Geneva Academy
25 May 2020
Building on a previous expert meeting on human rights in inclusive cities, this second online conference – co-organized by the Geneva Human Rights Platform, UN-Habitat, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Geneva Cities Hub in partnership with the World Blind Union, World Enabled and the General Assembly of Partners – focused on persons with disabilities (PWD) and older persons at the city level.
During two days around 60 experts – representatives of organizations of PWD, experts from United Nations (UN) and governmental agencies, members of the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disability (CRPD) and the UN Special Rapporteur on persons with disabilities – analysed existing challenges and barriers for PWD and older persons in an urban context and made specific recommendations thereof. Where possible, participants also identified specific actions and interventions to incorporate into local policies.
‘Persons with disabilities and older persons continue to face barriers in their day to day activities and as such, there is an urgent need to develop solutions that meet their needs and remove these barriers’ underlines Kamelia Kemileva, Director a.i. of the Geneva Cities Hub.
‘Ensuring the accessibility of the online meeting to all was a key imperative for us. As such, closed captioning, simultaneous interpretation in three languages – French, English and Spanish – as well as sign language interpretation were provided’ explains Felix Kirchmeier, Executive Director of the Geneva Human Rights Platform.
‘The World Blind Union (WBU) appreciates the initiative by UN-Habitat to engage experts, such as organized constituencies of persons with disabilities, to generate learning and actionable recommendations critical for UN-Habitat to accelerate mainstreaming throughout its operations, programmes and UN inter-agency coordination to create more inclusive cities’ says Hannes Juhlin Lagrelius, WBU Program Officer and Co-Chair of the General Assembly of Partners-Partner Constituent Groups of Persons with Disabilities.
This meeting, financed by the Swedish International Development Acency (SIDA) through UN Habitat, is the second of a series that aims at developing operational documents to translate human rights standards at the city level for local governments, city-level practitioners and decision-makers, as well as national governments interested in local governance issues.
The next meeting, concluding this series, will focus on gender aspects in cities. The outcome documents of these three conferences will be available publicly at the end of the series.
Sandra Pointet/Geneva Academy
The 78 students of our LLM in International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights and MAS in Transitional Justice, Human Rights and the Rule of Law are starting their classes this week, both in Geneva and online.
Olivier Chamard/Geneva Academy
In 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most meetings and exchanges had to take place online.
UN Photo
This short course, which can be followed in Geneva or online, analyses the main international and regional norms governing the international protection of refugees. It notably examines the sources of international refugee law, including the 1951 Geneva Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, and their interaction with human rights law and international humanitarian law.
ICRC
This short course, which can be followed in Geneva or online, will provide participants with an introduction to substantive human rights law. It will start with an introduction to the nature and sources of international human rights law and its place in the international legal system. The course will then provide a presentation of the main principles applicable to substantive rights (jurisdiction, obligation and limitations).
CCPR Centre
Resulting from traditional legal research and informal interviews with experts, the project aims at examining how – if at all possible – IHL could be more systematically, appropriately and correctly dealt with by the human rights mechanisms emanating from the Charter of the United Nations, as well from universal and regional treaties.
ILC