Update of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
The human rights instrument of international dimension is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). Human dignity lies in the fundament. The massive abuses of human rights during World War II provoked the drafting of the Declaration in 1948.
Several decades after, in October 2013, a Global Citizenship Commission (GCC) was convened to assess the document and provide revisions and recommendations to governments and the international community.
As a former member of the European Parliament, I could take part in an event shedding light on the general idea of the Commission at Bonn University in May 2014. After the meeting, I submitted proposals related to different aspects of the Declaration, among others: the right against poverty, and the grave violations of children’s rights affected by armed conflict; children facing disability in that respect; schools at risk of armed conflict when used as military facilities, or when being attacked. All those issues are not explicitly stipulated in the document. Remark: within some days, it will be a second year of the mass abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls and the #BringBackOurGirls campaign, and – yet – a replacement school has not been built. Education in emergencies is demanding of embracing around 80 million affected children. The big news is that the EU will provide aid to help educate more than 2.3 million children in 42 countries living in emergencies.
On April 18, 2016, the GCC report will be presented in New York, focusing on the update of the Declaration as a living document in a changing world.
The accent falls on the rights of specific groups such as women, children, disabled people, etc., as well as on vital interests when affected by migration, statelessness, corruption, extreme poverty, or related to privacy from surveillance, etc. There is a demanding need for a clearer articulation of rights in that respect, as well as for concrete implementation measures.
Among the recommendations of the GCC, the attention of the international community is drawn to strengthening the international refugee protection system and considering the adoption of a new convention on refugees and migrants. The creation of a Children’s Court falls also within the scope of the update, “with the power to receive and adjudicate petitions from children and their representatives on violations of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to issue legally binding judgments, and to investigate areas of concern such as child labour, child slavery, and child marriage.” A proposal to the UN Security Council exists to consider convening a “Children’s Council” for the review of children’s rights issues on an annual basis, “building on its existing debate of the plight of children in armed conflict.”
Preventive measures tackling in a systematic way the root causes of violent extremism such as marginalisation, poor governance, and other, are also brought to the fore. States are regarded as guaranteeing the rights of their citizens, and national institutions as addressing the issue and its violations. The EU institutions, however, may have high in their priorities the principle that countries or partners “may not misuse their national sovereignty as an excuse for insulating themselves from external pressure on human rights; and that it is legitimate for states to raise human rights issues in conducting foreign relations.” The grounds for the imperative lie in the need for a “common conscience” and a global ethic in an interdependent international community.
Mariela Baeva
BG MEP during the sixth legislature (2004-2009)
Good information.