Human Rights Day around the world

The UN Childrens Fund (UNICEF) provides support to parents, children and adolescents in Myanmar. © UNICEF Myanmar-Kyaw Kyaw Winn

10 December 2024 - Human Rights Day, marked annually on 10 December, will focus on the theme Our Rights, Our Future, Right Now, and we will bring you to UN Headquarters in Geneva and New York and every region of the world, with dispatches from colleagues on the ground from Gaza and Georgia to Nepal and Nicaragua.

Disability rights are human rights

In Zimbabwe, a joint project with UN agencies, the government and local disability rights non-governmental organizations has led to an increase in the participation of persons with disabilities in civic, social and political life. 

Afghanistan must embrace its human rights obligations

On Human Rights Day, the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) urged the de facto authorities to embrace global human rights obligations as a key to the protection and prosperity of current and future generations of women, men, girls and boys across the country.

“Regrettably, we continue to see the opposite unfold in Afghanistan. Despite improvements in security and a reduction in armed violence, there is an ongoing, dangerous erosion of human rights protections, with women and girls bearing the brunt,” said Roza Otunbayeva, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan and head of UNAMA.

The human rights record of the de facto authorities has been especially marked by their systemic discrimination against women and girls, who are excluded from most areas of daily and public life, including education and work.

“With authority comes responsibility,” Ms. Otunbayeva said. “The claim of the de facto authorities to be legitimate representatives of the Afghan people within the United Nations must be accompanied by genuine efforts to uphold and advance our shared norms and values.”

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 10 December 1948, with Afghanistan among the UN members supporting its adoption.

“Human rights instruments were established as tools to help communities around the world build a better future for themselves,” said Fiona Frazer, Representative of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Afghanistan. “If Afghans, in particular women and girls, continue to be denied their rights, this constitutes a clear and intentional failure to protect and be responsible for the well-being of all who live in Afghanistan.”

What the Human Rights Council is saying

It’s always good to remember that Human Rights Day marks each year the anniversary of the day in 1948 when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted at the United Nations General Assembly.

But, what do the 30 articles of the declaration, such as the right to life (article 3) and the right to freedom of opinion and expression (article 19), really mean more than 75 years later?

To find out, the UN Human Rights Council asked some of the experts, academics and activists it works with on today’s human rights challenges.

Right to health

So far this year, health care workers and infrastructure have faced three attacks per day in the world’s emergency hotspots. Every day, one health care worker is killed.

That’s according to the UN World Health Organization (WHO), which has documented well over 7,000 attacks on healthcare in 21 humanitarian settings since 2018.

Apart from the terrible human cost, the impact is on communities deprived of lifesaving healthcare is devastating, said WHO’s Dr. Rick Brennan, Regional Emergency Director for the Eastern Mediterranean Region.

“WHO, over the last six and a half, seven years, has documented 7,400 attacks on healthcare in 21 humanitarian settings. It's not an exhaustive study. These are the reports that we've been able to document and verify, this is solid data. That's an average of three attacks per day on healthcare, every day.," he said.

"We’ve also documented 2,400 deaths associated with those attacks. That's an average of one death a day associated with an attack on healthcare, and the impact on the delivery of health services in humanitarian settings is enormous. You know the figures, you know, only 47 per cent of hospitals in Gaza right now are functioning, and they're only partially functioning. In Khartoum is only 12 per cent of over 900 facilities, are functioning to some level and most of them only partially functioning.”

‘War is the ultimate violation of human rights’

Human rights must be protected everywhere at all times, including in warzones by warring parties, from Gaza to Sudan.

“War is the ultimate violation of all human rights,” said Volker Türk, UN High Commissioner for human rights.

The Geneva Conventions outline the rules of war, prohibiting the targeting of civilians, civilian infrastructure and medical facilities and personnel.

‘We all have a stake in Gaza’: UNRWA 

The rights being denied to people in Gaza are the same rights intended to protect all of us. We all have a stake in Gaza, according to the UN agency for Palestine refugees, which serves nearly six million people in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. – UN News