Photo : Caritas Europa

More than 160 human rights organizations, among them Terre des Hommes, Caritas Europa, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, has signed the appeal “Not crossing red lines-A negotiators’ checklist on minimum detention safeguards”, insisting that EU institutions ensure respect for asylum seekers’ right to liberty in recast Reception Conditions Directive and Dublin Regulation.

Jeannette Corbiere Lavell. (Photo: NWAC)

Based on the Canadian experience, the Native Women's Association (NWAC), the Feminist Alliance for International Action (FAFIA, member of the Social Watch national coalition) and other organizations stated this month at the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues that all governments should “immediately develop and implement a national strategy to address the disadvantaged social and economic conditions of Aboriginal women and girls, including poverty, inadequate housing, low educational attainment, inadequate child welfare policies, and over-criminalization”.

The danger of policy measures designed to socialize the costs of the crisis have become painfully apparent in Spain, where the impacts of successive austerity budgets have resulted in deteriorating outcomes across a broad spectrum of human rights indicators, warned the Center for Economic and Social Rights (CESR) in a parallel report coordinated with 18 civil society groups for the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights’ 48th session, held earlier this month in Geneva.

“The Internet should be governed on the principles of human liberty, equality and fraternity,” remarked six relevant civil society organizations on a statement addressed to the United Nations Commission on Science and Technology for Development (UN CSTD). The UN body will hold this Friday in Geneva a meeting on Enhanced Cooperation on Public Policy Issues Pertaining to the Internet.

Co-Chair Kim Sook (center) at the meeting in New York. (Photo: IISD)

Government representatives have failed last week to reach consensus on “The future we want,” the global plan of action to be adopted next month by the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio2012). The second round of informal negotiations on the draft outcome document, held at the United Nations headquarters in New York, saw intense debates and divides among delegates, who agreed to meet again for other five days of deliberations to bridge differences.