12th March 2012 Geneva, Switzerland
Maybe it’s just that I’m getting older but this feels like a particularly tiring Council session. And judging by the number of weary diplomatic faces around this week, I’m not the only one whose been feeling the strain. The Council is set to adopt more resolutions than at any other previous session, and with a […]
5th March 2012 Geneva, Switzerland
It’s been a busy week. With our Ministers in town for the Council’s High level Segment, we’ve all been suffering from higher than average stress levels. Many Ministers chose to use their statements to focus on the appalling violations in Syria, which the Council addressed in an urgent debate on Tuesday. Council members spoke out […]
27th February 2012 London, UK
The situation in Syria continues to shock and appal all those who see the images on our televisions or hear and read the testimonies of those affected by the Assad regime’s brutal repression of the Syrian people. Over 6,000 people people have died in the 11 months since the uprising in Syria began and it […]
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30th January 2012 Beirut, Lebanon
There is a joke that does the rounds in Beirut. Q: ‘What’s the definition of Lebanese long term thinking?’ A: ‘See you tomorrow’. Like many Lebanese jokes, there is truth in this. Of course, a focus on the short term is understandable, given the conflicts of the past, the volatility of the region, the interference […]
6th December 2011 Geneva, Switzerland
The Human Rights Council turned its attention to Syria again on Friday last week with another Special Session called by the EU- the 3rd consecutive time in 7 months it had met in response to the Assad regime’s ongoing brutality. This level of attention is a clear indication of the international outrage at what is going […]
26th September 2011 Geneva, Switzerland
The second week of the September Human Rights Council session was a typically frantic affair, as delegations scrambled to finalise the resolutions that they would present before Thursday’s deadline. Getting resolutions in tends to be a quite scrappy business, more like a school sports day three-legged race than a gracious Olympic sprint. Countries have quite […]
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12th September 2011 Geneva, Switzerland
I’ve never liked this time of year. It always invokes my childhood dread of going back to school without having done any of my homework for the summer holidays. Each year I promised myself I’d change and be more organised the following summer. But I never was. On Monday the Human Rights Council begins its […]