8th Meeting - 60th Session of Human Rights Council

A very good afternoon, Your Excellencies, distinguished colleagues, dear friends. I hereby declare open the eighth meeting of the 68th session of the Human Rights Council. We will now begin the biennial panel discussion on unilateral coercive measures and human rights. and this is held pursuant to Council resolutions 27/21 and 58/3. The theme of this year's panel is the impact of unilateral coercive measures and overcompliance on the right to food and food security. It is an honour for me to welcome Mr. Volker Turk, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, who will deliver an opening statement. I also have the pleasure of welcoming Ms. Alena Duhun, the Special Rapporteur on the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights, who will also deliver an opening statement. Let me also welcome our distinguished panelists. Mr. Michael Fakhri, the Special Rapporteur on the right to food. Ms. Atia Waris, independent expert on the effects of foreign debt and other related international financial obligations of states on the full enjoyment of all human rights, particularly economic, social and cultural rights. Mr. Robert Huisch, the associate professor in the Department of International Development Studies at Dalhousie University. And lastly, Her Excellency, Ms. Anayansi Rodriguez Camejo, Ambassador and Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cuba. Excellencies, dear participants, the list of speakers will close in 15 minutes. I encourage all speakers to intervene in an interactive fashion, present comments, and ask questions that reflect the panelists' interventions and the discussion. The speaking time limit is one minute and 30 seconds for all, and a maximum of 40 speakers will be accommodated. Delegates inscribed on the list of speakers who cannot take the floor due to time constraints can upload their statements to be posted on the extranet. I now have the honor to invite the High Commissioner for Human Rights to deliver his opening statement. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you very much indeed, Madame Vice-President.

Delegates and dear panelists, targeted sanctions against individuals and companies and other entities consistent with international law can be important tools in exerting pressure for peace, enhancing the protection of civilians, and protecting human rights. This may include arms embargoes on governments, whose armed forces commit gross violations of human rights, and travel bans, asset freezes, and other targeted steps against individuals credibly accused of serious human rights violations. But unilateral coercive measures that are inconsistent with international law pose serious risks to the enjoyment of human rights. Where sanctions are imposed on entire sectors of an economy, with sweeping impacts. They can prevent people from accessing the essentials of life. In conflict and crisis situations, they can hinder the provision of humanitarian aid by halting the purchase or import of goods or the payment of fees. They can interfere with the proper functioning of essential health and education systems. They can undermine the right to work, to housing, and to social security. They can disrupt the provision of basic goods and jeopardize the availability, quality, and affordability of food and clean water. Overcompliance is the application by third parties of sanctions to an extent that goes beyond the formal legal requirements of the sanctions regime. It may be a result of the complexity of rules around sanctions or the desire to avoid penalties and reputational risks. but it has real effects on people. The impact of overcompliance can include reducing or preventing the import of essential goods, including raw materials, supplies for the agriculture sector, food and medicine. Overcompliance can also prevent people from receiving lawful funds. It is critical to develop proper tools and guidelines to address overcompliance. Turning to the theme of today's meeting, sanctions can impact on the right to food directly by disrupting imports, production, distribution, and sales. Sanctions on agricultural products, inputs, and supplies can cause price increases that put a nutritious diet out of reach for many. They can also have an indirect impact by making even locally produced food inaccessible and too expensive for some parts of the population. Such sanctions have disproportionate effects on the most vulnerable people, including women and children. In some cases, they can contribute to large-scale food insecurity, which means people may struggle to know where their next meal is coming from and may become malnourished. Any imposition of sanctions must be fully compliant with international law, including human rights law. Sanctions processes must be fair. They must take human rights impact assessments into account. They must be subject to monitoring and independent review. And they must provide for the prompt lifting of sanctions when no longer justified. Sanctions should never be used to influence or harm the operation of accountability mechanisms in fulfillment of their mandates. I call on the Russian Federation to withdraw the arrest warrants it has issued against senior officials of the International Criminal Court. And I repeat my call on the United States to lift the sanctions it has imposed on senior ICC officials and on this Council's Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories. Coercive measures such as these against international officials performing their functions are completely unjustified. Madam Vice-President, all States have an obligation to ensure access to enough nutritious food for everyone under their jurisdiction. They should ensure that the steps they take do not violate enjoyment of the right to food in their own States or beyond. They should therefore refrain from any steps that jeopardize conditions for food production and access to food. I urge all countries that impose sanctions to establish clear and effective humanitarian exemptions that explicitly protect essential food imports and agricultural goods, including seeds, fertilizers, and associated equipment. I call on them to lift sectoral sanctions that restrict access to essential food supplies and which have a disproportionate impact on the most vulnerable. I urge all States to ensure that food is available, adequate, acceptable and affordable for people in their territory and subject to their jurisdiction. And I call on them to develop and implement special protection measures for vulnerable groups, including children, pregnant women, elderly people and people with disabilities who face higher health risks from food insecurity. I urge all States to uphold humanitarian and human rights law by insisting on the provision of sufficient food to all people affected by crisis and conflict. Sanctions must never be used to impose collective punishment on a population. I look forward to the outcome of this discussion.

Muchas gracias.

I thank the High Commissioner for his opening statement. And I now call upon Madam Elena Douhan to deliver her opening statement. Please go ahead, Madam.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice President, Excellencies. It's a privilege for me to be here today and to participate in this biennial panel meeting for discussion of issues relevant to the impact of unilateral sanctions, means of the enforcement and growing over compliance to the right to food and food security. Today, the rapid expansion of various forms of unilateral sanctions has taken place in the face of intensive political debate with very little attention paid to the illegality and humanitarian impact, especially as regard the right to food and food security. Reports received as well as country visits demonstrate that usually the whole population of the country under unilateral sanctions becomes subjected to the negative impact of them and also for the compliance with the most vulnerable groups facing the most dramatic effects. Unilateral sanctions regimes are usually pretending to introduce humanitarian exceptions to deliver in particular food as a survival good. At the same time, this allegation is generally misleading. Humanitarian exceptions are not effective. And additionally, as the G20 Zero Hunger aims to ensure not only food availability, but rather food sustainability, that is not possible when unilateral sanctions means of the enforcement or implementation and overcompliance affect access to water, electricity, transportation, gas, gasoline, infrastructure, and accessibility. Due to the limited time, it's not possible to address all elements of the impact, but I will focus at least at some of them. In particular, unilateral sanctions, means of the enforcement and over compliance create impediments in delivery of food, seeds, agricultural machinery, spare parts, fertilizers, livestock vaccines, and many other, what has serious transborder effects, decreases the effectiveness of agriculture, and make people to come back to hard and low effective hand food cultivation. Insufficiency of fuel due to sector and transportation sanctions affects agricultural machinery, food processing and storage, delivery of food to remote areas. Multiplying costs of food and goods necessary for agriculture, transportation costs make it unaffordable for the most vulnerable groups and in some countries for the majority of population. All the above results in the growing poverty rates and availability of food basket, reduced ratio and availability of the proper nutrition. Impediments in access to the newest list knowledge prevent countries from developing of more effective agriculture and often make them to use old, often environmentally unfriendly agricultural technologies, resulting in the deteriorating labor environment, violating, inter alia, the right of everyone to benefit from the results of academic progress. unavailability of stock vaccination undermines plane and livestock disease prevention capacities; reduced access to clean water and sanitation, transportation, use of sewage for irrigation purposes increases risk of water-borne diseases. Sanctions imposed against fertilizers industry have deteriorating effect over the population of the countries in many parts of the world, especially those which already face hunger elimination problems due to multiplied costs of fertilizers, risks of punishment for circumvention of sanctions regime, or the absolute unavailability. Even the delivery of food as such, which is claimed by sanctioning states as being fully exempted from any limitations, is usually very problematic and very expensive. due to the transportation, financial, insurance sanctions, as well as fear of food producers to get subjected to penalties in the face of unclear sanctions regimes and possibility of extremely severe punishments. The same reasons impede the implementation of the UN Security Council humanitarian resolutions requesting to release frozen assets to ensure basic needs of the population and to deliver food. Madam Vice President, Excellencies, the above reasons increase moderate and severe malnutrition and hunger, result in unbalanced food baskets and sufficiency of proteins and vitamins, violate fundamental human rights under the ICCPR, including the right to life, right to decent life, freedom from torture, prohibition of discrimination with growing mortality rates and reduced life expectancy. Freedom from hunger and right to the highest attainable level of health under many human rights treaties is violated as food is one of the fundamental prerequisites for implementation of the right to health. It severely affects vulnerable groups, children due to unavailability of baby formula, people dependent on health-related diets, women, as they sacrifice food on behalf of men and children, and in the environment of insufficiency of nutrition, are most subjected to the home violence. They increase the level of poverty and dependence on governmental support and humanitarian assistance, which is also reduced due to the general economic impact of unilateral sanctions. Poverty and hunger are viewed by the UN General Assembly as conditions conducive to terrorism and other types of transboundary crimes, as well as involvement in the grey economy. Madam Vice-President, Excellencies, the right to food is a right vital for the survival and living in dignity of every individual around the world every day. It cannot be postponed to the next year or even the next month. It consists of two parts, availability of food today and food sustainability in every country for every person. Due to the high importance of this right, no unilateral measures can be taken to affect the right to food both today and continuously. As the right to food and SDG 2 are directly dependent on the proper functioning of electricity, water supply, transportation, gas, and many other elements of infrastructure in the country, I request again to lift any measures which can negatively affect the functioning of critical infrastructure and goods necessary for agriculture and food sustainability. I also want to remind that states cannot justify negative impacts of unilateral sanctions as unintended due to overcompliance of private actors, as it is their obligation under international law not to violate human rights, as well as other international obligations, but also acting under the principle of due diligence to ensure that all actors acting under their jurisdiction and control do not violate human rights. I align here with the position of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights that if the right to food is violated by the action of private actors, states on the territory of under jurisdiction of which these businesses are registered are equally responsible. I hope for fruitful discussion today. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much indeed, Special Rapporteur, for your opening statement. I will now give the floor to the panelists for their initial presentations. I have the honor to give the floor, first of all, to Ms. Atiya Waris. Please go ahead, madam.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, it is a pleasure and an honor to be here with you, speaking on a topic that one would not normally find a person speaking on debt or tax or illicit financial flows to be having a conversation when it comes to food, overregulation, and unilateral coercive measures. In Somalia, there is a proverb, and it says, if you throw a stone in the market, you might hit your neighbor. So we're going to talk money, and that's why this is my conversation. Where are these stones landing? Why are they landing there? Do we really need these stones to be thrown out into the marketplace? And the reason I say that is because food is business and food is big business. There are probably five or more big companies in the world that manage most of the cross-border food movements across different spaces. And if I look specifically at the African continent, 90% of its carbohydrate sources come from off the continent. And these are necessities for that particular region. So how does one go into this conversation speaking about when the world is in economic crisis? And now you see the added layer of unilateral coercive measures coming in with the debt crisis, with the debates on increasing of taxation, not only with the UN tax conversations at the General Assembly, but also with the International Maritime Organization that is adding maritime taxes. And as I pointed out, if you are importing goods that are food products into your continents, then these prices are going to go up very soon. and at the same time in a market where we have reducing overseas development aid. This increased regulation is spreading beyond not only treaties and laws at the global level and regional levels, but is also trickling down into guidelines and recommendations. And really, this is where the biggest impact on finance is showing itself. While you have sanctions at the Security Council level, what you have is a series of unilateral measures that are being rolled out from different parts of the world, including regional blocks, where these economic blocks are making decisions to close down on the ability of many countries, some of which are extremely fragile and low-income countries, to actually receive food products because they are unable to make financial transactions and to complete those process. So these layers of finance that are affecting domestic needs are also adding to limitations not only on the right to food, but also other human rights, including the right to survive. So when one reflects on the impact of unilateral coercive measures and over compliance on the key aspects of right to food, issues of availability, accessibility, adequacy and sustainability have already been highlighted by Madam Dohan. But there are also certain issues that circulate around finance and there are four key issues I would like to point to. The first one is that during the FFD negotiations in Seville in June this year, we saw positive steps towards the creation of a debtors club, as well as conversations around the setting up of a task force to take the financing conversations forward. However, more needs to be done in legal regulation of finance using the lens of human well-being. to be truly assessed to ensure that any unilateral actions, which of course fall outside international law, do not undermine human life and survival. And what we do see is that diverse stakeholders, whether they're corporations or individuals, are now more and more finding themselves obliged to implement unilateral measures or face consequences in the country issuing this measure should they fail to comply. Blocking of their businesses, drops in profitability, and then also firings of labor staff. and access to goods and services is then also reduced. So when this affects the value chain of food, what one starts to see, and I say this now very often, that there is blood on the budget lines. And when these decisions are being made on financial transactions, we see more and more that food is leading to issues around survival. That now takes me to my second point, which is that the reform of the global financial and fiscal systems does need to advance an international law regime that does not condone the use of UCMs to undermine the ability of corporations and individuals to operate truly globally, if that is our intention as an international community. The laws must be anchored in not only mutual beneficial practices of international cooperation and assistance, but must align with the international human rights framework, standards and norms that will oblige states to take necessary measures of survival. The third point, which is in line of letters, both letters that I have led to the US government, to the New York State Senate, BlackRock on Zambia and the IMF on various technical issues, including surcharges, show clearly that regulation, for example, by the Israeli government most recently, that taxation being withheld, Debt being blocked or any type of financial transactions are being used to hinder the ability to actually fund not only policies and services that are essential, but also disproportionately does affect the poorest. We already are in a case where we see clear famine in both Palestine and the Sudan. My third point is my report that I presented to the General Assembly last year on a global fiscal architecture. This is an extremely important issue because we need to ensure that all member states on an equal footing are exploring effective and fair mechanisms to use public resources to grant human rights for all by tackling uncontrolled growth of the wealth of a few. inequality as it is at its highest ever point currently. Governments cannot tackle these issues alone and therefore require meaningful participation, cooperation and assistance to address the issues of global tax abuse, all of which are principles of human rights under a multilateral and inclusive rights aligned fiscal framework. My report goes forward and the IMF under the Pact of the Future was also tasked to reform the international financial architecture, and it is important that member states continue to push for this report to be released. I would like to point out that my upcoming report to the UNGA next month looks at issues of financing peace. And I think that as we talk about issues of food, one must take into consideration the fact that whereas we normally talk about economies that are socialist or capitalist, we are now in an era where we are speaking about war economies and peacetime economies. And for this, we really need to sit back and reflect. I thank you very much for your time, and I look forward to the conversation, Madam Chair.

I thank the independent expert, Madam Juarez, for her statement. Thank you very much indeed. And it's an honor now for me to give the floor to Mr. Robert Wisch. Please go ahead, sir.

What we're to hear is unilateral coercive measures, is that they seek the product of total destruction that comes from war, all in order to prevent actual war, allegedly. The underlying purpose and original design of sanctions or other unilateral coercive measures, dating back to antiquity, has always been to inflict hunger, pestilence, and suffering on civilian populations. In the late 19th century and the early 20th century, economic weapons were the ultimate weapons. Up until World War II, hundreds of thousands of deaths by economic isolation were the chief man-made cause of civilian death in conflict. United States President Woodrow Wilson said that economic weapons like sanctions are infinitely more terrible instrument of war than war itself. Wilson's comments drew on the horrors of the Persian famine in 1917 to 1919, which claimed 2 million lives through military occupation and economic blockade. And as famine emerged during World War II, this reinforced the belief that the threat of isolation from the world was, in fact, so great that no nation would dare break international protocols for fear of inflicting pestilence on its own population. This is to say that before the atomic bomb, Economic weapons were the most feared deterrent to conflict. Now, throughout the 20th century, ham-fisted sanctions, better described as blockades, have been routinely applied to promote regime changes. Cuba has faced and continues to face relentless unilateral coercive measures that are meant to create isolation, stagnation, and deprivation, even by specifically targeting food and medicine. Many nations banned trade with Iraq in the 1990s, causing a grinding breakdown of sanitation and health services in that country. The country was very dependent on imports that saw its economy shrink by two-thirds. And as a result, sanitation, health, and education infrastructure nearly collapsed. Now, with such lessons in mind, the 21st century has witnessed a rapid increase in the use of unilateral coercive measures, sometimes referred to as smart or strategic sanctions. Now, this method targets individuals within a government or assets a person in a targeted government may possess abroad. And unlike the first wave of seeking destruction or the second wave of threatening total destruction, this third wave of UCMs, the threat is of isolation from global markets. But the hope, instead of causing pestilence, is just to cause financial ruin for individuals. Now today, there are over 70,000 unique sanctioned persons and entities worldwide, a 370% increase since 2017. Over 16,500 are aimed directly at the Russian Federation in response to the war in Ukraine. I suggest as Council that the purpose of even the allegedly smartest sanctions continue to inflict unnecessary and often unintended harm against civilians. Food security is both the victim and the bellwether for understanding how economic weapons harm the innocent and vulnerable communities in both targeted and in non-targeted nations. While sanctions may appear smarter, more targeted, or even softer, they continue to hold to their original purpose, which is to harm civilian populations. Pursuing peaceful global protocols. through unilateral coercive measures is tantamount to a glassblower reaching for a sledgehammer to craft his work. They just don't work. As smart as sanctions are supposed to be, there will always be unintended consequences and, as a result, humanitarian harm. As I see it, these consequences occur in three ways. First, as has been mentioned, over compliance by the private sector. It leads to a noticeable deprivation of imports as companies withdraw entirely from areas targeted by UCMs. The United States and the EU sanctions against Russia did not block food or fertilizer outright for export, but they did disrupt the movement of those goods globally and at a significant cost. And since Russia controls a third of the world's phosphate fertilizers and companies struggled to export after being cut off from global financial networks and shipping insurers also avoided Russian assets, fertilizer prices jumped by 50% since the beginning of the war. Farmers in the global south paid that price. And likewise, Russia's blockade of Ukrainian grain exports pushed the United Nations food price index to an all time high in March of 2022. As a result, 8.2% of the global population, that's some 673 million people, experienced hunger in 2024. My second point is that humanitarian harm shows up directly on people's dinner plates. Broadly speaking, UCMs make hunger worse. Even targeted sanctions against government officials and the affluent will quickly trickle down to the broader population. It involves higher prices for food and fuel, broken trade links, and job losses. Heavily sanctioned nations like Venezuela, Iran, Syria, and Sudan all face limited food and fertilizer imports and often empty shelves as a result of it. Now, I've conducted much research on this. My assistants and I have shown that UCMs cause an immediate decline in imported proteins. Targeted countries scramble to find local alternatives, which increases vulnerability in what food is available, how is it consumed, and the labor required to obtain it. Women often dedicate more hours to acquiring food through local networks, and a lack of fertilizer and climate shocks further destabilize production. The third point I would like to quickly make is that targeted nations often rely on so-called pressure valves of acquiring foreign resources outside of central banking systems. Recently, targeted nations have turned to gold and cryptocurrency for that, but those items do not have the same mechanism as central banking platforms to help respond to shocks or crises that happen internally. So in closing, Let me just say that issuing nations often fail to understand this, that humanitarian harm may not be the intention of a sanction, but it is always the consequence. I urge a simple realization that, simply put, UCMs are the wrong tool for behavior change writ large.

Thank you very much indeed for your statement.

And I now have the pleasure to give the floor to Her Excellency, Ms. Ana Yanci Rodriguez Camejo, for a video message.

Madam Vice President, we would like to thank the Office of the High Commissioner for the efforts undertaken in organizing this biennial panel within the difficult situation of the liquidity crisis faced by the United Nations. For over six decades, the Cuban people have faced the consequences of an unrelenting economic, commercial, and financial blockade imposed by the United States government, which has seen an upsurge in recent years with new pressure-based measures, extraterritorial actions, and financial restrictions. This policy, which is unilateral in nature, is a mass flagrant and systematic violation of the human rights of the Cuban people. And it directly affects national food security, restricting access to inputs, technologies, funding, and international cooperation. During the period between March 2023 and February 2024, the harm caused by the blockade in the agri-food sector in Cuba rose to over $441 million. This figure is not simply an economic loss, but rather it reflects the human impact of a policy which attacks the food security of our people, given that it prevents the acquisition of fertilisers, agricultural machinery, fuel, chemical products and essential technologies to guarantee national food production. The blockade hampers and indeed interrupts the arrival of supplies that have already been paid for, affecting the availability of commodities such as rice, beans, powdered milk, oil, meat, bread, and coffee. The intimidating effect of the blockade has, in fact, reached entities within the United Nations system. In 2024, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the FAO, sought to acquire tractors for small Cuban producers at a value of $1.5 million. However, the manufacturer refused to take the risk to trade with Cuba as a result of US coercion. Madam Vice-President, the blockade has also restricted Cuba's access to multilateral foreign financing for agricultural development programmes, the modernisation of rural infrastructure and the strengthening of climate resilience. This restriction affects the Cuban state's ability to guarantee in a appropriate or adequate standard of living, particularly within a context marked by global crises, economic volatility and environmental challenges. Various mandate holders of this Council have been categorical in pointing out that UCMs, such as the blockade, breach international law, the principle of non-intervention and interference in the internal affairs of states and the purposes of the United Nations Charter. In January 2024, the Special Rapporteur, Alina Duhon, together with the Special Procedures on the right to food, the right to development, extreme poverty and human rights, sent a joint communication to the US government. in which they described the blockade as a serious violation of the human rights of the Cuban people, including the right to life. Madam Vice-President, in spite of all of this adversity, the Cuban state has undertaken many efforts to guarantee equitable access to foods, to protect the vulnerable sectors and to promote the local production of food. One of the pillars of this strategy is the law on food, sovereignty and nutritional education. Which was adopted in 2020 and is coordinated with the sustainable development goals and the national economic and social development plan running up until 2030. Furthermore, the urban, suburban and family agriculture program has been revitalized as a strategic tool to ensure self sufficiency at the municipal level. Together with the World Food Programme, Cuba has implemented actions to bolster mother-child nutrition, food at school, and care provided to the elderly. The World Food Programme supports the self-supply programme, the plan for the prevention and monitoring of anaemia, and the life plan. which is a programme of the Cuban state, and it addresses the impacts of climate change on food security. Madam Vice-President, we restate our appeal for the immediate and unconditional cessation of the blockade. This demand is not only a question of justice for the Cuban people, it is an ethical, legal and humanitarian requirement which questions the credibility of the international human rights protection system. The Human Rights Council must continue to foster events such as these, which raise the profile of the effects of UCMs on the enjoyment of the human rights of millions of people across the world. We urge the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to continue to follow up on this important topic. And in that regard, we would like to highlight the very rigorous and professional work done by the Special Rapporteur, Elena Duhon, in developing her mandate. Cuba will continue to defend its right to live without a blockade, to produce its own food, and to build a development model which is fair, sustainable, and based on solidarity. Thank you very much.

I thank the Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cuba for her statement. Excellencies, dear friends, we will now begin the first segment of the list of speakers. All interventions from the floor are limited to one minute and 30 seconds. The list of speakers is now closed. I give the floor to the Distinguished Representative of the European Union. Thank you.

The European Union recalls that its sanctions are used to defend universal values and international law, preserve peace, security, and human rights in line with the UN Charter. They are reversible, proportionate, targeted, and calibrated. The EU carefully designs its sanctions to avoid unintended consequences, including for food security around the globe. The EU sanctions do not target the trade in agricultural and food products, including grain and fertilizer, and there is no ban on transit to third countries via the EU on such items. In addition, EU sanctions have no extraterritorial application. They do not create obligations for non-EU persons or organizations which have no link to the EU. In order to prevent overcompliance and de-risking activities, extensive guidance on the implementation of sanctions are available to economic operators. The EU and its members are the world's largest donors of humanitarian and development assistance, including to countries under sanctions. In addition, the EU has introduced broad humanitarian carve-outs in the autonomous sanctions regimes, thus underlining our strong commitment to humanitarian principles. Dear panellists, food should never be used as a weapon of war, as it has a greater negative impact on the enjoyment of the right to food and on food security than EU sanctions.

Could you please elaborate on such a practice?

I thank you.

Thank you very.

Indeed, I'd now like to call upon the distinguished representative of Ghana, speaking on behalf of a group of countries.

Madam Vice President, distinguished panelists, the African group remains deeply concerned about the persistent use of the universal coercive measures, which disregard the principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations and undermine the promotion, protection, and full realization of human rights. Socioeconomic sanctions remain one of the major impediments to the successful implementation of both the African Union Agenda 2030 and the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Our heads of states have on several occasions expressed concern over the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of the right to development, as well as their detrimental effects on international relations, trade, investment, cooperation, and overall pursuit of peace and stability across the continent and globally. The African Union has firmly condemned the continued unilateral application and enforcement of coercive measures by certain countries, particularly when used as instruments of political or economic pressure against any state. The Union has expressed particular concern over such actions directed at African Union member states, as they undermine the sovereign right of nations in self-determination and violate the principles of international law and multilateral cooperation. In closing, we stress the importance of continued dialogue and cooperation, not only to mitigate the negative impact of UCMs on human rights, but also to eliminate UCMs themselves. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I now call upon the Ambassador of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela on behalf of a group of countries.

Ambassador, please.

Thank you, Vice President. Venezuela is honored to speak on behalf of the Group of Friends in Defense of the United Nations Charter. We thank the panelists for the various statements and presentations given. We also express our thanks for the steps undertaken to hold this vitally important biennial panel. The Group of Friends appreciates the fact that the United Nations General Assembly adopted the 4th of December as the International Day Against Unilateral Coercive Measures, and this is an initiative fostered by this group. Addressing the structural causes of food insecurity, hunger, and widespread poverty is vital, not only to understand the phenomenon in its entirety, but also to develop effective and efficient actions which would put an end to the scourge of hunger and save the lives of millions of people. Guaranteeing the food security of our peoples means that we need to seek out comprehensive, sustainable, coordinated, and effective solutions. and this needs to be done by the international community, as well as the elimination of all measures which distort the market and applied by developed countries. The Group of Friends requests the immediate elimination of UCMs, which run counter to the United Nations Charter and international law, and are applied as weapons of war. These have a direct effect on the enjoyment of all human rights of entire peoples, including the right to food. Thank you very much, Madam President.

Thank you, Ambassador.

I'd now like to give the floor to Uganda on behalf of the NAM. Please go ahead.

Thank you, President. I have the honor to deliver this statement on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement. The NAM expresses its appreciation to the Office of the High Commissioner for organizing the biennial panel, and we thank all the panelists for their presentations. We believe that today's discussions will further contribute to a better understanding of the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights. The NAM firmly believes that UCMs and overcompliance impacts on the key aspects of the right to food, including availability, accessibility, adequacy, and sustainability. This further compounds the challenges in food production, processing, preservation, and distribution, which disproportionately affects the most vulnerable. The 19th NAM summit held in Kampala in 2024 reiterated its objection to all UCMs, including those measures used as tools for political or economic and financial pressure against any country, against developing countries, which violate the UN Charter rules and principles of international law. NAM leaders reaffirmed that under no circumstances should people be deprived of their own means of subsistence and development. They expressed concern that such measures hinder the well-being of populations of affected countries and create obstacles to the full realization of their human rights. The NAM underlines that UCMs are one of the obstacles to the full enjoyment of the right to food and call upon all states to avoid the unilateral imposition of economic coercive measures and the extraterritorial application of domestic laws that largely affects developing countries and access to basic human rights. I thank you, President.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. I'd now like to give the floor to the Ambassador of Belarus. Please go ahead, Ambassador.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice President. We thank the High Commissioner, the Special Rapporteur, and the distinguished panelists for highlighting the negative impact of UCMs on food security. And also for the overview of the use of sanctions as an economic weapon, historically and now, Belarus is a major global producer of potassium fertilizers. Before 2022, more than a third of potassium was supplied to Africa from Belarus. The ban by EU countries in 2022 of the transit of Belarusian fertilizers through its territory and the blocking of the Baltic ports blocked access by foreign farmers to Belarusian products and caused a sharp growth in food prices and also food shortages and worsening nutrition quality in developing countries. This is precisely how these unlawful sectoral sanctions against Belarusian fertilizers impact African farmers who may seem so far away from Europe. We call on the OHCHR to maintain its focus on the problem of the negative impact of UCMs on food security and to take systemic and decisive measures to respond. We support the view of the High Commissioner and many other speakers of the need to assess the impact of this phenomenon and to monitor it, that is, the impact of sanctions on human rights. And we trust that UN agencies will take part appropriately in this process. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I now call upon the representative of China.

Madam Vice President, UCMs are pure and simple hegemony, a policy of might is right, which openly throw the brakes on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, undermining the foundations of multilateralism and the international rule of law, attacking the fundamental rights of the peoples concerned, including their right to life and the right to development. Some countries, in spite of their many human rights misdeeds, do not hesitate to adopt UCMs based on domestic law on the pretext of democracy running against the spirit of multilateralism. This is a serious obstacle to global governance and international cooperation. As a significant member of the global South and a victim of UCMs, China will always stand by multilateralism, justice and equity, and the common interests of the international community. Recently, President Xi Jinping proposed an initiative on global governance, calling on all parties to promote sovereign equality, to respect the international rule of law, to practice multilateralism, and to place the human being at the heart of concerns, and to focus on action so as to build together a fairer and more reasonable global governance system. China seeks to step up cooperation with all parties, including the UN human rights mechanisms, to eliminate at the international scale the negative impacts of UCMs and to promote together the cause of healthy development and human rights. Thank.

You. Thank you very much.

I'd now like to call upon the representative of Indonesia.

Madam Vice President, Indonesia reaffirms its principal opposition to UCMs. UCMs are a symbol of double standards and run contrary to the UN Charter and international law. After decades, they have not proven effective in achieving their unilateral politically motivated objectives. What they do is they change the price of food, fuel, and fertilizers. Restrictions on trade, access to financing, and distribution channels, as well as targeted measures against companies and individuals, severely limited the availability, accessibility, and affordability of food and other essential goods. Above all, essential goods such as food and medicine must never be used as political pressure. These measures and policies have undeniable grave impacts on the enjoyment of human rights, including on the right to food. The heaviest burden invariably falls on the most vulnerable groups, including women, children, and persons with disabilities. Indonesia firmly believes that human rights concerns must be addressed through dialogue, cooperation, and constructive engagement, not coercion. To the panelists, we ask this question: What is your view on the persistence of states or groups that insist on safeguards in unilateral measures, though these safeguards clearly fail and harm human rights?

Thank you.

Thank you. I now call upon the distinguished representative of Cuba.

Microphone.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. The economic, commercial, financial blockade imposed by the US government is one of sustained hostility and it is the most prolonged UCM applied against any country in the contemporary world. This blockade, which has in recent years, seen an upsurge, has devastating effects on all sectors of Cuban society, in particular on the right to food, which is an essential human right for life and dignity. As a result, we weren't able to acquire over 214,000 tons of corn or 17,000 tons of soya. We no longer produced hundreds of thousands of tons of fruit and vegetables, and over 26,000 tons of refrigerating capacity was lost. affecting the conservation of basic foods. Of the $42 million planned for pork production, scarcely 41% was used as a result of the cancellation of contracts, the rise in the prices of shipping companies, the lack of availability of ships, which risked reaching Cuban ports because of the risk of trading with our country and the fear of receiving fines running into the millions. In spite of those conditions, The Cuban Government is undertaking extraordinary efforts to ensure that the usual family basket is supplied. The blockade is an act of unilateral aggression. It's a constant threat against our national stability and a mass, flagrant, and systematic violation of the human rights of all Cubans. It is an act of cruelty, and we demand that it be lifted without any conditions and immediately. Thank you very much indeed.

I'd now like to call upon the representative of the Russian Federation.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. The large-scale and uncontrolled use by Western countries of unilateral coercive measures in pursuit of their policy goals and to obtain economic advantages is becoming a global challenge for the sovereign development of states and the prosperity of their citizens. These restrictive actions by the West contradict the UN's fundamental human rights documents. There is now essentially a practice in international relations of collectively blaming the inhabitants of some countries and whole regions for seeking to enjoy basic human rights and freedoms, especially the rights of peoples to sovereignty and self-determination. The countries of the collective West continue to develop norms in their national legislation to criminalize the violation of sanctions regimes. There is an increasing number of prosecutions for attempts to circumvent restrictions by natural and legal persons, including in third countries. The blacklists include the family members of political, cultural, and public figures and entrepreneurs. Some countries and their citizens are artificially shrouded in an atmosphere of toxicity which cannot help but negatively impact their enjoyment of fundamental rights and freedoms. The practice of using UCMs exposes the true colours of the Western so-called champions of human rights, their hypocrisy and unscrupulousness, and this should be categorically condemned by the international community.

Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'd now like to call upon the representative of Eritrea, please.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. Eritrea thanks the panellists. Unilateral curative measures and their overcompliance have weaponized food, undermining the most basic of rights. They disrupt access to seeds, fertilizers, technologies, and finance, while overcompliance by banks and shipping lines blocks even lawful trade. Humanitarian exemptions exist only on paper, leaving millions vulnerable to hunger and malnutrition. These measures affect every aspect of the right to food, availability by restricting agriculture inputs, accessibility through inflated costs and blocked markets, adequacy by limiting nutritious imports, and sustainability by strangling investments in food systems. The result is declining productivity, weakened preservation, and broken distribution chains. Eritrea has lived this reality, these politically motivated sanctions without legal basis have constrained our efforts to modernize farming, secure trade, and strengthen food security. The adversity imposed was never a result of scarcity, but of deliberate external restrictions. The deeper question is, how can the Human Rights Council move beyond condemnation to establish binding mechanisms, legal, institutional, and reparative, that not only deter the future use of food as a tool of coercion, but also deliver justice and redress to populations already harmed by these unlawful measures? I thank you, Madam Vice President.

Thank you very much. I'd now like to invite the delegation of Pakistan. Please go ahead.

Pakistan.

Pakistan, please.

Mawdhan and Salah.

Thank you, Madam Vice President. My delegation welcomes the distinguished panelists and thanks them for sharing their insights on a topic both timely and relevant. The link between coercion and starvation has become increasingly clear in the face of the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza. We are witnessing the instrumentalization of the right to food to create conditions untenable for continued existence. The genocidal campaign to drive the Palestinian people from their land is unfolding before our eyes. The right to food, drinking water and health are catered with direct linkages on the right to life and the right to safety and security of the person. that resort to unilateral measures restricting access to essentials such as food and water must cease both in occupied Palestinian territory and elsewhere. Madam Vice President, on unilateral coercive measures, Pakistan has consistently maintained that they contravene the UN Charter and entail considerable human right risks. The resort to UCMs in pursuit of foreign policy goals remain a matter of concern, especially with increasing evidence indicating that such measures undermine enjoyment of several interrelated human rights by affected peoples. Sanctions must only be implemented with authorization of the UN Security Council, with adequate safeguards for people's humanitarian needs and fundamental rights. I thank you.

Thank you very much. I'd now like to invite the Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran to take the floor.

Madam Vice President, we thank the High Commissioner, the Special Rapporteur, as well as the distinguished panelists for their thoughtful contributions. We also support the mandate of the Special Rapporteur and the organization of this important panel discussion. which provides a timely opportunity to assess the humanitarian and human rights consequences of UCMs. Iran reiterates that UCMs, particularly in the form of financial and trade sanctions, are unlawful and contrary to the Charter of the United Nations. They directly undermine the realization of economic, social, and cultural rights, with the right to food among the most seriously affected. In practice, Such measures block access to agricultural inputs, fertilizers, machinery, technology, and financial transactions necessary for the production, process, storage, and distribution of food. This creates shortages, inflates prices, and disproportionately harms vulnerable groups, including children, women, the elderly, and persons with disabilities. Overcompliance by private sectors further worsens the situation, restricting even goods not nominally exempted. Such dynamics illustrate how sanctions erode availability, accessibility, adequacy, and sustainability of food systems, violating states' obligations under international human rights law. In this regard, could the Special Rapporteur clarify how standardized methodologies can be developed to document sanctions violations of the right to food, ensuring accountability under international law? I thank you.

Thank you.

I now call upon the Ambassador of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

Ambassador.

Thank you, Madam Vice President. We would like to thank the panelists for their valuable contributions and presentation. Since 2014, Venezuela has been a victim of the cruel implementation of UCMs by the US government. which declared Venezuela to be a threat, an unusual threat to its foreign policy. This was the beginning of the economic, financial, and diplomatic, and trade blockade against Venezuela, whose aim is to cause an internal collapse, which through force, allows for a change in political regime in our country. To date, on the Venezuelan people, 1,042 UCMs have been imposed, which constitute crimes against humanity. The food system has been one of the damaged sectors by these measures, which affects the imports of goods and inputs, the development of national production, and funding of plans and programs in that field. In spite of this, to guarantee fully the right to food of our people, the Venezuelan the Venezuelan Government has developed a policy to combat against these UCMs, these illegal UCMs. The FAO certified in its last report the reduction of the prevalence index of undernourishment in Venezuela, standing at 5.9% in the last quarter. Venezuela energetically rejects the imposition of UCMs and requests the unconditional and immediate cessation of this policy, which violates the UN Charter and the human rights of entire peoples. Thank you very much, sir, or madam.

Thank you very much. I now call upon the delegation of Zimbabwe.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice President. We appreciate the convening of this important panel discussion and thank the panelists for their insightful presentations. As one of the countries that have been affected by the imposition of unilateral coercive measures, Zimbabwe's agriculture, a backbone of the national economy, has suffered from diminished export competitiveness and reduced foreign exchange earnings, jeopardizing our food security. International banks have been hesitant to engage with Zimbabwean entities, making it difficult to conduct normal transactions, leading to reduced support and declining foreign direct investment in the agricultural sector, hindering the ability of our farmers to finance their business. UCMs also interfere with the movement of food, leading to shortages and higher prices, placing food out of reach for many in targeted countries. We call for the lifting of all UCMs and reiterate the need for UN agencies to monitor and report on the impact of UCMs, secondary sanctions, and overcompliance on the enjoyment of human rights in targeted countries and on the weakened capacity of those countries to effectively respond to their human rights obligations. I thank you.

Thank you very much.

I will now turn to the list of speakers for national human rights institutions and non-governmental organizations. I give the floor to Jameh Eghran Tabsonati, Vas Salamet Iranian. Please go ahead.

Madam Vice President, distinguished panelists, we thank the distinguished panel for addressing the critical theme of this discussion.

The right to food is a precondition for the realization.

Of life and dignity, yet unilateral sanction and the overcompliance they generate are undermining right for millions of people. U.S. sanctions drop agricultural production, block access to seeds, fertilizers, and technology, and restrict international trade and banking channels necessary for importing food and medicine. Other compliance by private companies and financial institutions worsens the situation by denying transaction even where humanitarian exemption exist. According to general comment number 12 of the CSCR, food should never be used as an instrument of political and economic pressure. However, limitation imposed on food have severe consequences, specifically on children, women, and persons with chronic illnesses. As a special rapporteur, Professor Dohan highlighted such practices amount to collective punishment violating human rights law. We urge member state to demand the immediate lifting of unilateral sanction that endanger food security, to establish effective monitoring of other compliance, and to reaffirm that no political interest can justify depriving civilians of food, medicine, or other essential for survival. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'd now like to give the floor for a joint statement to the Cuban Association of the United Nations.

Senora Vice President, the United Nations Cuban Association congratulates and thanks the panelists for their presentations. No serious in-depth and exhaustive analysis on development and human rights is possible without bearing in mind the barrier that these multidimensional measures are of pressure and asphyxia for countries. When it comes to Cuba, for over six decades, we've suffered the imposition of the broadest and most complex UCMs in history, which affects all spheres of social, economic, and cultural life of the country and its people. The US blockade against Cuba is a flagrant violation of human rights and the main barrier for the development and attainment of the SDGs. We have seen an upsurge in extreme levels with the current administration. When it comes to food, Not only is there hampering when it comes to purchasing food and energy sources and inputs for industry, but also all commercial financial transaction of countries with third states. The blockade prevents the normal functioning of civil society organizations in Cuba and their exchanges with international counterparts. On behalf of civil society living and working in Cuba, we state the claim to immediately lift the blockade and ensure that Cuba is removed from the list of co-sponsors of states. The inclusion of our country in this list is an additional tool used by the US government to justify and to increase to extreme levels the genocidal blockade against Cuba. It is vital to report and have awareness raising of experts, human rights mechanisms as to the devastating and cruel human impact of UCMs. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

I would now like to call upon the Medical Support Association for Underprivileged Iranian Patients.

Thank you. Madam Vice President, distinguished panelists, U.S. sanctions severely undermine the right to food and global food security. Sanctions disrupt trade, finance, and supply chains, leading to food shortages and inflated prices and malnutrition in affected populations. A 2025 report has documented the food inflation rates to have alarmingly increased in sanctioned regions and reached 32 percent in Iran in a one-year period. In Yemen, about half of the population were facing high levels acute food insecurity in 2024 due to sanctions. Overlaps of sanction regimes, threats of secondary sanctions, and zero-risk policies lead to overcompliance by, by, by banks, producers of foodstuffs, transportation, and delivery companies, and limit access to food. Madam President, we call on this distinguished panelists to use their academic capacities to continually raise awareness on the negative human right impacts of UCMs and discuss the inequalities in global systems caused by UCMs. We call on the panelists to advocate for international collaboration and address inequalities in food distribution and access. We call on the UN member states for sharing knowledge, experiences, and innovative strategies to combat hunger and malnutrition, emphasizing that the global food crisis is primar- primarily a distribution issue rather than a lack of resources. Thank you.

Thank you very much indeed.

I'd now like to call upon Organization for Defending Victims of Violence.

Thank you, Madam Vice President, distinguished panelists. I welcome the convening of this panel on unilateral sanctions and their devastating impact on global food security. The Global Report on Food Crisis 2025 highlights the worsening humanitarian crisis with millions facing acute food insecurity. Unilateral sanctions inflict severe harm on people's access to food and other necessities by disrupting supply chains, reducing household purchasing power, inflating import costs, and crippling national infrastructure. Even when directed at specific individuals or entities, their consequences ripple across entire economies, worsening hunger and poverty on a massive scale. This is deeply concerning as many people face poor nutrition and rising health risks. As UN human rights experts emphasized in March 2022, access to food, water, sanitation, medicine, vaccines, and other services essential for survival and the functioning of critical infrastructure must never be obstructed by unilateral sanctions. The Special Rapporteur's latest report underscores the human cost of these measures. In countries such as Iran and Venezuela, sanctions have intensified food insecurity and deepened dependence on humanitarian aid. Under the worn-out excuse of targeting governments, they deprive civilians of medicine, food, and dignity, violating the fundamental right to live free from hunger. I thank you.

Thank you. I call upon for a joint statement, Charitable Institute for Protecting Social Victims.

Mr. President, this NGO, drawing on its field experience, emphasizes that UCMs and the overcompliance of banks and companies directly restricted the right to food and food security, endangering livelihoods and access to adequate nutrition for vulnerable groups. These measures, contrary to the UN Charter, the Declaration on the Right to Development, and other international treaties, have limited people's access to essential necessities of life, including food and adequate nutrition. Field evidence shows that financial restrictions and fear of secondary sanctions have disrupted food supply chains, reduced the capacity of civil society organizations to provide support services, and increased poverty and food insecurity. Women, children, older persons, and persons with disabilities bear the heaviest burden. We recommend that the HRC, in cooperation with relevant Special Rapporteurs and civil society, establish an independent mechanism to for the human impacts of sanctions on the right to food and food security, and hold the states accountable for the social and humanitarian consequences of such measures. Compensation and reparation for victims of sanctions are only part of the action needed to restore the human agency and dignity of communities under sanctions. This NGO stands ready to provide field-based data and documentation to strengthen the Council's mechanisms. I thank you.

Thank you.

I now call upon United Nations Watch.

Madam Chair, this panel is premised on the idea that the greatest threat to human rights today comes from Western sanctions. In truth, the gravest assault on human dignity comes from authoritarian governments that oppress, jail, and torture their own people. And so we ask this panel, is it right that the Special Rapporteur, Ms. Doo-Han, has traveled to Qatar, Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Iran, Syria, and China, not to to defend the victims of these dictatorships, but to lend a UN imprimatur to the propaganda of the oppressors. Ms. Duhan, when the people of Venezuela cried out under Maduro's misrule, when Syrians were bombed and slaughtered by Assad, when Iranian women were beaten for showing their hair, what was your response? To blame the West and excuse the despots. Why did your office get $50,000 from Qatar? Why $265,000 from Russia? Why $980,000 from China? Who believes that Sheikh Tamim, Vladimir and Xi Jinping gave $1.3 million to help human rights victims. Let us be clear, sanctions are not the cause of hunger in Cuba. It comes from a one-party system that for decades has denied its people freedom, choice and prosperity. Ordinary Cubans know it is not sanctions that prevent them from growing food freely or importing without state control. It is their rulers in Havana. The UN should be defending victims, not enabling their oppressors. By turning this Council into a platform against the West, today's discussion betrays its mandate. If we care about human rights, let us first demand accountability from the governments that oppress their own people. I thank you.

Thank you. Let me stress that participants are expected to make comments or ask questions on the panel and the panelists. I cannot fail to notice that we have heard derogative language or remarks, and that some of them are personal in nature. This is not acceptable in this forum. Everyone has the right to express his or her views about, in this case, the topic of the panel or activities of the mandate holders, but this should remain within the accepted framework, ensuring that a sense of respect permeates our discussions. Once again, no personal attacks against mandate holders should be made in this setting. And I will now continue with the speakers list.

We have exhausted the first segment of the list of speakers, and we will now proceed with the second segment of the list. I give the floor to the distinguished representative of Laos.

Vice President, my delegation expresses its appreciation to all panelists for their insightful presentations. The Lao PDR is of the view that the imposition of unilateral coercive measure is contrary to the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and international law. It creates not only serious impact on the full realization of human rights and development in the affected countries, but also hinders the international trade, investment, and cooperation, as well as the provision of humanitarian assistance. The rights to food are fundamental human rights recognized under the international law, which guarantee every person physical and economic access in subsistence safe and nutritious food necessary for an adequate standard of living and for a life with dignity. The Lao PDR reiterates that multilateral system maintain remain a key to enhancing cooperation in order to address the root causes of global hunger. We also call for the immediate and unconditional lifting of the universal coercive measures so that all citizens can enjoy the right to food and food security and no one is left behind. I thank you.

Thank you very much.

And I call upon the delegation of Iraq.

Thank you, Madam Vice President.

We would like to thank the panelists at this important UCMs have a negative impact on the enjoyment of the right to food and food security. These measures compromise the fundamental dimensions of the right to food, namely availability, accessibility and sustainability. They also disproportionately affect women, children, the elderly and persons with disabilities. Madam Vice-President, the phenomenon of the over-compliance lead to difficulties in civilians having access to essential goods. Even though they are formally exempt from exception regimes, they lead to the hampering of SDGs and attack economic, social, and cultural rights. Their repercussions aren't only limited to a single country, but also to third countries who have dealings with them. By way of conclusion, Iraq calls upon all countries to refrain from imposing such measures and to lift those that already exist. There is a need to exempt foodstuffs and supplies because they must guarantee the right to food. This is a collective responsibility which requires international firm commitment in terms of a peaceful cooperation. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Vice President. Egypt's delegation welcomes the Special Rapporteur and this panel discussion, and we take note of the presentation of panelists on the negative impact of these measures on enjoyment of human rights, especially the right to food. We also support the efforts of the Special Rapporteur when assessing the impact of these UCMs. We reiterate the, uh, need for any UCMs to be in compliance with international law, international human rights law, and we category- categorically reject the use of these measures for political pressure. We need also to distinguish between UCMs and national decisions resorted to for national security considerations that are in line with the constitution and international treaties, especially if these conventions are aimed at combating terrorism, crime, or destabilizing national security. In closing, we would like to inquire about the latest trends for the implementation of these measures. and how to expose that they run counter to international conventions and treaties and the ways to address them in accordance with international law. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I'd now like to call upon the delegation of Sudan.

Thank you, Vice President. We would like to thank experts for their contributions and observations. We agree with the recommendations regarding the impact of UCMs on the enjoyment of human rights, especially the right to food. These unilateral measures denied nations such as Sudan enjoyment of basic rights, including the right to food, by not implementing major projects on agriculture, this also hinders the, the, uh, performance of economic sectors, it, it also affects, uh, financial transactions and, uh, the importing of, uh, tools for agricultural projects and also delay the delivery of main commodities. We also refer to the measures that are indirectly imposed by third countries or through trade or financial institutions to avoid sanctions from the states imposing these sanctions.

I thank you, Madam President.

Thank you. I give the floor to Brazil.

Thank you, Madam Vice President. Brazil is extremely concerned with the impact of unilateral coercive measures on the right to food, food security, and nutrition, especially among vulnerable groups. We have consistently condemned unilateral coercive measures as they violate international law and have a detrimental impact on the enjoyment of human rights. In particular, unilateral coercive measures should never undermine the functioning of critical infrastructure related to food, agriculture, water supply, and irrigation, and should -- nor should they restrict access to seeds, fertilizers, or other essential agricultural inputs. In 2024, Brazil launched the Global Alliance Against Hunger and Poverty, bringing together governments, international organizations, and other partners to advance concrete measures to eradicate hunger. According to the United Nations, more than 670 million people still suffer from hunger, while 2.3 billion experience food insecurity worldwide. UCMs must not become an obstacle to global efforts aimed at eliminating hunger. Looking ahead, Brazil observes with concern that unilateral coercive measures are increasingly diverging from the international obligations of sanctioning states as well as from the requirement to exercise due diligence by fully taking into account humanitarian considerations and the protection of fundamental rights. UCMs often undermine human rights and have recently even targeted democratic institutions and the independence of the judiciary. They are not only unlawful, but they also pose a threat, serious threats to the international order grounded in international law and to the effective functioning of the multilateral human rights system. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I now give the floor to Burkina Faso.

Thank you, Madame Vice-President. Vice-President, my delegation commends the panelists on the relevance of the impact analysis of UCMs on the right to food and food insecurity. In a global context marked by food food systems which have been made fragile by security and economic crises. UCMs simply deprive vulnerable peoples of their livelihoods, that is the consequences. Burkina Faso has always voiced its concerns vis-a-vis the use of famine as a weapon of war or restraints measure. Indeed, during the High-Level Policy Forum on Development in April 2025, Burkina Faso called for the lifting of UCMs, which are a violation of international law and the United Nations Charter. Thus, together with the Republics of Mali and Niger, my country has denounced the illegal, illegitimate and inhumane nature of sanctions handed down by ECOWAS against some countries of the Alliance of Sahelian States. To conclude, my delegation calls upon the international community to demonstrate further commitment so as to counteract the implementation of UCMs. I thank you.

Thank you very much.

I now call upon Rwanda.

They are not in the room.

I'll move on then to the following delegation, and that's the United Republic of Tanzania.

Madam Vice President, the United Republic of Tanzania aligns with the statement made by the African Group and Non-Aligned Movement. We thank the Office of the High Commissioner for organizing the panel discussion highlighting the impact of unilateral coercive measures and of a compliance on the right food and food security.

Unilateral coercive measures have serious adverse effect on the targeted economies and innocent lives, especially of women and children and older persons.

They also hinder the full achievement of economic and social development, particularly in developing countries.

We stand against the position of unjust economic sanctions and other unilateral coercive measures that undermine.

Sovereignty and prosperity for all. We therefore call for the.

Lifting of unjust sanctions and end to unilateral coercive measures that are inconsistent with the principles of international law. I thank you.

Thank you very much.

And I give the floor to Algeria.

They're not in the room. because I still don't find all the delegations in the room, because this is the first time that I'm chairing in this new setting. So between the ones that I cannot see from far, the time that it takes to allocate them. Anyway, so Algeria is not in the room, that's correct? Okay, so we continue with Malawi.

Madam Vice President. Malawi aligns with the statement of the African group and commends the panelists for the enriching presentations made in this biannual panel discussion on unilateral coercive measures. It is concerning to note that to date, negative impact of UCMs and overcompliance on the enjoyment of human rights remain deeply rooted. This is despite numerous calls and recommendations made in Council-mandated panels and workshops in previous years. We share the concern on the negative impacts of targeted coercive sanctions on the right to development of innocent people, especially on the rights to food, food security, as well as other related economic, social, and cultural rights. We reiterate the position of SADC and the AU on unilateral coercive measures and call for the lifting of sanctions against Zimbabwe, as the sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe continue to have far-reaching effects on the country and the entire SADC region. I thank you.

Thank you.

I now invite Armenia.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. Armenia thanks the panellists for the valuable insight. Ensuring the right to food and achieving food security are fundamental elements of realization of human rights and SDGs. It's undeniable that UCM and particularly overcompliance may create unintended barriers to trade in food and agriculture goods, hinder financial transactions, and disrupt supply chains. These effects often extend beyond the states directly concerned, impacting third countries as well. For small landlocked and/or conflict-affected states, such disruption can exacerbate existing vulnerability, heighten cost of imports, and place additional pressure on households and vulnerable communities. We underline the importance of dialogue, transparency, and careful assessment of humanitarian and human rights impacts before and during implementation of UCMs. We also emphasize how crucial it is for being guaranteed that measures targeting states never obstruct access to food, agriculture, inputs, or products and distribution critical technology. To support global food systems, monitoring exceptions must be implemented clearly, effectively, and consistently, and internationally collaboration must be maintained. Thank you.

Thank you.

And I call upon the Plenaria 120 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:00,000 Please go ahead.

Thank you, Vice President. We welcome the holding of this panel. Bolivia is a country that promotes the right to food and food security with sovereignty. We believe that adequate food for peoples also requires actions involving cooperation and coordination at the international community level. We have noted the backsliding that the world has experienced as a result of the multidimensional crisis. This has increased levels of extreme poverty, hunger and food insecurity. As has been underscored, the countries which have experienced UCMs have had their possibilities of addressing the basic needs of their peoples seriously affected, such as the right to food. Economic sanctions restrict their possibilities of developing trade relations with other states, with cooperating with the organizations and international institutions normally. These UCMs isolate states, affect their economies, and very often become devices of political pressure. Bolivia rejects these unilateral measures and expresses its support and solidarity with the peoples of the brotherly countries affected by these measures. We restate our preference for diplomacy over sanctions. which have a widespread effect on human rights.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

I now call upon Malaysia.

Malaysia thanks the panelists for their insightful presentations.

We align ourselves with the statement delivered on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement.

Malaysia is deeply concerned that unilateral coercive measures and overcompliance directly undermine the right to food and food security. By disrupting supply chains, restricting access to essential goods and inflating food prices, such measures exacerbate in- inequalities and place heavier burdens on vulnerable groups, denying millions their right to adequate and nutritious food. For Malaysia, food security is a national priority. Under the Madani Vision and the 13th Malaysia Plan, our national food security policy and agro-food policy 2.0 aim to ensure availability, accessibility, affordability, and sustainability. Among our initiatives are strengthening rice reserves and diversifying imports, empowering smallholders and SMEs, advancing climate-smart agriculture, and expanding social safety nets for households. Malaysia underscores that humanitarian consequences are severe when access to food and essential supplies is deliberately restricted. We reiterate that food must never be weaponized as a tool of political coercion. We reaffirm our principle opposition to unilateral coercive measures and call for disputes to be resolved through dialogue and cooperation consistent with the UN Charter and international law. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Cameroon.

Has the floor.

Thank you, Vice-President. Cameroon aligns with the statements by the African Group of countries and the Non-Aligned Movement made respectively by Ghana and Uganda. My country welcomes the convening of this panel and thanks the panelists for their informative contributions. Cameroon remains deeply concerned at the devastating effects of unilateral coercive measures, including on the right to food and food security. These measures run counter to the UN Charter and international law and mostly affect the most vulnerable populations. They can significantly undermine agricultural production systems, disrupt supply chains and aggravate humanitarian crises. The situation is all the more concerning given that overcompliance by some economic actors denies targeted countries of basic commodities such as seeds, fertilizers, and conservation technologies, thereby seriously hampering the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. This is why Cameroon calls for greater mobilization by the international community to ensure that the right to food is fully guaranteed without discrimination, and that UCMs are lifted instinctively when they compromise the survival of civilian populations. It is imperative that hunger cease to be used as a political lever. Food cannot be a weapon. Thank you.

Thank you.

I'd now like to give the floor to Chad.

Thank you, Vice President. Chad also welcomes the convening of this panel and thanks the panelists for their excellent presentations. We are currently going through troubled times, a time of global uncertainty, a slowing down of economic growth with inflationary pressures and geopolitical tensions, conflicts, climate change, and rapid technological change with the rise of artificial intelligence. In such a climate, It is understandable that people are being deprioritized and that perfectionism is taking hold. We see the effects of unilateral budget cuts on the humanitarian situation, especially in vulnerable countries such as Chad, which hosts about 2 million refugees in its territory. Coercive measures threaten to roll back some hard-won agricultural achievements and make the vulnerable even more vulnerable. This is why the response to these challenges must be international cooperation, multilateralism, and a mutually beneficial partnership. Unilateral coercive measures on food security can only lead to worrying outcomes for everyone. We therefore call, Vice President, for continued in-depth discussions on measures that could, inter alia, allow us to address structural vulnerabilities and infrastructure problems, which in turn could bolster our resilience in the face of today's crises and those of the future.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

I'll then move on to the list of speakers for National Human Rights Institutions. and non-governmental organizations. Global Institute for Water, Environment and Health has the floor.

Thank you, Mr. President. We remain gravely concerned about the devastating impact of unilateral coercive measures and external interference on the enjoyment of human rights in both Palestine and Sudan. In Palestine, decades of blockade and collective punishment have denied an entire population access to food, water, healthcare, and development. Such coercive measures are not about security, they are about control, and they perpetuate cycles of suffering and despair. In Sudan, foreign interference and the use of mercenaries supported by external actors have fueled conflict, displaced millions, and deepened the humanitarian crisis. These practices undermine sovereignty and directly obstruct the Sudanese people's right to peace, justice, and development. We urge this Council and Member States to move beyond condemnation and take concrete steps to end coercive measures and external support to conflicts. The people of Palestine and Sudan deserve dignity, self-determination and a future free from imposed suffering. Thank you.

Thank you very much indeed.

I'll now give the floor for a joint statement to Bachehaye, Asemane, Kamran, Rehabilitation Institute.

Mr. President, this NGO expresses its deep concerns over the severe impact of UCMs and overcompliance on the right to food and food security. These measures in violation of international law block access to food and farming resources, disrupting supply chains and threatening people's rights to adequate and sustainable food. Field evidence demonstrates that overcompliance by financial institutions and private actors, often motivated by fear of secondary sanctions, has exacerbated food insecurity, disrupted supply chains, and limited the capacity of humanitarian and civil society actors to respond effectively. We recall that the HRC in its resolution 2721 through 583 has repeatedly affirmed that essential goods, including food, must never be used as tools of political coercion and that such measures impede the full realization of economic, social, and cultural rights. Monitoring and accountability mechanisms are critical to assess and mitigate the human impact of these measures. This NGO urges the states, the United Nations and relevant stakeholders to, one, ensure that humanitarian exemptions are effectively implemented to safeguard access to food. Two, strengthen monitoring and reporting mechanisms to document violations and impact on food security. Three, promote accountability for the adverse consequences of sanctions and overcompliance on vulnerable populations. I thank you.

Thank you very much.

I now give the floor to the Human Rights League.

My apologies, I think I missed one. So joint statement, Indian Council for South America.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We highly commend Elena Dohan for her excellent work. Alaska, Hawaiian, and indigenous peoples as subjects of international law, largest diplomatic protest against the application of domestic law to annex our territories in violation of Article 73 and 1.2 of the UN Charter.

The equal right and self-determination principle makes it clear that unilateral coercive measures cannot be applied for.

Peoples under colonialism and foreign occupation. The peaceful settlement of our international dispute has been denied. In no case may our peoples be deprived of our right to subsistence, a fundamental principle of self-determination. We reject all attempts of unilateral coercive measures, including enactment of laws, national laws, and extraterritorial application not in conformity with international law. Yet, UNGA Resolution 1469 is weaponized as a unilateral coercive measure, devoid of UN monitoring or arbitration by member states, making territories of Alaska the 49th and 50th states, respectively. The Royal Hawaiian Kingdom, the family were not informed or invited to participate as a free political institutions, nor were the sovereign indigenous authorities.

Thank you. Time is up. I will continue with the next one. So the following is Human Rights Research League.

Thank you, Mr. President. In 2014, the Human Rights Council adopted resolution 2721, expressing grave concern that in some countries, the situation of children and women is adversely affected by unilateral coercive measures. Though the negative impacts on the quality of life for ordinary citizens in countries that are affected by sanctions are a relevant concern for any international body engaged in the issue of human rights, we in Human Rights Research League would like to draw the attention of this Council to the fact that many such countries spend much of the country's wealth not on improving the standard of living for said women and children, but rather spend billions of dollars on advancing their military capabilities. One such example is the Islamic Republic of Iran. The Islamic Republic of Iran has been subjected to international sanctions due to its nuclear program. The representatives of the Iranian government lament the plight of civilians suffering under crippling sanctions imposed by Western countries. All the while, Iranian authorities have spent billions of dollars of the national wealth not on improving the standard of living for women and children. but on advancing their ballistic missile program, showcasing vividly how little concern the authorities have for the welfare of their citizens. This Council should not be fooled by the crocodile tears shed by authoritarian governments, but rather question their misuse of funds and widespread corruption. Thank you, Mr. President.

Thank you. I would like to call on everyone to adhere to language that is commensurate with the dignity inherent to the discussion on human rights issues. Let me count once again on your support, so a sense of respect permeates all our discussion in this Council. Thank you so much.

Let's move on then with Associazione Comunita Papa Giovanni.

President, EPJ 23 welcomes the team of this panel and thanks all the panelists. UCMs are contrary to the Charter of the United Nations and constitute an obstacle to the implementation of the right to development and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. UCMs significantly impact the right to food because these measures, which may include economic sanction and trade restriction, can disrupt food supply chains, increase food prices, and limit access to essential resources. In many developing nations where food imports are critical, UCM can lead to skyrocketing food prices, a limited access to vital resources, resulting in increased malnutrition and hunger. Moreover, the phenomenon of overcompliance further complicates these issues. When businesses organization preemptively adhere to UCMs, even beyond their legal obligation, they may restrict access to food and agriculture products. The right to food enshrined in international human rights law obligates states to respect, protect, and fulfill this fundamental need. UCM and overcompliance undermine these obligations, disproportionately affecting marginalized communities and exacerbating existing inequalities.

To uphold the right to food.

It is crucial for the international community to clearly denounce and reassess the use of unilateral coercive measures. Dialogue and cooperation should replace coercion, ensuring that humanitarian exemptions are effectively implemented. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

And now, go to the Fort Shanshi Patriotic Volunteer Association.

President, dear delegates, I'm the founder of the International Patriotic Pact Organization, advocating love- loving one's own country without harming other countries' interests. UCMs violate international law and hinder the right to development and safeguarding of people's livelihood. World Bank report shows that U.S. sanctions have driven up Iran's food import costs, leading to a significant rise in child malnutrition rates. Sanctions imposed by the US have led to shortage of agriculture equipment and sharp decline in wheat production. Excessive compliance by enterprises have plunged 25 million people in Africa's Sahel region into food crisis. In 2024, the global reduction in food aid due to excessive compliance is equivalent to the annual food ration for 12 million people, which is a typical example of political games at the expense of human rights.

We call upon all.

Countries to ensure humanitarian channels within the framework of law and prevent food from becoming political weapons. We have repeatedly called at the UN meetings for replacing unilateral sanctions with multilateral cooperation, supporting the monitoring of impact of sanctions on, on the right to food, and establishing a human rights assessment mechanism. We call upon the UN to give attention to the international patriotic pact drafted by us, which prohibits the use of food for political coercion. Loving one's own country is not as if it were some game that sacrifices the interest of other countries, but a responsibility. Let's join hands to put an end to the political abuse.

Thank you very much indeed. With this, we have concluded the second part of our list of speakers. Distinguished participants, this was the last speaker that we could accommodate. The delegates inscribed in the list of speakers who cannot take the floor due to time constraints can upload their statements to be posted on the extranet. I will now give the floor back to the panelists for their concluding remarks. First of all, I will call upon Madam Atia Waris. You have three minutes.

I thank you very much, Madam Chair. The point in time when financial conversations enter into UCMs is literally at the point when two or more member states are unable to come to an amicable solution. At this point in time, countries have the opportunity to either continue negotiations or to implement unilateral coercive measures. They are not legal under international law, and it is settled. I think it's really important from a fiscal perspective that these are placed center of my response. Debt, tax, and aid, as well as all cross-border transactions, should not be used as a tool under unilateral coercive measures. And what we do need is a potential solution of a do no harm principle to ring fence issues around survival should unilateral coercive measures be taken into account. Recently, the world has been faced with a global challenge of a unilateral coercive measure when one member state withdrew from multiple treaties. That has affected almost every single country in the world. And one can see the effect of a unilateral measure, which is seeking to coerce a renegotiation of a treaty. Now, this particular challenge has caused a lot of problems across the world, not only in food, but in multiple other industries. There is a potential solution when we come to issues of fiscal challenges, the answer is to ensure that it is an international fiscal authority that is tasked with the protection of financial transactions so that these cross-border financial transactions and the survival-related goods and services that they engage with can be ring-fenced and protected. And it is a building block. Again, I would like to remind Member States that the IMF has been tasked with preparing the report on the creation of this international fiscal authority, and this is where one element of protection under UCMs can be put away. The last thing I would like to point to is that there are entities such as the FATF, where peer-to-peer assessment of countries has resulted in an agreement to set aside how they are going to be dealt with, and when they do not comply, we have economic blocs in the world that apply unilateral coercive measures, which are illegal, based on their understanding of whether these countries are compliant or not. I find this to be unacceptable under human rights principles, and I thank you very much for your time.

Thank you very much.

I now give the floor to Mr. Robert Huisch, who has three minutes. Please go ahead.

Thank you. The responses that we've heard from the panel today are illuminating, and I'll offer my response to members who've notably the European Union, who asked particularly about the humanitarian impact of UCMs from Europe. Let me just say that the critique of sanctions and universal unilateral coercive measures is not a suggestion that anyone should do business with regimes that intend to abuse human rights. But nor is the issue of sanctions and unilateral coercive measures not a license to avoid humanitarian responsibility. I believe here we need to think about what we've heard about understanding more around the measure of humanitarian impact from unilateral coercive measures. The enthusiasm to issue unilateral coercive measures is enormous in this day, 2025. which is why we require decisive upstream research to identify and preempt any humanitarian consequences from them, especially for those who are already vulnerable to food insecurity. And if through such research and compliance to such research, those nations who do issue unilateral coercive measures should be then compelled to respond with humanitarian measures that may include subsidies or direct food aid to populations and vulnerable groups who are indirectly and unintentionally targeted by these measures. Now such research, which I personally plan to continue to pursue and I hope others will as well, may just indeed demonstrate how poor a tool unilateral coercive measures are for resolving conflict. For those countries who have issued UCMs, the question that we can ask now is do you feel they have worked? For those who have received UCMs, can you record the impacts it has had on your civilian population? I want to highlight again just how important the case of Cuba is in this discussion. No other country has received such an enormous broadside of sanctions over a 60-plus year period, and it continues on. The final message here with the connection with sanctions and food security is that we are connected globally. and that countries that are sanctioned will have a more difficult time to respond to any shocks for food security that may relate to climate or conflict. And it is why this Council and the global community should bear that in mind to help each other ensure food security.

Thank you very much indeed. Lastly, I'll give the floor to the Special Rapporteur, Madame Dohan, two minutes, please.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice President. I would like to thank all participants today for their attention to the problem. As some of the questions have been responded by our distinguished panelists, I will focus on a few issues. The first point is that the issue of legality from the perspective of international law is extremely clear. measures can be taken by states unilaterally, either if it's a direct implementation of sanctions of the UN Security Council, or if they do not violate any single international obligation of these states, or if they fully conform the standards of countermeasures. All other measures are unilateral coercive measures, and they are illegal. I was very happy to hear the support to the idea of monitoring and assessment, which I have been promoted since several years. Indeed, it has not been done in different organs, and I hope very much that the organizations like FAO, WFP, focusing on the impact on the right to food, will start to do it and will follow up and assess precisely. But at the moment, I invite everyone to help me to develop the monitoring tool which has been in the process of development by the mandate. We do our best, but we are not able to collect your cases and your information without you. Therefore, I invite everyone to contribute. Issue of accountability and responsibility is indeed important, and therefore the mandate took an initiative to develop the guiding principles on accountability, responsibility, and redress, and all of you have received the first draft. Please help me to draft it properly. I'm open to all proposals. And the last point concerning the impact on the right to food, as the topic is extremely important, I plan to do my next report to the Human Rights Council with special impact on the right to food, and I will welcome all contributions. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much.

Excellencies, distinguished participants, this brings us to the end of this biennial panel discussion on unilateral coercive measures and human rights. I wish to thank the High Commissioner, Ms. Duhan, our distinguished panelists, and all the participants who have contributed to our discussion. We will now take a very short break before holding the interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery. Distinguished colleagues, let us continue. We will now resume our interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery. We will now continue with the list of speakers for national human rights institutions and non-governmental organizations. My apologies. Let's continue with the states, first of all. The first delegation on the list is Libya. Go ahead, please.

Thank you, Madam Vice President. We'd like to thank the Special Rapporteur on the report that shed light on some of the worst forms of child labor and the difficulties in fighting this practice, despite the progress made in this area. But exploiting millions of children is still a scourge and it is a source of great concern. We concur with the recommendations and outcomes of the Special Rapporteur, including taking more stringent measures at the national level and boosting the mechanisms to follow up on cases of child labor at the workplace, and ensuring a better cooperation at the regional and international levels and exchanging good practices in the practices of cross-border networks that promote these practices. We'd like to reaffirm the importance of combating transnational border crimes in slavery by exploiting the economic and social situations of people, and the importance of international cooperation in combating this scourge, because it also aligns with the human trafficking and human smuggling exposing humans to modern forms of slavery. Thank you, Madam Vice-President.

Thank you very much.

I'd now like to call upon the delegation of Ecuador.

Madam Vice-President, we thank the Special Rapporteur for his report, and we go along with the diagnosis that, at the world level, a large number of children continue to work in hazardous conditions in several sectors of the economy, in contravention of international human rights and labour standards. In recent years, Ecuador has made significant strides forward in combating child labour, transforming commitments at the global level into obligations at the national level, in particular when it comes to key institutions such as the Ministry for Labour and the Ministry of Economic and Social Inclusion. For instance, Ecuador, Interalia, has an intervention service to eradicate child labour, which, in coordination with public and private institutions, aims to achieve an effective disconnection of children from child labour. Similarly, we continue to strengthen learning areas to guarantee that these children remain in school and not engage in labour activities, bearing in mind the fact that the upcoming month of October the working group established by resolution 26/9 of the Human Rights Council will take place to draft an international legally binding instrument on companies and human rights, we would like to ask the following: how does the Special Rapporteur assess the possible contribution of an instrument of this kind to strengthen prevention and eradication of child labour in global supply chains? Thank you very much.

Thank you.

I'd now like to give the floor to the delegation of Guatemala.

Thank you, Madame Vice-President. It's always a pleasure to see you presiding over the meeting. Guatemala thanks the Special Rapporteur for presenting the report on the worst forms of child labour and shares the concerns about the persistent challenges identified. The government of the President Bernardo Arrevalo has affirmed and reaffirmed its commitment to eradicating child labour and the full protection of children. We acknowledge that we still face challenges to guarantee the full enjoyment of the rights of boys, girls and adolescents. To grapple with this reality, actions that have been spearheaded by the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare have been intensified, such as inspections in high-risk areas, awareness-raising campaigns on hazardous work, and the strict implementation of the Law on Comprehensive Protection of Children and Adolescents. Also, the Vice Presidency of the Republic, through the specific Cabinet on Social Development, fosters an institutional plan to eradicate child labour, open up specialised care centres, and hold inspections focused on social reintegration. Within this framework, the Government has also extended an invitation to the Special Rapporteur to hold an official visit to Guatemala in 2026, so as to support and strengthen these processes. Guatemala restates its willingness to continue to work with the mandate and the international community. We are convinced that only through a comprehensive and child-based approach that we'll be able to break away from the cycles of poverty and exclusion that perpetuate child labour. Thank you very much indeed.

I now call upon the delegation of the Cote d'Ivoire.

Thank you, Vice-President. Cote d'Ivoire thanks the Special Rapporteur for his report, which highlights the worst forms of child labour and the persisting hindrances to eradicating them. My country deplores these practices, which are often transboundary and are a serious violation of the fundamental rights of children, including the rights to education and health. To rectify this, the Ivorian Government has strengthened its legislative framework including by setting up in 2011 the National Committee to Monitor Action to Combat Trafficking, Exploitation and Child Labour. It is chaired by the First Lady, and the committee monitors and evaluates government actions as well as actions by national stakeholders in combating trafficking, exploitation and child labour in Cote d'Ivoire. Recently, my country launched the fourth National Plan of Action 2025-2029, which seeks to expand children's access to social services, to reduce family vulnerability, and to consolidate the legislative framework. Previous plans allowed us to lift 30,541 children out of the worst forms of child labor and to punish 233 perpetrators. In terms of international cooperation, Alongside Ghana and stakeholders in the cacao sector, Cote d'Ivoire has launched a new framework of action to eliminate child labour sustainably in cacao growing areas. Mr Special Rapporteur, what particular measures would you recommend to strengthen international cooperation, especially in terms of criminal justice, so as to better tackle forced child labour? Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I now go the floor to Jamaica.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. The Jamaican delegation notes the report of the Special Rapporteur and his continued engagement with a wide range of stakeholders aimed at eradicating the worst forms of child labour. The Government of Jamaica is committed to the eradication of child labour. As such, we have ratified ILO conventions on the worst forms of child labour and the minimum age. In terms of our contribution to the broader global context, the government has established a Child Care and Protection Act of 2024, the National Action Plan and the National Task Force Against Trafficking in Persons. In this regard, we share the concern of the multiple cases of child labor worldwide affecting 138 million children with more than a half of that figure engage in hazardous work in view of the SDG 8.7 target to end all forms of child labor by 2025. My delegation recognizes that the eradication of child labor requires a multi-stakeholder approach. We therefore welcome the focus on the role of industry through due diligence mechanisms and support for coming to base interventions against child labor. As part of efforts to address the root causes of child labor and promoting access to education, the government of Jamaica through the program of advancement through health and education and the school feeding program provides support to vulnerable families. The Government also launched in 2022 the Find a Child initiative to re-engage students who were detached from the school system during the COVID-19 pandemic. Mr. Special Rapporteur, what specific measures can States put in place to adapt to the shifting dynamics of child labour to address emerging challenges and trends related to labour migration and climate change in the bid to eliminate child labour? I thank you.

Thank you.

The Republic of Korea has the floor.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. My delegation would like to commend the report of the Special Rapporteur for its timely and comprehensive examination of the persistent worst forms of child labour. We are deeply concerned that 54 million children are still engaged in hazardous work, and that SDG 8.7, which pledges to end all forms of child labour by 2025, remains far from being achieved. We agree that state must protect children from any work that is likely to be hazardous or that is harmful to their health or their physical, mental, spiritual, moral, or social development. In this regard, the Republic of Korea strictly prohibits the employment of children under the age of 15 and limits working hours and night shifts for those aged 15 to under 18. As digital technologies are making sexual exploitation of children much easier, we have also criminalized the production and distribution of deepfake videos, as highlighted by the Special Rapporteur in his report. In particular, the Republic of Korea has continued its collaboration with UNICEF, jointly launching the Resilience for Children+ initiative this year to strengthen children's recovery in humanitarian and crisis settings. My delegation took note that the Special Rapporteur recommended the States to provide adequate guidance and support with businesses, particularly SMEs, to strengthen their capacity to implement human rights due diligence more effectively. Mr. Special Rapporteur, could you elaborate on which approaches are most effective in supporting businesses, including SMEs, to identify and prevent such risks throughout their supply chains? I thank you.

Thank you.

And I call upon Chile.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice-President. Chile would like to thank the Special Rapporteur for his report. We appreciate the emphasis placed on the need to formalise the informal economy, to protect child victims and to ensure social participation in sustainable solutions. We affirm our commitment to eradicating child labour. and we have fostered this with greater force as the President of the Alliance 8.7. We have fostered immediate and effective measures, including up-to-date legislation and national strategy from 2015 to 2025. Similarly, the survey on activities of children and adolescents for the first time incorporated the measurement of domestic work and care work, highlighting the gender impact on girls and adolescents. We note with concern that the worst forms of child labour take on a transnational nature, and this increases their scope and impact. This reality aggravates the vulnerability of boys and adolescents and girls. These require coordinated responses from the State, and it is therefore vital to enhance international cooperation so as to tackle these cross-border dynamics and ensure effective protection of the rights of the child. We would like to ask the Special Rapporteur in that connection how he views the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and how they can be tied in with international efforts to address the transnational nature of this practice and move forward towards its eradication. Thank you.

Thank you. I now call upon India.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. We have taken note with appreciation the report presented by the Special Rapporteur focusing on the worst forms of child labor. Government of India has undertaken several measures to eliminate child labor and safeguard children's rights. The Child and Adolescent Labor Prohibition and Regulation Act strictly prohibits employment of children below 14 years in any occupation and adolescents aged 14 to 18 years in hazardous work. That prescribes strict penalties and makes violation cognizable offenses. To support implementation, a model state action plan guides states in eradicating child labor. For rehabilitation, the National Child Labor Project Scheme rescues children from work, provides bridge education through special training centers, and mainstreams them into schools. In line with constitutional mandate, the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act guarantees free elementary education in neighborhood schools for all children aged 6 to 14 years. The National Education Policy of 2020 further emphasizes early childhood care and education as the foundation of lifelong learning. Additionally, the Juvenile Justice Act, 2015, provides a child-friendly framework for care, protection, and rehabilitation of vulnerable children. Madam Vice President, India is committed to addressing child labor through a comprehensive approach, encompassing legislative, educational, and socioeconomic measures. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Zambia has the floor.

Zambia?

I'll move on then with the next speaker, the distinguished representative of Brazil.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. Brazil thanks the Special Rapporteur for his comprehensive report and acknowledges its importance in reminding us of the urgency of eliminating the worst forms of child labor. The persistence of hazardous child work, the alarming rise of online exploitation, and the involvement of children in armed conflicts and criminal economies remain global realities that demand coordinated and decisive responses. We recognize the clear links the report highlights between child labor, poverty, inequality, and lack of access to education and social protection. These realities equal our own experience. Sustainable progress depends on strengthening institutions, ensuring every child is well fed and in school, and protecting families from falling into situations that drive child labor. We also take note of the reference to Brazil, including our dirty list mechanism and specialized justice institutions. These have shown many positive results. We acknowledge the need for continuous improvement and are committed to it, reinforcing inspections, ensuring protection for victims, and working with business and communities to deepen the impact of these measures. Mr. Special Rapporteur, in your view, are there particular international trade, financial, or governance mechanisms that currently make the fight against child labor especially challenging, and how might states work collectively to overcome them? Thank you.

Gracias.

Thank you. Nepal has the floor.

Madam Vice-President, Nepal thanks the Special Rapporteur for presenting the report on the worst forms of child labour and its challenges. The Constitution of Nepal prohibits child labour in all its forms. Nepal is a party to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and both of its optional protocols. We have ratified the ILO Convention 182 on the worst forms of child labour, as well as the ILO Minimum Age Convention 138. A Pathfinder country of the Alliance 8.7, Nepal's commitment to eliminating child labour, forced labour and modern slavery is steadfast and unequivocal. Madam Vice-President, protection of children today means safeguarding the future. Every child deserves a safe and nurturing environment to flourish and thrive well, with full enjoyment of rights. Therefore, we call upon all the stakeholders to act collectively in the spirit of genuine international cooperation to create a world free from child labour and slavery. I thank you, Madam Vice-President.

Thank you.

Gambia now has the floor.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice-President. The Gambia agrees with the Special Rapporteur's report. that the worst forms of child labor persist due to a combination of political, social, cultural, and legal factors. Accordingly, the Gambia's National Social Protection Policy 2021-2025 reflect our commitment to a multi-stakeholder approach to strengthen prevention, protection, and enforcement actions to eliminate the worst forms of child labor. The Labour Act 2023 also explicitly prohibits exploitative child labour, mandates the publication of hazardous work lists, requires employers to keep a registry of any children under 18 engaged in training, raises the minimum age for employment to 18 years, and imposes severe penalties on persons who contravene the law, including parents and guardians. As part of efforts to tackle root causes, In 2023, the Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education, in partnership with UNICEF and other stakeholders, also launched the Zero Out of School Children project, targeted more than 66,000 children and adolescents for enrollment into education, including those with disabilities. The National Trafficking Agency has also introduced a national hotline and strengthened its investigative and enforcement capacity, and is a beneficiary of the ECOWAS Fund for Victims of Trafficking in Persons. Notwithstanding these resource and cultural challenges in monitoring and enforcement, the Gambia remains determined to accelerate progress towards eradicating the worst forms of child labour.

Thank you. Thank you.

I now give the floor to South Sudan.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice-President. South Sudan thanks the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, and also thanks her for a successful end of her tenure and alliance with the African statement. We concur with the Special Rapporteur that child labour threatens progress on sustainable development goals, and hence must be addressed together with its root causes, with technical assistance and capacity building promoted to assist those who may not have the sufficient resources and the capacity to do so. Madam Vice President, although a post-conflict country with challenges, it is essential to underscore that South Sudan, to address child labour, has established laws and regulations related to child labour. It has also ratified international conventions on child labour in relation to minimum age, worst forms of child labour, optional protocols on armed conflict and on sale of children as well as on child ***********. South Sudan also strives for the protection and respect of labor rights, especially in relation to vulnerable groups such as women, girls, and children, to ensure their dignity and rights are safeguarded, as is stipulated in our penal code, which criminalizes selling or buying of minors for trafficking purposes, and likewise prohibits transfer of persons' control with the intent to subjugation to unlawful compulsory labor.

Furthermore, South Sudan has taken--

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. I'll move on to the next speaker. Iraq has the floor.

Thank you, Madam

Vice-President. My country delegation has considered closely the report of the Special Rapporteur and has taken note of it. We are surprised to see that the Republic of Iraq, amongst the countries using children in armed conflict, ignoring the last report of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children in Armed Conflict. My Government has undertaken significant efforts to prevent the recruitment of child soldiers, particularly in collaboration and cooperation with the Special Rapporteur on Children and Armed Conflict. This has led to the signing of a joint action plan between Iraq and the UN in 2023. Its implementation has led to the withdrawal of Iraq from the list and annex to the report in 2023 of the report. By way of conclusion, my delegation requests the Special Rapporteur whether his mandate will enable him to address issues related to children and armed conflict, particularly given the mandate of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict. I thank you.

Thank you.

Germany, please.

Madam Vice President, we align ourselves with the EU statement and thank the Special Rapporteur for his report. This year's focus on the worst forms of child labor seems to hate from the past, but unfortunately, it describes a gruesome reality. With over 100 million children worldwide affected by child labor, the world blatantly missed the mark set by the SDGs to finally eradicate child labor by 2025. We join the special rapporteurs called to adopt and implement the corresponding humanitarian and labor law standards, such as the ILO Convention 137 and 182. Germany's anti-child labor strategy focuses on strengthening education systems, fostering sustainable job creation, and building social safety nets in partner countries to keep children in school and out of harm's way. Moreover, as a pathfinder country in the ILO Alliance 8.7, Germany pioneers and finances programs to help companies eliminate child labor in global supply chains, a policy backed by our national supply chain due diligence legislation. Child labor and contemporary forms of slavery in a broader sense are closely intertwined with organized crime and trafficking in persons. Effectively combating criminal networks, identifying, protecting, assisting, supporting, and empowering victims and survivors, therefore, is equally essential to reach our common goal, a world where no human being is treated as a commodity, neither child nor adult. What are best practices of interstate cooperation on combating child labor, Mr. Repetto? Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Switzerland has the floor.

Thank you, Madame Vice-President. Switzerland would like to thank the Special Rapporteur for his work as well as for presenting his report. On the dawn of the deadline for the 2030 Agenda, the pathway towards eliminating child labour in all its forms remains very long. Despite significant headway made, Switzerland remains concerned by the number of children who are forced to work, estimated at 138 million across the world. Amongst them, 54 million take part in dangerous work considered as the worst forms of child labour. The Swiss government's action to effectively combat child labour in the value chains combines legislative measures and proactive initiatives. Since 2022, national legislation imposes upon companies based in Switzerland a reasonable diligence obligation in the field of child labour, whilst encouraging companies to go beyond the legal minimum requirements. Switzerland also supports multi-party initiatives and international networks of companies such as the Child Labour Platform, which, thanks to their comprehensive and collaborative approach, contribute to addressing the root causes of child labour. So as to attain the objective of eradicating child labour and its worst forms, it is vital to address the root causes. This problem cannot be resolved through isolated efforts. It is therefore more urgent than ever to strengthen cooperation amongst all stakeholders.

I thank you. Thank you very much.

I now call upon the Russian Federation.

Thank you, Vice-President. We thank Mr. Abukato for setting out his vision of the main reasons for the worst forms of child labour. In our view, he rightly asserts that exploitation of child labour is unacceptable. Under the Russian Labour Code, there is a ban on labouring by minors in any dangerous or harmful conditions. We agree with the view on a comprehensive approach being needed to addressing the deep-rooted views in culture and society which condone child exploitation. In our view, it would be worthwhile to mention the historical root causes of this negative practice, which can be found in the dark colonial past of countries that today call themselves beacons of democracy and champions of human rights. We would like to recall that up until the 20th century, the former colonial capitals encouraged child exploitation, forcing whole households in Africa to labour, that is, adults and minors, Millions of children worked on plantations and in mines in unbearable conditions, absolutely without pay. Poverty and destruction bequeathed to African countries continue to force children to work in harsh conditions to support themselves and their loved ones. We call on the Special Rapporteur to pay the closest possible attention to this aspect. Thank you.

Thank you.

Japan has the floor.

Thank you, Madam Vice President. We express our sincere gratitude to the Special Rapporteur for his tireless efforts and valuable contributions. Japan views child labor as a grave violation of children's right, including the right to education. It deprives children of their childhood and hinders their full and healthy development. The report rightly underlines the critical responsibility of both states and businesses in eradicating child labor and provides useful examples from different regions. In this regard, Japan has, uh, consistently contributed to global effort to end child labor through strategic partnerships with international organizations such as the ILO and through its ODA initiatives. For instance, Japan's international cooperation agency, JICA, serves as the secretariat of the sustainable cocoa platform in developing countries, facilitating collaboration among public entities, corporations, and civil society. Japan also actively supports the child labor free zone initiatives in Ghana and Nepal in collaboration with ILO, UNICEF, and other related organizations. No matter where in the world a child is born and regardless of the circumstances faced by their parents or caregivers, it is never permissible to deprive a child of their boundless potential. Japan remains firmly committed to working closely with international organizations to address child labor and the contemporary forms of slavery. I thank you.

Thank you.

And I give the floor to Armenia.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. Armenia welcomes Professor Tomoya Obokata and thanks for the comprehensive report. Armenia remains steadfast to its resolve to extinguish all form of child labour. We recommit our partnership with international partners, including ILO and UNICEF, as well as civil society, toward the future free of child exploitation. We have taken substantive steps as part of our commitment to SDG target 8.7 and CRC. Amendments to our labor code strengthened protections for children, and the National Action Plan on Trafficking dedicates special focus to child exploitation. The Health and Labor Inspection Body has expanded its workforce, carried out hundreds of inspections, and identified cases of child labor, while courts secured convictions in forms cases. On the social side, Armenia continues to implement a family benefits program targeting vulnerable households alongside UNICEF-supported initiatives improving inclusive education in rural and minority communities. A national referral mechanism ensures that children identified as victims receive immediate protection and support. Armenia recognizes that sustainable progress demands constant vigilance, resourcing, and inclusive rights-based policies. Thank.

Thank you.

Cuba has the floor.

Thank you very much, UNICEF President. The Cuban government attaches the highest priority to the comprehensive protection of children as a key principle of social justice and sustainable development. Our Constitution expressly prohibits child labour and establishes legal sanctions for those who employ minors under the age of 17. Only under exceptional circumstances and with the consent of their parents or tutors can they hire children between 15 and 16, as long as they have concluded professional or trade studies. have enhanced protection, and it's important to have this in the state and non-state sectors to allow for the full enjoyment of their labour rights, 10 days of 10 hours, et cetera. In line with this commitment, the National Assembly of the People's Parliament has adopted a new law which strengthens the legal framework of public policies aimed at those sectors, consolidating a rights-based approach and participation. The eradication of child labour globally requires much more than political will. It requires the strengthening of social and inclusive policies, universal access, free of charge access to education, the fight against discrimination and genuine and solidarity-based cooperation. It's also vital to comply with the commitments of ODA. and the provision of appropriate resources for the full implementation of the 2030 agenda, in particular, goal 8.7. Thank you.

Thank you.

I now give the floor to South Africa.

Madam Vice President, Excellencies, this delegation aligns itself with the statement delivered by distinguished delegation of Ghana on behalf of Africa Group. South Africa welcomes the Special Rapporteur's report on the worst forms of child labor and the persisting challenges in this area. We commend the comprehensive analysis and actionable recommendations directed at states and businesses. South Africa affirms its strong support for the recommendations. We especially acknowledge the report's of South Africa's ongoing efforts to combat the scourge of contemporary slavery through decisive legislative measures. In particular, the report highlights the Prevention and Combating of Trafficking in Person Act of 2013 and the legal protections afforded to domestic workers, which together forms a robust framework for safeguarding the most vulnerable children and their families from exploitation. South Africa has taken measures to ensure free education for children, including providing meals as part of our commitment to the right to education. Our policies emphasize universal access to primary, secondary education, and providing school meals to support attendance and learning, particularly for vulnerable communities. We remain dedicated to expanding access, improving quality, and ensuring every child learns free from fear and hunger. We urge all member states to take legislative and administrative measures to implement the report's recommendations.

More vigorous enforcement...

Thank you very much. I need to move on to the next speaker. Equatorial Guinea, please.

Equatorial Guinea.

Equatorial Guinea? They appear to be absent. Okay, I'll move on to the delegation of China.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. The Chinese delegation has taken note of the report presented by the Special Rapporteur on the contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences. Children represent the future and hope of the world. Promoting and protecting their rights is a vital part of the international human rights agenda. The Chinese government adheres to the principle of putting children first and continues to improve institutional mechanisms that best support their holistic development, optimize the environment for their growth, and fully safeguard their rights to subsistence and development. The Chinese government also strictly enforces laws against child trafficking and is actively implementing the China National Action Plan against trafficking in persons 2021, 2023. Achieving comprehensive protection of children's rights remains a long term and challenging task. China will continue to actively engage in international cooperation to advance the global cause of children. China calls on relevant countries to ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child as soon as possible and to effectively address issues such as intergenerational poverty, forced child labor, gun violence, abuse of children and racial discrimination, and to crack down on child trafficking and sexual violence against children. I thank you.

I'll now move on to.

The list of speakers for national human rights institutions and non-governmental organizations. Colombia has the floor, the Ombudsman's Office. Please go ahead.

A society in which girls, boys and adolescents are forced to carry out illegal, hazardous and degrading activities in exchange for economic remuneration or payment in kind is not a fair or protective society. In Colombia, armed conflict groups as well as organized crime use children who are underage. However, although we know that this is a common practice, there are no figures or structural actions which are coordinated and firm. In addition to use, recruitment is widespread and on the rise. Boys and girls from a very early age are used, girls in particular, and are sexually exploited. There's a need to raise the profile of this situation. That is why we urge for governments to take budgetary, technical, and institutional measures to overcome these degrading forms of exploitation, all children, boys and adolescents are entitled to a good future in which the only alternative is to grow, learn and to live in peace.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you very much. The next speaker on my list is Anti-Slavery International.

Anti-Slavery International thanks the Special Rapporteur for his report.

As it highlights, there is a clear nexus between child marriage and the domestic servitude of girls and sexual exploitation. Child marriage can manifest as child slavery and therefore a worse form of child labour in various ways. There are clear-cut cases, such as where girls are abducted and sold as wives. In other more nuanced cases, a girl who enters a family as a new bride may find herself forced to work long hours, controlled in her movements, subjected to physical and/or sexual abuse, and be unable to leave. The younger the age of the child concerned, the less likely that the marriage has been entered into with full, informed and free consent. The privacy of the institution of marriage, unlike a regulated workplace, exposes millions of children to the risks of the worst forms of child labour, hidden from view in the marital home.

To effectively counter child marriage and the worst forms of child labour, it is crucial that we tackle them together.

We must also address the patriarchal norms that increase the risk of slavery experienced by child spouses. Special Rapporteur, what do you suggest Member States do to address the risks of the worst forms of child labour?

In the context of child marriage.

As this is the Special Rapporteur's last report to the Council, we would like to sincerely thank him for his dedicated service and wish him the best for the remainder of his mandate.

Thank you. Thank you.

Joint statement by the World Evangelical Alliance.

Thank you, Madam Vice-President. The World Evangelical Alliance and the Salvation Army welcome the Special Rapporteur's report and fully support its urgent call to end the worst forms of child labour. Nowhere is this situation more stark than in sub-Saharan Africa, where one in four children, an estimated 86.6 million, are forced to work. In Tanzania alone, 4.2 million children are subjected to the worst forms of child labor, including mining, quarrying, fishing, and domestic work. In the gold mining region of Gaita, 96% of school absenteeism is linked directly to child labor. We note that children exploited for labor are often subjected to sexual exploitation as well. We emphasize the critical role of community based strategies where local networks, including churches, can be mobilized to prevent exploitation and support families in keeping children in school, equally children themselves must be included in shaping solutions that affect them. We strongly affirm the non-punishment principle as a cornerstone of protection. However, its effectiveness relies on robust, child-sensitive identification systems and remedies. Without them, children remain invisible and unprotected. We affirm that every child carries inherent worth and must be protected. We call on all governments and stakeholders to act with urgency and unity to make this a lived reality for every child. I thank you.

Thank you.

DKA has the floor.

Welcomes the report of the Special Rapporteur as it highlights the worrisome involvement of children in hazardous forms of work related to mining. In Ghana, artisanal and small-scale mining activities, mostly characterized by illegality and commonly called galamsey, currently recruit thousands of child workers around the country. The resulting serious human rights violations range from health risks, unacceptable long hours of hard labor, denial of basic education to violent clashes with the national army and police patrols. We express our deep concern for this situation and its effects on the present and future of Ghanaian youth. In line with the report of the Special Rapporteur, we recommend Member States to: 1. Allocate adequate resources to legislate and enforce policies to eradicate child exploitation in mining. 2. Secure access to universal, quality and free education for all children. 3. Support the youth with employable skills through capacity building, vocational and skills training. Thank you.

Thank you.

A joint statement by InternationalLawyers.org.

Thank you, Madam Vice President. We thank the Special Rapporteur for his report and his continued efforts to highlight the worst forms of child labor.

Such practices undermine children's rights to education.

Health, and development, threatening the progress towards achieving SDG 8.7, abolishing forced labor in all its forms. Whether for business, informal economies, or in the context of armed conflicts.

Those responsible for the exploitation of children must be held fully accountable, as effective accountability.

Constitutes one of the strongest deterrents to child labor.

It is widely acknowledged that migrants are increasingly becoming subjected to different forms of exploitation around the world.

There is rising concern regarding migrants deported from the United States who are being enslaved.

By armed groups in South America.

We strongly support the Special Rapporteur's call to promote restorative justice for children coerced into armed conflict, while stressing that true justice also demands holding those exploiting and recruiting child soldiers fully accountable. Such accountability contributes to reinforcing international norms that recognize children as right holders rather than economic tools. We urge all member states to take decisive action against the worst forms of child labor.

By ending the impunity of those who benefit from it.

Addressing the root cause will contribute to breaking cycles of poverty and exploitation that sustain child labor across generations. Finally, we would like to emphasize once again the crucial need for the full implementation of the Durban Declaration and Plan of Action to end all forms of racism and slavery.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And now I call upon the Iraqi Development Organization for a joint statement.

Mr. President, we draw the Council's attention to the exploitation of migrant workers in GCC countries, which amounts to modern-day.

Slavery.

Foreign migrant workers endure harsh conditions. They live in overcrowded and unsanitary housing, work long hours in extreme heat, and suffer physical, mental, and sexual abuse by employers, only to receive low, insufficient wages. The most alarming issue is the continued use of the kafala system. Under this framework, employers hold full authority over foreign workers, who cannot change jobs or leave the country without written permission. This system enables deception about job conditions, wage withholding, passport confiscation, and denial of essentials such as food, rest, and medical care. These abuses push workers into extreme poverty, punishments for disobedience or for escaping inhuman jobs, deportation, health complications, and death under mysterious circumstances, while employers exploit with full impunity. Mr. President, the Gulf's recent economic boom has been built on these enslaving conditions. We ask the rapporteur, isn't it time to end modern-day slavery in GCC, or must we wait for yet more human rights disasters?

Muchisima gracias.

Thank you. I now go to the floor to Sirac.

Senora Vice Presidenta.

Madam Vice-President, our organization would like to recognize and hail your ongoing commitment to the fight against all forms of slavery. However, we would like today to draw your attention to the dramatic situation which remains in the Tindouf camps in the Algerian territory under the control of the armed group of the Polisario Front. In these camps, there are similar practices to slavery, particularly against Sahrawis who are of These families are also victims of systemic discrimination, deprived of their most basic rights. And women and children are forced into hereditary submission. Forced marriage and forced labor are encouraged by the Polisario Front as a measure of social and political control. This situation violates the International Convention against the 1926 slavery abolition. the 1956 Additional Convention, and also highlights the responsibility of Algeria as the host country, which must protect all persons on their territory. We would appeal to you and your mandate to investigate urgently these practices and to conduct a visit to the Tindouf camps, which would include these flagrant violations, and include these flagrant violations in your upcoming report to the Human Rights Council. The victims of slavery in Tindouf have the right to freedom, dignity and justice. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

I call upon International Dalit Solidarity Network.

Thank you, Mr. President. The International Dalit Solidarity Network thanks the Special Rapporteur

for his report.

We were disappointed that caste affected communities, particularly Dalit children, are not mentioned as they are disproportionately subjected to the worst form of child labour. In Pakistan alone, millions of Dalit children are trapped in exploitative conditions. Up to 90% of bonded labourers are from scheduled caste communities, with entire families subject to slavery-like conditions in sectors including brick kilns, agriculture and domestic work. Affected by intersectional discrimination, Dalit girls are victims of forced and early marriages, sexual exploitation and denial of education throughout South Asia, despite existing law. and international standard implementation remain weak. Poverty is key driver, but caste discrimination creates systematic exclusion, denying the children equal protection, access to education and justice. We urge member states and the United Nation to explicitly recognize caste as a root cause of child and bonded labor, strengthen legislation and improve enforcement of child and born laws provide free and inclusive education with targeted scholarship for the little children. Thank you.

Thank you.

International Presentation Association.

Regarding the report from the 2024 visit of the Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Slavery to Australia, the International Presentation Association appreciates the progress made for creating additional referral pathways for victims and survivors to access the Support for Trafficked People program without engaging with law enforcement. However, barriers to access still exist for youth under the age of 16 without a guardian. In addition, conditions are applied to aid after a period of 90 days, suspending support for victims unless they participate in the criminal justice system. The ICA also appreciates the appointment of the Australian Anti-Slavery Commissioner in November of 2024. Nevertheless, Australia remains the only liberal democracy without a national act or charter on human rights. We share the disappointment of the Special Rapporteur at the abolition of the Truth-Telling and Healing Inquiry and the repeal of the Path to Treaty Act in Queensland, as well as the defeat of the 2023 Voices Referendum. Civil society must be consulted in all stages of the establishment of laws and policies. State and local actors and those with lived experience must have meaningful formal roles on the National Roundtable on Human Trafficking and Slavery. Additional pathways for victims and survivors must be created, and barriers such as age and legal action must be removed from the Support for Trafficked People program. The Australian government must adopt crucial elements of the defeated 2023 Voices referendum, including the revisions to the Constitution to recognize Indigenous rights, remove racist elements, and include an anti-discrimination clause. We appreciate your attention to these urgent concerns, and we thank you for your time.

Muchas gracias.

Thank you. And I give the floor to Sirid. My name is President, distinguished delegates. We would like to highlight the persistence of slavery, modern slavery in Africa, and in particularly in the Tindouf camps in the Algerian territory. Despite the fact that the international community has prohibited slavery under all forms, these camps continue to be scenes of hereditary servitude and racial discrimination. A specific case in 2020 is that several Sahrawi NGOs highlighted the case of Mohammed Salem, a young Sahrawi born in the camps. Although he was under age, he was prevented from marrying a woman because of his background. This refusal was based on his family origin, and it shows the existence of a racial and slavery segregation system which is passed on from generation to generation. That is why we call upon this Council to investigate the contemporary forms of slavery in the camps and remind Algeria of its international obligations as a host state, given that these obligations took place in its territory. Recall the obligation of the Polisario Front. Slavery does not belong to the past. This is a current reality in the camps, and it is a flagrant attempt against human dignity. Thank you very much.

Muchísimas gracias.

Thank you. A joint statement from APG23.

Madam Vice President, APG23 and the COSIGEN NGOs thank the Special Rapporteur for shedding light on the worst forms of child labor. I want to bring attention to children on the move falling victim to slavery and forced labor. Restrictive migration policies and the lack of safe and regular migration pathways exacerbate the vulnerability of these children, making them easy targets for traffickers and turning them into an invisible, highly profitable workforce. Many unaccompanied minors fall into debt ******* to repay the cost of their migration journey. According to our experience, migrant children are exploited in construction and agricultural sectors and are compelled to work sorting clothes or sewing bags. Their testimonies and the visible marks on their bodies show the violence and the abuses they suffered from. The prevalence of informal work leads to abusive practices such as smuggling of migrants, forced labor, and child exploitation. Therefore, implementing due diligence in line with the guiding principle on business human rights is a pivotal step in fighting child labor. We call on states to provide safe pathways and migration strategies aimed at identifying, preventing, and protecting children from falling under the dangers of slavery. Addressing child labor and protecting children on the move are legal and political responsibilities that must be at the core of every national and international action. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

That was the last speaker that we could accommodate for our dialogue. I now give the floor to the Special Rapporteur, Mr. Obokata, to make concluding remarks. You have five minutes, sir.

I'd like to thank all contributors to this interactive dialogue. To begin with Australia, I would like to thank the federal government for its invitation, courtesy, and excellent cooperation during my visit. And I'm glad to know that the country is proactively taking steps to implement my recommendations. I look forward to continuing constructive dialogue. I would also like to thank other member states for sharing promising initiatives, but the best way to showcase these good practices to invite this mandate to your country. So I urge all member states respond positively to a country visit request. I particularly welcome those from regions such as Asia or Middle East, where this mandate has not been able to visit to date. Uh, in terms of, uh, some of the key issues raised, uh, many states have touched upon, uh, responsibility and role of businesses, and I agree that businesses need to do more to eliminate child labor in all its forms, in line with the guiding principle on business and human rights, which apply to large companies as well as small and medium enterprises. in entire value chain. But in promoting human rights due diligence, a degree of flexibility could be considered depending on the capability of businesses in question and taking into account local context. So the large companies may be ready for stronger human rights due diligence, but SMEs might require more time and resources, so a softer approach may be more realistic and appropriate. And the treaty on business and human rights, I believe this is a positive step, and it obliges all member states to strengthen accountability and protection of victims. And with regard to international trade investments, good practices can be seen in the inclusion, for example, of labor rights clauses in bilateral or multilateral trade and investment agreements, and I do encourage all states to do so in the future. Many countries also raise the issue of voices of children and family, and they're particularly important. And I do encourage, you know, responsibilities on states to reach out these vulnerable populations. But there are others like independent children's commissioner, educational institutions, civil society and workers organization. They are also able to reflect the voices of family and children. So I urge states, public authorities to closely work with them in a spirit of multi-stakeholder cooperation. good practices in international cooperation in a criminal spheres, yes, they are. first step is to ratify as treaty such as UN conventions against transnational organized crime, as well as the newly adopted Convention on Cybercrime, which provide useful framework for international criminal justice cooperation. And some of the good examples may exist, for example, within the European Union, where they conduct joint investigation, intelligence gathering, and so on. So I would encourage other regions to follow suit. And finally, a child marriage was raised by the Anti-Slavery International. Uh, states should recognize the link between child marriage and other forms of exploitation, such as domestic servitude and, and, and sexual slavery, so it is important to enact legislation to prohibit early marriage under the age of 18, in line with the international standards, and also raise awareness among communities, uh, and so on, uh, which are at risk of promoting, uh, child marriage and, and, and other forms of exploitation. And this once again requires a multi-stakeholder approach by working collaboratively with local faith-based and other leaders, parents, and children. To conclude, as this is my last interactive dialogue, I'd like to thank once again the Human Rights Council, Member States and civil society, workers' organizations and other important stakeholders for supporting my mandate in the last five and a half years. And although my time is running out almost, I continue to support all stakeholders in order to promote more effective action against contemporary forms of slavery. And even after I finish my term, I intend to continue my endeavors in this regard. So I very much look forward to working with all stakeholders, perhaps from a different capacity. But thank you very much once again for your continuing support.

This brings us to the end of the interactive dialogue. I wish to thank the Special Rapporteur, Mr. Tomoya Obokato, for his five years as the Special Rapporteur, for his reports, and for all of the work done in his capacity. Thank you very much indeed. We won't take a short break. We will immediately continue with our interactive dialogue on the Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order. We will immediately begin with the interactive dialogue with the independent expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order. The list of speakers will close in 15 minutes. I will now give the floor to the independent expert, Mr. George Katrogolos, to present the report. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you very much, Madam Vice-President. It is an honour for me to present my second report before this Council. It analyzes how current trends, like the recent United States tariffs and resurgent territorial ambitions, collide with permanent structural drivers of inequality to deepen the North-South divide. Moreover, blatant violations of international legality like the recent sanctions against the Special Rapporteur on Palestine by the US Government, represent a direct attack on the integrity of the UN human rights system, and especially the special procedures. In the report, I outline several intersecting drivers of conflicts, shifts in global power relations, the resurgence of trade wars, climate change, unsustainable debt burdens, and persistent digital and knowledge divides. I wish to underline that structural inequities remain deeply embedded in the global economic order. As a legacy, both of the colonialism and power imbalances, like those embedded in the international financial governance. Developing countries are constrained by unequal market access and limited participation in decision making. The global order is undergoing a complex transition. Rather than reverting to bipolarity, Current trends point towards fluid, multi-layered partnerships among states and regions, aptly described by the new term of multi-alignment, as it's coined by the Indian diplomacy. This environment offers space for a more balanced international order, but also carries risks of fragmentation. In this increasingly multipolar world, I see opportunities to revitalize multilateralism, provided that we keep alive and further democratize the United Nations ecosystem. Innovative proposals, like, for instance, the recent Chinese Global Governance Initiative, serve this goal to the extent that, in the words of Secretary General, are answered in multilateralism and underscore the importance of safeguarding the international system, with the United Nations at its core and the international order underpinned by international law. A strategically autonomous European policy applying the same standards of human rights respect in all situations would also strengthen multilateralism. In the same direction go schemes of cooperation among countries of the Global South, regional and interregional initiatives, South-North initiatives like the recent proposal by Brazil and Spain for a more effective global taxation of the super-rich. Yet, I am concerned that without systemic reforms at the level of the national governance, these developments alone will not resolve structural imbalances. I have therefore put forward several recommendations aimed at strengthening multilateralism, ensuring fairer economic governance, and embedding redistribution and sustainability into policy frameworks. I'm not going to enumerate analytically these proposals due to the limitation of time. I would like to highlight, however, that effective multilateralism requires the engagement of not only states, but also non-state actors, civil society, and local communities. Madam Vice President, I am also pleased to share insights from my country visit to Iceland last May. I commend Iceland for its strong human rights record and its global leadership in gender equality, sustainability, human development. I recognize Iceland as a model for advancing democratic values and human rights. progressive governance, demonstrating how even a small nation can have a global impact. At the same time, I remain concerned about some issues that still require attention. For instance, the national action plan to combat hate speech is not yet adopted. I further urge authorities to intensify efforts to combat gender-based violence, ensure equal access to justice and services for migrants, and strengthen safeguards for persons with disabilities and those facing involuntary psychiatric treatment. I strongly believe that Iceland is well positioned to lead by example, and I call for continued determination to close the remaining protection gaps so that all individuals enjoy full dignity, justice and safety. In conclusion, I wish to emphasize that the persistence of the North-South divide is neither inevitable nor insurmountable. It reflects power relations that can be and should be changed. I believe we can build an international order that serves the common good and upholds the rights and dignity of all peoples. I look forward to continuing constructive dialogue with Member States and stakeholders. Thank you, Madam Vice-President.

Thank you very much indeed to the independent expert.

I would like to say that because of time constraints, we cannot open the list of speakers at this point in time, and this will take place next Monday. So we have now concluded our session, and once again, I would like to thank Mr. Katrogolos for his participation. Thank you very much indeed. This brings us to the end of the meeting. We will resume on Monday morning at 10:00 a.m. to hold the panel discussion on combating discrimination, violence and harmful practices against intersex persons; and to continue the interactive dialogue with the Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order, to be followed by the interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on Unilateral Coercive Measures. I hereby close the eighth meeting of the 60th session of the Human Rights Council. Have a very good weekend, everyone.