rights

Recognizing her real-life role in the fight against human trafficking, the Academy Award winning actress and UN Goodwill Ambassador, Mira Sorvino, was awarded the Global Advocate of the Year Award by the UN press corps at an event in New York on Wednesday night.

The United Nations marked Human Rights Day today by shining the spotlight on the hundreds of thousands of “largely unsung heroes,” the human rights defenders who risk dismissal, harassment, torture, jail and even death for their activities.

The United Nations human rights chief today welcomed the approaching entry into force of a landmark new treaty to deter enforced disappearance after Iraq became the 20th State to ratify the convention, paving the way for it to become effective in the next 30 days.

A group of independent United Nations experts today urged South Africa to strengthen oversight and control over private military and security companies exporting their services abroad, saying regulations currently in place face implementation challenges.

The upcoming five-year review of the United Nations Human Rights Council should help it make a greater difference on the ground, reacting more swiftly and effectively to chronic and urgent abuses, the body’s president told the General Assembly today.

United Nations independent human rights experts have urged the repeal of all laws discriminating against people affected by leprosy, which has been eliminated as a public health problem in most countries but still carries a strong social stigma.

The United Nations human rights office in Nepal today said that it has been assured by local Government officials that two landmark verdicts on cases involving caste-based discrimination will be swiftly enforced.

The United Nations today launched a major campaign for universal adoption of treaty protocols that outlaw the sale of children, child prostitution and pornography, and protect youngsters in armed conflict, with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon calling for full ratification by 2012.

A United Nations expert body is urging broad support for the creation of a new global treaty to regulate the activities of private military and security contractors, stressing the need for strict control mechanisms for this “highly specific and dangerous trade.”