ISSUE46: JUNE-AUGUST 2007
network of research and training centres/programmes
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Role of human rights rapporteur focus of Lund workshop
UN Nations University (UNU) and the Raoul Wallenberg Institute (RWI) organized a joint workshop on “Human Rights Special Procedures: The Role of the Special Rapporteur” in Lund, Sweden May 2-4.
Project directors Martina Timmermann (UNU) and Lyal Sunga (RWI), assembled an eloquent, goal-oriented group of human rights experts, such as former deputy and acting High Commissioner of Human Rights, Bertrand Ramcharan, and Jakob Möller, former chief, communications branch, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Member of the Human Rights Chamber, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Among the participants were several active special procedures mandate holders who shared their valuable on-the-ground experiences and insights and stood for an intense and fertile debate:
- Miloon Kothari, UN special rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living;
- Amada Benavides de Pérez and José Gómez del Prado, both from the UN working group on the use of mercenaries as a means of impeding the exercise of the right of peoples to self-determination;
- Martin Scheinin, UN special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights while countering terrorism;
- Leila Zerrougui, from the UN working group on arbitrary detention;
- Vitit Muntarbhorn, UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in North Korea; and
- Gudmundur Alfredsson, RWI Professor and expert member of the UN sub-commission on promotion and protection of human rights.
The first concrete result of the meeting is the “Lund Statement to the United Nations Human Rights Council on the Human Rights Special Procedures," which was drafted in a unique common effort between academics and practitioners striving to contribute to the discussion on the future of the human rights special procedures during the upcoming Session of the Human Rights Council, in Geneva, June 11-18.
The papers and interviews from the workshop will be published in a UNU-RWI book to be edited by Lyal Sunga (RWI) and Martina Timmermann (UNU).
© 2007 United Nations University