BRIEFING NOTES: (1) Human Rights Day; (2) Myanmar; (3) Libya

Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights: Rupert Colville

Location: Geneva

Date: 10 December 2021

Subject: (1) Human Rights Day; (2) Libya; (3) Myanmar

1) Human Rights Day

The HC issued a statement yesterday focused on inequalities – the theme of Human Rights Day this year.

The past two years have demonstrated, all too painfully, the intolerable cost of soaring inequalities. Inequalities that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the UN General Assembly 73 years ago on 10 December 1948, sought to eradicate in its effort to pave a path to a better world.

The decades since then saw some very significant progress. However, over the past twenty years, since 2001, a succession of global shocks have undermined that progress. And this devastating pandemic has laid bare many of our failures to consolidate the advances we had made.

Inequalities have fuelled the pandemic, and continue to do so. In turn, the pandemic has fed a frightening rise in inequalities, leading to disproportionate transmission and death rates in the most marginalized communities, as well as contributing to soaring poverty levels, increased hunger, and plummeting living standards.

Women, low-income and informal workers, younger and older people, and those with disabilities, as well as members of ethnic, racial and religious minorities and indigenous peoples are among those hit hardest, creating even greater age, gender and racial inequalities.

Inequalities have widened both within and between countries, with most developed economies forecast to grow in 2022, while the lowest-income countries are projected to endure continued recession, pushing their people even further behind.

This divergence has been aggravated by shockingly unequal vaccine coverage – as of 1 December, barely 8% of adults had received one dose of vaccine in low-income families, compared to 65% in high-income.

The environmental crisis caused by climate change is further exacerbating discrimination, marginalization, and inequity.

A growing debt crisis is also weighing heavily on many countries. Over half of least-developed and low-income countries are now in, or at high risk of, debt distress.

This is a critical period in world affairs. Humanity is reeling from the setbacks sparked by COVID-19, and struggling to make the radical changes necessary to prevent further environmental disaster.

Yet the measures needed to prevent catastrophic climate change are well-known. We also have the knowledge and means to establish universal social protection measures and take the necessary actions to end discrimination, advance the rule of law and uphold human rights.

Equality is at the heart of human rights, and at the heart of the solutions required to carry us through this period of global crisis.

As a common single race – the human race -- our only way forward is to work together for the common good. This was well understood during the years of rebuilding after World War II – the years that saw the development of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the subsequent elaboration of the all-embracing system of international human rights law.

However, our failure to build back better after the financial crisis a decade ago, coupled with the social and economic turmoil caused by COVID-19 and the rapidly accelerating impacts of climate change, suggests we have forgotten the clear and proven remedies rooted in human rights and the importance of tackling inequalities.

We must bring human rights back to the forefront if we want to maintain progress – not just for those who suffer from the gross inequalities that blight our planet, but for the sake of all of us.

2) Myanmar

We are appalled by the alarming escalation of grave human rights abuses in Myanmar. In the last week alone, security forces have killed and burned to death 11 people – among them five minors – and rammed vehicles into protesters exercising their fundamental right to peaceful assembly.

More than 10 months since Myanmar's military overthrew the democratically elected Government in a February coup, the country’s human rights situation is deepening on an unprecedented scale, with serious violations reported daily of the rights to life, liberty and security of person, the prohibition against torture, the right to a fair trial, and freedom of expression.

Today the courageous and resilient people of Myanmar have marked Human Rights Day and their opposition to the coup with a universal silent protest.

On 7 December, a unit of the Myanmar army was allegedly ambushed with a remote-controlled explosive device in Salingyi Township of Sagaing Region by militia forces. Security personnel reportedly responded by raiding the village of Done Taw and arresting six men and five minors - the youngest of whom was 14 years of age.

The 11 males were later found burned by villagers who said they saw fire coming from the area. The villagers indicated that human corpses were contorted into shapes that appeared as though they were trying to shelter one another and escape from burning huts.

In a separate incident on 5 December, security forces in Kyimyindaing Township, Yangon, rammed a vehicle into unarmed protesters and then fired on them with live ammunition, leading to several casualties.

These attacks are heinous are heinous, completely unacceptable, and disregard common values of humanity. They are also far from isolated.

In recent weeks, we have received multiple reports of villages being burned, including protected structures such as places of religious worship, and residential buildings.

In Thantlang town in Chin State, credible sources report the military torched 19 civilian and religious buildings and 450 homes in 10 different incidents. A few weeks ago in Kayah State, villagers were reportedly burned alive when the structure they tried to shelter in was allegedly set ablaze by security forces.

Since the coup, General Min Aung Hlaing’s forces have repeatedly failed to respect their obligations under international law to protect the country's people. As a result, more than 1,300 people have lost their lives and over 10,600 more have been detained.

These latest grave violations demand a firm, unified and resolute international response that redoubles efforts to pursue accountability for the Myanmar military and the restoration of democracy in Myanmar.

3) Libya

We are deeply concerned by a continuing series of forced expulsions of asylum-seekers and other migrants in Libya, including two large groups of Sudanese over the past month, with another group of 24 Eritreans apparently at imminent risk of similar treatment.

According to information received by our team on the ground, on Monday this week (6 December) a group of 18 Sudanese individuals were expelled without due process after being transferred from the Ganfouda detention centre in Benghazi to the al-Kufra detention centre in southeastern Libya. Both centres are under the control of the Ministry of Interior’s Department for Combatting Illegal Migration (DCIM). They were apparently transported across the Sahara desert to the Libya-Sudan border area and dumped there.

A month earlier, on 5 November, another group of 19 Sudanese were deported to Sudan, also from Ganfouda via the al-Kufra detention centre .

In recent months, other migrants from Sudan, Eritrea, Somalia and Chad – including children and pregnant women -- have also been detained and have either already been expelled or may be at any moment.

Such expulsions of asylum-seekers and other migrants in search of safety and dignity in Libya without the necessary due process and procedural guarantees, contravene the prohibition of collective expulsions and the principle of non-refoulement under international human rights and refugee law.

The Sudanese expelled on Monday, for example, were reportedly arrested, detained and arbitrarily expelled without being afforded an individual assessment of their circumstances and protection needs, such as risk of persecution, torture and ill-treatment or other irreparable harm in their home country. They were not granted access to legal assistance, and were not able to challenge the lawfulness of the expulsion order. In addition, they were not given access to relevant UN organizations, including the UNSMIL Human Rights Service, during their time in detention.

Now of immediate concern is a group of 24 Eritreans who were being held in the same Ganfouda detention centre, and who are believed also to be at risk of imminent deportation. On 3 December, we were informed that, in a pattern mirroring the experience of the expelled Sudanese, they had been transferred to the al-Kufra detention centre in preparation for their deportation.

We published a report on 25 November, entitled Unsafe and Undignified: The forced expulsion of migrants from Libya, in which we highlighted that asylum-seekers and other migrants in Libya are routinely at risk of arbitrary or collective expulsion from Libya's external land borders in a manner that fails to respect the prohibition of collective expulsion and the principle of non-refoulement. Additionally, the report documents how expulsions from Libya often place migrants in extremely vulnerable situations, including long and perilous return journeys on overcrowded vehicles across remote stretches of the Sahara Desert, one of the world’s harshest deserts, without adequate safety equipment, food, water and medical care.

Those expelled have often already survived a range of other serious human rights violations and abuses in Libya at the hands of both State and non-state actors, including arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, trafficking, sexual violence, torture and ill-treatment. We call on the authorities to protect the rights of all migrants in Libya, regardless of their status, to investigate all claims of violations and abuse, and to bring perpetrators to justice in fair trials.

And we call on Libya to act urgently to meet its obligations under international human rights law, including the principle of non-refoulement and the prohibition of collective expulsions. We also urge the international community to ensure due diligence in the provision of operational, financial and capacity-building support to the Libyan government in the areas of migration and border management, to ensure these efforts do not undermine human rights.

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