rights violations could be exchanged. Despite the bipolarity of the world order, there was a boom and internationalization of the commitment to human rights in the 1980s, not least in the course of the human rights pacts published by the UN only a few years earlier. This favored the work of the working group. From 1984 to 1998 she worked on the draft for the declaration: During this time, not only the Soviet Union collapsed, but also the last military dictatorships in Latin America and the South African apartheid regime . Representatives of autocratic states in particular had insisted that it was the task of the sovereign individual states to enforce human rights issues on their national territory . With the collapse of the Soviet Union, however, the balance of power within the working group also changed; in 1992 it presented a first draft statement on human rights defenders. Numerous inconsistencies and detailed questions meant that it would take another five years before a quorum could finally be presented in 1997. The final version of the declaration remained a compromise text, which many NGOs involved in drafting the same, such as Amnesty International, described as a “strict minimum”.

content

The preamble to the declaration acknowledges “the valuable work of individuals , groups and associations in their contribution to the effective elimination of all human rights violations”. The second part of the declaration consists of a total of twenty articles.

Article 1 states:

"Everyone has the right, individually as well as in community with others, to promote the protection and implementation of human rights and fundamental freedoms on a national and international level and to work towards this."

These statements are followed in Article 3 by a reaffirmation of the “primary” responsibility of every state to implement human rights from its own sovereign territory. This affirmation is to be understood as a concession to the group of opponents of a declaration within the working group who viewed the strengthening of civil society actors as a threat to their own state sovereignty. Articles 5 to 8 explain rights that civil society actors should support in their activities: such as freedom of assembly and association ; the right to communicate with NGOs and intergovernmental organizations; Freedom of information and the right to publish information relevant to human rights; the right to develop new ideas about human rights and to promote their acceptance and to participate in public affairs. In Articles 9 to 12, the defense of human rights violations is also expressly linked to the right to protection against human rights violations. Due to the influence of autocratic states such as Cuba , China or Syria , Article 18 emphasizes the obligation of the individual towards the community - a not precisely defined and therefore flexible phrase, from which states like the above-mentioned weaken the effect of the resolution on their own Hoped for territory.

Although the declaration passed in 1998 became known as the “Declaration on Human Rights Defenders”, the term “human rights defender” is not found either in the official title or anywhere in the actual text. Instead, the resolution was published under the cumbersome title "Declaration on the right and obligation of individuals, groups and organs of society to promote and protect generally recognized human rights and fundamental freedoms". The complicated language is considered an heirloom from the first years of negotiations during the Soviet era.

 meaning

The declaration is not binding under international law ; but to a large extent it promoted international recognition for the - often risky - work of human rights activists. What is innovative about the idea of ​​the declaration on human rights defenders from 1998 lies not least in the fact that, when dealing with states with problematic human rights situations, they not only denounce them, but - in a certain positive way - to strengthen forces within society that campaign for human rights . The declaration thus provided an impetus for a more preventive and sustainable claim to international human rights work, which does not just name grievances.

See also

Notes and individual references

Remarks

aActually: to promote Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society, the universally recognized human rights and fundamental freedoms and to protect (English: Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms ).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Voting Record: A / RES / 53/144  ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) UNBISNET, United Nations. Retrieved July 14, 2017.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / unbisnet.un.org
  2. ↑ Benjamin Beuerle (2004): On the implementation of the “Declaration on Human Rights Defenders ” five years after its adoption - an inventory of MenschenRechtsMagazin , MenchenRechtsZentrum, University of Potsdam. ISSN  1434-2820 . Retrieved July 14, 2017.
  3. ^ A b UN Declaration on the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Information platform Humanrights.ch . Retrieved July 13, 2017.
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g h Janika Spannagel: Declaration on Human Rights Defenders (1998). In: Sources on the history of human rights. Working Group on Human Rights in the 20th Century, September 2017, accessed on November 1, 2017 .
  5. ^ Karl-Peter Fritzsche: Human rights: An introduction with documents 3rd, updated and expanded edition. Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, 2016. ISBN 978-3-8252-4487-3 . Retrieved July 13, 2017.
  6. ↑ Who is a Defender OHCHR. Retrieved July 14, 2017.
  7. ↑ A / RES / 53/144: Declaration on the right and obligation of individuals, groups and organs of society to promote and protect generally recognized human rights and fundamental freedoms United Nations, December 9, 1998. Retrieved July 13, 2017 .

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