By Libya Herald staff.
Tunis, 27 March 2015:
The UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) intends to send a team to Libya to investigate . . .[restrict]human rights abuses since the beginning of 2014. The aim is that proceedings be taken against those responsible.
A resolution on helping improve human rights in Libya, submitted to the 28th Regular Session of the Council in Geneva which ended today, Friday , called on the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, to send a team to investigate human rights abuses since the beginning of 2014 “with a view to avoiding impunity and ensuring full accountability”. The resolution, from Algeria and a number of other countries, said the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) should help the investigation and that a report be submitted to council at its thirty-first session.
This is expected to take place in March 2016.
The resolution, adopted unanimously by consensus, also condemned terrorism in Libya by the Islamic State (IS) as well as by other terrorist organisations. Calling on the Libyan government to increase efforts to end the impunity that has enabled the militants to ride roughshod over international human rights law, the council said that all those responsible for violations had to be held accountable.
The resolution also called on the international community to help Libya’s parliament and government to promote and protect human rights in Libya.
Latvia, in its role as current president of the European Union, said that the International Criminal Court had to play a greater role in Libya.
For its part, Russia, stressing the threat posed to Libya and the region by terrorism, said that Libyans had to unite to fight the scourge.
Libya thanked Algeria and other countries for presenting the motion, saying that it would give a spur to cooperation between Libya and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Terrorists were operating in Libya, it said, and there were severe human rights violations by IS. Dialogue, it said was the only way to ensure that democracy was adopted in the country
The full text of the resolution can be found here. [/restrict]
