20th Anniversary of the Declaration on Human Rights Defenders

It is a great honour for me to be joining this panel, on behalf of the United Nations in Montenegro, to commemorate and pay tribute to the crucial role of human rights defenders in protecting human rights and safeguarding democratic values. Twenty years ago today, in 1998 the United Nations General Assembly adopted a landmark Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms - or also known, in short, as “the Declaration on Human Rights Defenders”.

It is about those who defend the rights of others, those who stand up for the human rights of their peers. It is a solid instrument of soft-law that reaffirms and is underpinned by international human rights obligations, including those laid out in International Human Rights Treaties. The Declaration elaborates on human rights provisions so that they become much easier to interpret and apply to the regular day-to-day lives of millions of rights activists around the world. 

Human Rights Defenders exist in many forms. They may be working in the field to preserve nature from toxic wastes and contamination, or in shelters to support victims of gender-based violence, or protesting in the street in support of LGBT and Intersex rights, or carrying out monitoring and research to expose corruption and abuse, or helping poor communities suffering from forced eviction and displacement. These are everyday people that dedicate their lives for the defense of human rights.

Yet, we live in dangerous times for Human Rights Defenders around the world, including in the Western Balkans. Many activists face Governments and non-state actors that question their legitimacy, and try to silence and discredit them. If you are a rights activist, you may risk being threatened, intimidated, criminalized, subjected to media smear campaigns, and find that your fundamental freedoms, including your right to express yourself freely and to associate and assemble peacefully, are being unduly restricted. You risk being detained, often without or with dubious charges, enforcedly disappeared, and killed. As recently documented by the United Nations Secretary-General, there is an alarming rising level of reprisals against Human Rights Defenders, many of which go unreported as they seek to deter civil society from cooperating with the United Nations and performing its work. 

We are very encouraged that the Government Montenegro has put human rights at the top of its political agenda, as a key strategic priority. The country has practically ratified all United Nations human rights instruments, and has accepted complaints and inquiry procedures from the Treaty Bodies. There is no doubt that the intention is to ultimately provide Montenegro’s citizens with a solid human rights framework for which they can rely on.  It is therefore imperative that such good will is not left as a mere statement of good intentions, but it effectively transforms public institutions and the lives of the people in Montenegro and their social conduct.  Meeting human rights and accountability benchmarks is paramount to ensuring an enabling environment for Human Rights Defenders.

As we celebrate also this year the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, let me reiterate my full support and that of the United Nations Country Team to ensure that its content is “matched by facts on the ground” (quotation taken from a Secretary-General’s speech).

I thank you.