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September 30, 2009

IMADR Statement, Human Rights Council 12th Session
item 9, General Debate

The International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism (IMADR) welcomes the recommendations made by the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance in his report on the manifestations of defamation of religions.

We also welcome efforts that the Special Rapporteur has made in pursuing his mandate since the Durban Review Conference (DRC). Indeed, his mandate has a great responsibility to assist the development of the follow-up of the DRC and the implementation of recommendations made in the outcome document of the Conference, which, we believe, should help bring about progress in the efforts made by all stakeholders including UN and civil society towards the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, especially discrimination based on work and descent.

We would like to call attention of the Special Rapporteur and all respectable delegates gathered in the 12th session of the Human Rights Council to the recent development made by the civil society in regard to the issue of discrimination based on work and descent. During the current session, IMADR, the International Dalit Solidarity Network (IDSN) and other human rights NGOs organized a side-event for the development of the draft UN principles and guidelines for elimination of discrimination based on work and descent prepared by the former Special Rapporteurs of the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, Professors Yokota and Chung. The side-event was participated by many people including the state minister of Nepal, who confirmed the Nepalese government support for the draft UN principles and guidelines, and the director of the Research and Rights to Development Division of the OHCHR who stressed that elimination of all forms of discrimination remains the highest duty of the UN, its member states and all stakeholders. This side-event reconfirmed the importance of concerted efforts towards elimination of discrimination based on work and descent under the initiatives of the Special Rapporteur and all mandate holders appointed by the Human Rights Council.

For 260 million people in the world who are affected by this particular form of discrimination, IMADR urges all stakeholders at national and international levels to remember the statements made in the DRC outcome document, which reads that the DRC emphasizes the need to address with greater resolve and political will all forms and manifestations of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, in all spheres of life and in all parts of the world, and that the DRC reiterates that poverty, underdevelopment, marginalization, social exclusion and economic disparities are closely associated with racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance and contribute to the persistence of racist attitudes and practices which in turn generate more poverty.

We call for all stakeholders, especially respectable representatives present in this session, to immediately take actions for the elimination of discrimination based on work and descent.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Speaker: Daisuke Shirane