United Nations

Human Rights and the SDGs: Progress or a Missed Opportunity?

Human Rights and the SDGs: Progress or a Missed Opportunity?

On 25 September 2015 the United Nations General Assembly adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which would replace the Millennium Development Goals...
Towards an International Legally Binding Instrument on Business and Human Rights

Towards an International Legally Binding Instrument on Business and Human Rights

The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights are the first global set of guidelines for states and companies to prevent and address the risk of adverse impacts on...
Uber, Informal Work and the Expert Working Group on Discrimination Against Women

Uber, Informal Work and the Expert Working Group on Discrimination Against Women

The decision of the London Employment Tribunal that Uber taxi drivers are employees and not self-employed is of global importance, in the face of the increase in all kinds of...
Law of Peace(making) and the Promise of a New Beginning for Children

Law of Peace(making) and the Promise of a New Beginning for Children

The act of peacemaking may be viewed as the promise of a new beginning. It is latent within the sui generis legal form of the self-constituting process, and the often...
The Human Rights Council – Highlighted Outcomes of the 33rd Session

The Human Rights Council – Highlighted Outcomes of the 33rd Session

The three intensive weeks of the 33rd session of the Human Rights Council (HRC) concluded on 30 September 2016. They resulted in thirty resolutions, a Presidential statement, and the appointment...
UN Rights Experts Warn Against the Grave Threat of Unsafe Abortions

UN Rights Experts Warn Against the Grave Threat of Unsafe Abortions

A group of United Nations human rights experts have called on States to repeal restrictive abortion laws and policies; dismantle discriminatory barriers to access to safe reproductive health services; decriminalise...
EUNAVFOR Med: A Military Operation on Shifty Waters

EUNAVFOR Med: A Military Operation on Shifty Waters

EUNAVFOR Med (referred to in this post as the “Operation”) was commissioned by the European Council on 18th May, 2015 to address the immediate concern of migrant deaths occasioned by...
Thinking Long–term: A Foundational Framework for Durable Solutions for Refugees

Thinking Long–term: A Foundational Framework for Durable Solutions for Refugees

The world is currently facing the biggest refugee crisis since the Second World War. The debate so far has rightly focused on traditional refugee protection topics, such as access to...
What Principles Should Guide a Fairer Refugee Responsibility-Sharing Regime?

What Principles Should Guide a Fairer Refugee Responsibility-Sharing Regime?

On 19 September 2016, world leaders gathered at the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants . This historical Summit was set against the backdrop of a select few countries bearing...
ICJ Judge Joan Donoghue speaks on the difficulty of proving Human Rights violations in front of the “World Court” at the Oxford Human Rights Program

ICJ Judge Joan Donoghue speaks on the difficulty of proving Human Rights violations in front of the “World Court” at the Oxford Human Rights Program

By starting off with a made up case of forced disappearance that led our made up victim to flee to another country away from his captors, Judge Donoghue demonstrated the...
Prevention is Key to Ending State Conflict & Fragility

Prevention is Key to Ending State Conflict & Fragility

Conflict, violence and instability are troubling yet familiar phrases that continue to dominate media headlines. At the recent World Humanitarian Summit held last month in Istanbul, the take-home message for...
Sweating in the Park or in the Factory: Beyoncé’s New Sports Wear Company and Respect for Human Rights

Sweating in the Park or in the Factory: Beyoncé’s New Sports Wear Company and Respect for Human Rights

In April, Beyoncé released her album Lemonade. In May, she launched her sports clothing brand Ivy Park. The former was hailed as a ‘new civil rights movement’, while the latter...

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