We use various third-party cookies to provide social media features and to analyze our traffic. Please use the options below to manage your cookie settings. You can change your cookie settings at any time. Please be aware, if you deny cookies, certain features of our website may not work.
This will apply to all services
Google Analytics
YouTube
Asian Development Bank>
23 November 2020
Authored by Dr Christophe Golay, Senior Research Fellow and Strategic Adviser on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights at the Geneva Academy, our new Research Brief The Right to Land and Other Natural Resources details the content of this right, states’ obligations, as well as accountability mechanisms for its enforcement at national, regional and international levels. The Research Briefs also presents the Colombian case where peasant organizations are using the United Nations (UN) Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP) to protect peasants’ right to land.
‘The UNDROP has been adopted to rebalance power relations in rural areas and addresses a number of fundamental questions, including the right to land and other natural resources, a right that is central for billions of people. This right must now be implemented at national, regional and international levels’ underlines Dr Golay.
Asian Development Bank>
The UNDROP recognizes the right to land and other natural resources for non-indigenous people and communities for the first time in international human rights law. It also provides that this right can be exercised individually and/or collectively.
On 17 December 2019, a number of UN special procedures and members of UN treaty bodies called for more accountability mechanisms to ensure UNDROP’ implementation. They committed to protecting the rights enshrined in the UNDROP, and they underlined that special measures shall be taken by states and other stakeholders to protect human rights defenders of land, environment and natural resources – who are the first victims of criminalization, intimidation and attacks against their physical integrity and life – and that their safety must be prioritized and protected via all available mechanisms.
In 2019 and 2020, the UN Human Rights Committee and the Interamerican Court on Human Rights referred to the UNDROP to protect the right to land in two important cases.
‘All human rights mechanisms should follow these examples, and make duty bearers accountable in cases of violations of the right to land and other natural resources. Civil society organizations and lawyers can also be instrumental in supporting peasants and other people working in rural areas in their claims, and in convincing human rights mechanisms to take steps to protect the rights enshrined in the UNDROP’ stresses Dr Golay.
This Research Brief is a summary of an upcoming Guide aimed at supporting the land community in UNDROP’s implementation, published with the International Land Coalition (ILC).
This guide focuses on the steps that states and international and regional organizations shall, and that social movements and civil society organizations should take to better promote and protect the right to land. It will be launch on 17 December 2020 to mark the second anniversary of UNDROP’s adoption by the UN General Assembly.
Asian Development Bank
Asian Development Bank
News
Adobe
Our latest Research Brief examines the myriad consequences that accompany damage rendered upon food systems during armed conflict.
News
SPC
In November, our Geneva Human Rights Platform – in partnership with the Pacific Community and the Commonwealth Secretariat – conducted its third and final UN human rights treaty body follow-up review pilot in Nadi, Fiji.
Event
CIEL
Organized by the Geneva Human Rights Platform in co-operation with Center for International Environmental Law this event will explore the significance of this ruling by the European Court of Human Rights.
Training
UN Photo / Jean-Marc Ferré
This training course will explore the origin and evolution of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) and its functioning in Geneva and will focus on the nature of implementation of the UPR recommendations at the national level.
Project
The Geneva Human Rights Platform contributes to this review process by providing expert input via different avenues, by facilitating dialogue on the review among various stakeholders, as well as by accompanying the development of a follow-up resolution to 68/268 in New York and in Geneva.
Project
Adobe
This research will provide legal expertise to a variety of stakeholders on the implementation of the right to food, and on the right to food as a legal basis for just transformation toward sustainable food systems in Europe. It will also identify lessons learned from the 2023 recognition of the right to food in the Constitution of the Canton of Geneva.
Publication
Geneva Academy
Publication
Geneva Academy
