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This declaration addresses the necessity to implement the principles enshrined in the Beijing Platform for Action in connection to a post-2015 African development agenda. It underlines the need to ensure that growing and new challenges to gender equality must be addressed, and states must underline and enforce women’s rights, adopt gender-sensitive planning, and demand accountability from other member states and organizations to achieve these goals.

This document covers the international commitment to address maternal health and sexual and reproductive health and rights. It outlines the means by which countries must put their commitment to these issues to work, by empowering the youth, addressing gender equality, climate change, and strengthening health systems.

ARROW released its new brief on sexual, reproductive and health rights in the wake of the post-2015 agenda for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The brief calls for reforms in the social, economic, and environmental dimensions to truly complete the new Sustainable Development Agenda, and for member countries to secure SRHR as an important facet of any development processes and towards gender equality.

Human Rights Watch, July 2016

In Saudi Arabia, a woman’s life is controlled by a man from birth until death. Every Saudi woman must have a male guardian, normally a father or husband, but in some cases a brother or even a son, who has the power to make a range of critical decisions on her behalf.

As dozens of Saudi women told Human Rights Watch, the male guardianship system is the most significant impediment to realizing women’s rights in the country, effectively rendering adult women legal minors who cannot make key decisions for themselves.

Rania, a 34-year-old Saudi woman, said, “We are entrusted with raising the next generation but you can’t trust us with ourselves. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Every Saudi woman, regardless of her economic or social class, is adversely affected by guardianship policies.

Adult women must obtain permission from a male guardian to travel, marry, or exit prison. They may be required to provide guardian consent in order to work or access healthcare. Women regularly face difficulty conducting a range of transactions without a male relative, from renting an apartment to filing legal claims.

The impact these restrictive policies have on a woman’s ability to pursue a career or make life decisions varies, but is largely dependent on the good will of her male guardian. In some cases, men use the authority that the male guardianship system grants them to extort female dependents. Guardians have conditioned their consent for women to work or to travel on her paying him large sums of money.

The 32nd session of the UN Human Rights Council took place from the 13th of June to the 1st of July 2016.  
The HRC32 Recap from the Sexual Rights Initiative (SRI) provides information on some of the key sexual rights related:

• Resolutions
• Panels and Discussions
• Oral Statements

In recent years, there has been a perceived rise in the expression of fundamentalism in many contexts across the world. Despite the frequent use of the term, “fundamentalism” remains a word that is rarely defined with any specificity. Common use generally centers on religious fundamentalism, and this is perhaps what comes to mind first for most people.

But fundamentalism can encompass much more than religion, and in this report the Special Rapporteur takes a much broader view of the term. He believes that fundamentalism can and should be defined more expansively, to include any movements – not simply religious ones – that advocate strict and literal adherence to a set of basic beliefs or principles. Adherence to the principles of free market capitalism, for example, has spawned what has been called “market fundamentalism.” And the unbending belief in the superiority of one ethnic group, race, tribe or nationality can lead to what might be called “nationalist fundamentalism.” Numerous other examples are detailed in this report.

This report is not concerned with fundamentalist viewpoints per se, but rather with fundamentalism in action: concrete, specific violations of the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association that are motivated by these viewpoints. The mere voluntary adherence to a fundamentalist belief system is not a human rights violation in and of itself. The right to hold opinions and the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion are protected by Articles 18 and 19 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

The danger arises when holders of these beliefs seek to impose them in a way that controls or restricts the rights of others who may have different views or backgrounds, thereby threatening the values of pluralism and broadmindedness which are core to democracy. The tipping point, for purposes of this report, is when fundamentalist views form the basis for violations of the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association.

A separate section of the report examines the related, but distinct, phenomenon of extremism, and the role that assembly and association rights can play in countering its rise.

“Denying people space for peaceful, legal and constructive engagement does not make their feelings of anger, despair and dissatisfaction go away,” Kiai writes in the report. “To the contrary, it simply pushes these feelings underground, where they can fester and turn violent. Extremism thrives in such environments, because it is the only option left.”

The report (A/HRC/32/36) was released on June 7, 2016, and will be presented to the Human Rights Council during its 32nd session on June 17, 2016.

This factsheet accompanies  Special Rapporteur Maina Kiai’s report to the Human Rights Council, June 2016 (A/HRC/32/36)

The factsheet answers the following questions:

Does the report argue that fundamentalist ideologies violate international law?

Can States promote or adopt fundamentalist ideologies that encourage intolerance

It also sets out descriptions of four different kinds of “fundamentalism”

1. Cultural and nationalist fundamentalisms
2. Religious fundamentalism
3. Political fundamentalism
4. Market fundamentalism

We, the people from National Human Rights Institutions, civil society organisations and collectives from across the African continent, having assembled and engaged in dialogue at the First Regional African Seminar on Finding Practical Solutions for Addressing Violence and Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression in Johannesburg, South Africa from 3^rd to 5^th March 2016, do adopt the following Declaration. 

 

The Secretariat has the honour to transmit to the Human Rights Council the report of the Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health.

Prepared pursuant to Council resolution 24/6, the report focuses on the right of adolescents to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health and on the imperative to implement measures necessary to guarantee optimum health and development in accordance with the unique nature of adolescence.

In the report, the Special Rapporteur elaborates on mental health, the rights to sexual and reproductive health, and substance use and drug control, in view of the particular challenges they pose in balancing adolescents’ emerging autonomy with their right to protection.

The Secretariat has the honour to transmit to the Human Rights Council the report of the Working Group on the issue of discrimination against women in law and in practice pursuant to Council resolutions 15/23 and 26/5.

In its report, the Working Group addresses the issue of discrimination against women with regard to health and safety. The instrumentalization of women’s bodies lies at the heart of discrimination against women, obstructing the achievement of their highest attainable standard of health. The Working Group highlights in particular the health and safety situation of women who experience discrimination on multiple and intersectional grounds.

Women’s non-discriminatory enjoyment of the right to health must be autonomous, effective and affordable and the State has the primary responsibility to respect, protect and fulfil women’s right to health in law and in practice, including where health services are provided by private actors.