This week ECOSOC members could break years of deadlock for civil society participation at the UN through a vote that would give consultative status to six civil society groups.
The ECOSOC Committee on NGOs has adopted its report bringing the first session of 2022 to a close. The session saw heated exchanges around a vote to accredit 5 deferred NGOs a well as serious consequences of under-resourcing of the NGO Branch.
On Wednesday, 13 April, members of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) elected 19 members to the UN Committee on NGOs, a body frequently criticised for restricting civil society participation at the UN.
The elections to the Committee on NGOs are three weeks away. We now know the full list of 20 candidates for membership. They include some of the most egregious human rights violators on the planet. ECOSOC members should not give them their vote. It is also not too late for better candidates to stand.
Voices from around the world took to Twitter to join the conversation about why civil society is so important to the UN and to demand that the UN #OpenTheDoorToNGOs.
In April, elections will be held to the UN Committee on NGOs, a body mandated to accredit NGOs to the UN. 349 national, regional and international NGOs have called for States to take NGO participation seriously and vote accordingly.
A new ISHR report maps China’s presence and influence in the UN economic and social affairs system, highlighting potential risks for civil society participation and the promotion and protection of human rights.
To date, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights’ (the African Commission) recommendations to the Kenyan Government on reparations for the eviction of Endorois indigenous people from their ancestral lands in the 1970s remain largely unimplemented. On 13 April 2021, the NGO Forum met to discuss the status of the implementation of the African Commission’s 2010 decision 276/2003 on the rights of the Endorois people.
The ECOSOC Committee on NGOs has just completed its first 2021 session after two postponed sessions due to Covid-19 restrictions. Failing to move with the times, the Committee did not allow for virtual participation of NGOs in Q&As, something States called out and which must be addressed at the next session in August.
The International Service for Human Rights (ISHR) publishes yearly Chinese Human Rights Monitors (CHRM), aiming to support Chinese human rights defenders and civil society working on human rights in China in acceding to the UN human rights mechanisms.
