UN Geneva - Multimedia Newsroom : HRC - Press Conference: Special Rapporteur on unilateral coercive measures

Good afternoon, everyone.

Welcome to the press conference of the UN Special Rapporteur

on Lateral cohesive measures and human Rights.

The full name of the mandate is the

special rapporteur on negative impact of un lateral cohesive

measures. So, in the enjoyment of human rights,

the topic of today's press conference is

on sanctions monitoring an impact assessment.

And this was the topic of the thematic report presented by the special rapporteur,

Professor Alan

and

Duhon

on Friday, 13th September

to the 57th session of the UN Human Rights Council.

The press conference will start with, um,

around 12 minute introductory statement by the special vote

outlining the main messages of this press conference

followed by Q

and a

session

I would kindly ask those who have kindly joined

this press conference online also to

identify themselves. And

without further ado,

I will give the floor to the special rapporteur.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen,

I would like to thank all of you for

coming and joining me at this press conference which will

indeed focus on the findings of the research which has

been done by the mandate since the last two years

and focusing on the possibility to develop as well

as the options of the development of the monitoring system

to provide for the systematic,

comprehensive and adequate assessment of the

negative humanitarian impact of unilateral sanctions,

means of the enforcement as well as the result of all the above over compliance.

Let me make a brief overview of the recent sanctions development first.

The use of unilateral sanctions has been

expanding dramatically during the past few years,

causing a negative impact on human rights not only in sanctioning

countries

in sanctioned countries but also across the border to the neighbouring

countries in the regions in other parts of the world,

quite often in the far

regions and even in sanctioning countries themselves,

the harm produced by the imposition of unilateral sanctions extends

to human rights of various groups of specific individuals,

groups of individuals and sometimes entire populations,

usually affecting the most vulnerable groups such as Children, women,

persons with disability or elderly population.

The sanction in states are currently using

different means of enforcement of unilateral sanctions,

including secondary sanctions,

civil criminal and administrative penalties

for circumvention of sanctions regime,

the multiplicity and uncertainty of sanctions regimes,

the higher risk of penalties for the ESA convention,

reputational risks and uncertain and contradictory interpretation result in the

growing de risk in policy and over compliance by states,

businesses, individuals and unfortunately, even the UN institutions.

That is why measuring the impact of unilateral sanctions on human

rights is essential to alleviate this situation for all affected individuals.

I have to admit that today the efforts to monitor a negative impact of

unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of

human rights are not systematic at all.

The UN agencies and organs do not include it

in the agenda and do not assess the impact of

CMS on indicators they moon it within the scope of their mandates.

Although the necessary information is often collected

at the national level by the country

teams and the role of UCS and

the additional extraterritorial factor is undeniable.

The only attempt to develop a sanctions

assessment methodology was done in 2004 by OA

and EAS

to assess the humanitarian impact of UN Security Council resolutions on Iraq

in 2021. 0

and Ek

have developed guidance on the impact of

sanctions and counterterrorism measures on humanitarian operations,

which identify main indicators for assessment of the impact

on humanitarian actors and on humanitarian operations only,

but did not assess the impact on human rights of affected people.

The national efforts to monitor and assess the

negative impact of unilateral sanctions are mostly limited

to the collection of statistical data by relevant

ministries with primary economic rather than humanitarian assessment.

Sanctions related databases prepared by private actors

and universities are mostly limited in scope,

developed with limited participation of interested stakeholders,

and often are aimed to ensure

compliance rather than to monitor humanitarian impact

in a specific country or to put pressure on the

specific companies with access provided on a paid basis.

So it is not available for the majority of people,

although all states are under obligation of due diligence

and humanitarian precaution to ensure that the activity,

as well as activity under their jurisdiction

and control do not affect human rights.

Despite three calls for contributions signed by me for

the development of the methodology establishment of the monitoring,

tool and collection of information,

no evidences have been ever received that sanctioning states monitor

and assess humanitarian impact of measures they are applying.

Ladies and gentlemen,

the development of the monitoring methodology raises a number

of serious problems and concerns and as concerned,

the indicators sources of information.

They need to differentiate between the impact of sanctions

and of other factors like military conflicts,

existence of part of territory beyond the control of the government, pandemics,

draughts or other reasons

to distinguish between the impact of different types

of sanctions and that of over compliance,

means of calculation and assessment of the results.

To ensure accuracy,

I shall admit that it is not possible, for example,

to assess the impact of separate types of unilateral sanctions

or sanctions of a specific country or unilateral sanctions only.

But at the same time,

it is possible instead to identify the comprehensive

impact of all types of unilateral sanctions,

means of the enforcement and over compliance,

which is vital for the promotion and protection of human rights

for the purpose of consistency of the UN.

Efforts to promote and protect human rights

are affected by sanctions. The methodology developed by OSHA

and

ES in 2004 has been used as a starting point during

the preparation of the report and development of the methodology.

It is not fully fitting the purposes of the current situation

as it is limited in the scope was specific for Iraq,

only one country only,

and it does not provide for the possibility to

assist the impact of measures taken to enforce primary sanctions

and of over compliance.

Moreover, it does not take due account of the multiplicity of sanctioning actors.

Therefore,

we could only keep main principles and approaches of

the methodology for the assessment of the impact of

S

and over compliance.

Due to the politicisation of the issue and political discrepancy among states,

adequacy of monitoring and assessment can only be achieved at the UN level

through collecting information based on specific criteria

and indicators from all relevant sources,

including UN agencies and or

states, national human rights institutions,

international and national humanitarian actors, research institutions,

individual academics and other stakeholders based

on the principles of comprehensiveness,

impartiality, transparency and verification.

Such tools shall collect and reflect information

on an annual or biennial basis under the

leadership of the mandate on unilateral curves of measures and with the

active engagement of the office of the High Commission on Human Rights

to ensure its sustainability and long term operation.

Another problem was the mechanism of collecting information for the database,

which has never existed before.

As a result, in particular,

UN agencies and organs as well as the UN Country team have not been able

much responsive to the calls for contribution

for the development of the monitoring tool,

although they collect and assess data relevant to many of the indicators,

presumably as the issue of the humanitarian impact of unilateral

sanctions have not been included into the official agenda.

At the same time,

statistical indicators are already included to the reports

or databases of U organs and entities,

but some are the way developed for the purposes of

M impact assessment, and they shall be provided by relevant stakeholders.

Ladies and gentlemen.

The tool for monitoring and assessment of the impact of unilateral sanctions has

been finally developed by the mandate on the base of information received from the

Web pages of the UN organs and agencies,

information from states and other stakeholders,

as well as during several expert consultations.

Naturally, it is on the first

step for establishment a comprehensive and consistent monitoring instrument.

The current instrument exists in the form of online applications.

It is supposed to establish the inclusive, comprehensive, systematic,

transparent and evidence based system of monitoring and

assessment of the comprehensive impact of unilateral sanctions,

means of the enforcement and over compliance.

A

reference to the tool is already placed to the Web page of the mandate,

and it is possible to assess the impact over some of the countries.

The Monitoring and Impact Assessment Tool has several unique features.

It allows to collect and process the data to effectively timely,

fully and systematically assess negative effects of unilateral sanctions on

the enjoyment of human rights through the mechanisms of collection,

verification and presenting visualised information.

The application collects information from documents and reports received from

the UN agencies and specialised specialised agencies and entities,

international human rights mechanisms,

other international organisations and institutions,

nongovernmental organisations, governments,

national human rights institutions,

the work of the country visit of the special Rapporteur

as well as submissions received through the monitoring tool. Questionnaire

Submissions are open for all actors via online surveys of the application,

so basically any interested stakeholder can share information.

The information This survey can be filled confidentially

to make sure that principles of comprehensiveness,

impartiality and verification are fully observed

due to the broad scope of indicators

used to identify the negative humanitarian impact of

S.

The survey is built in the user layer

friendly form, providing for the possibility to select necessary spheres like,

for example, health, food education, impact

on vulnerable groups or even impact on humanitarian work.

Survey is in no way a yes or no check box.

It provides for the possibility to give examples or identify the main impede

for protection of specific human rights or a delivery

of necessary goods or functioning of a humanitarian operation.

The structure of the application ensures that

no confidential data appear publicly online.

The tool will allow the collection,

storage and processing of confidential information through a

database with adequate levels of data security protection.

Collected information is assessed and verified by the

personnel of the mandate in the internal database,

providing for the possibility of detailed assessment

to identify my attendances and challenges.

The last part is an independent Web

interface allowing any interested stakeholder access to

country specific or human rights specific statistics

on the negative impact of unilateral sanctions,

means of the enforcement of over compliance

on the enjoyment of human rights in an interactive form

such as the world map diagrams and tables with statistical data

showing adverse effects of

CMS and over compliance on the sanctioned states and third states.

The tool will be monitored permanently and updated on a regular basis.

It will provide for the possibility to observe

how various humanitarian indicators have been changing from

yearly comparing to the data before

unilateral sanctions were imposed with special attention

paid to the years when the sanctions pressure has been increasing or decreasing.

Results of the monitoring and impact assessment carried out within the tool

pursue only a humanitarian purpose and cover at the

moment only states directly affected by unilateral sanctions.

Ladies and gentlemen, the current version of the Monitoring

Impact Assessment Tool, as I have already said, is only a starting point

and the application with necessary undergo a series of updates in the future.

The goals for future development of the tool within the short term

perspective include elaboration of the methodology

to assess the negative impact of

S

and over compliance on different groups of human rights, for example,

cultural or social

to ensure migration of the verified and non confidential data from the

database for internal use to the Web page of the tool,

with the possibility for any user to search data on

specific parameters and to retrieve the reports on them.

With the long-term perspective, the tool will assess the impact of

MS and do

a compliance on all states, not only those which are directly affected

and shall include the assessment of the impact of

MS and do

a compliance on the states and sanctions states affected

by secondary sanctions or other means of sanctions enforcement

states which impose sanctions as well as any other state.

It shall also include the

Ass said the impact of micro economic

indicators and consequent impact on human rights.

It shall possibly cover the broader range of human rights affecting,

including the right, for example,

to justice as well as different categories of cultural rights.

Ladies and gentlemen,

I would like to stress that the monitoring and Impact assessment tool should not

be seen in any way as an acceptance of the legality of unilateral measures,

but rather as a means of reducing the politicisation of the issue,

encouraging the impact,

encouraging the impact assessment work of all relevant actors,

establishing factual humanitarian impact for all possible purposes,

including periodic and systematic monitoring,

fostering advocacy in favour of lifting unilateral coercive measures,

facilitating the delivery of humanitarian

assistance and providing for accountability,

responsibility and redress to the affected actors

at the same time,

To achieve this purpose is not sufficient to establish the monitoring tool.

It is necessary to make it functionable

and I believe it can only be done by joint efforts of all stakeholders.

In particular,

states affected by unilateral sanctions should take

all measures necessary to establish national mechanisms

for the comprehensive and consistent monitoring and

assessment of the negative impact of unilateral cove

measures on humanitarian situation and enjoyment of human rights

under their jurisdiction.

They shall provide information for the monitoring tool in accordance with

the methodology developed by the special rapporteur to ensure the accuracy,

reliability and trust forcefulness of the results.

They shall also open the way for all nongovernmental

organisations and research institutions about the possibility to submit

information to the monitoring tool to encourage diverse engagement

and provide for the verification of such information.

States which impose sanctions first of all shall leave,

suspend or minimise all unilateral measures,

not in conformity with the international obligation

or the illegality of which cannot

be excluded from the mechanism of countermeasures

on the ground of countermeasures in accordance with

the standards of the law of international Responsibility.

At the same time, for the time being,

they shall stop to ignore the examples and evidences of

the negative and often devastating humanitarian impact of museums,

and to start monitoring and assessing the possible

humanitarian impact of any unilateral measures before and

during the process of such measures being applied

in accordance with the obligations of humanitarian precaution.

All states should support the inclusion of the

issue of the humanitarian impact of unilateral sanctions

and means of the enforcement and over compliance

in the agendas of relevant United Nations organs,

agencies and institutions.

UN specialised agencies,

organs or entities shall add UCM means of enforcement and

over compliance as an additional factor to be taken into account

in any assessment within the scope of the respected mandates.

Nongovernmental actors, including humanitarian organisations and scholars,

are welcome to submit information for the monitoring through the online system.

It is only by drawing efforts it will be

possible to make sure that information collected is systematic,

comprehensive, verified and adequate

to pay the VA for the access access to remedy human rights, protection in sanctions,

environment, accountability, responsibility and redress.

I thank you for your attention, and I'm open for your questions.

We are now opening the floor of questions from journalists online or in the room.

And I give first the floor to Yuria pre

from RIA

Novosti.

Yes. Thank you for taking my question. And thank you.

Special rapporteur for this briefing. I have, in fact, three questions.

The first one is,

uh how do Western countries respond to your request

to monitor the impact of sanctions on human rights?

Um, when do you think that your tool will be effective?

Do you receive help from many countries or UN agencies on that?

And, uh, my second question is related to that.

Uh,

can we talk about thousands of victims of sanctions

around the world due to the lack of funding,

medicines, infrastructure?

Do we have an idea of how many people maybe died from the past 12? Uh, 20 or 30 years,

uh, again, because of the sanctions. Thank you.

Give a follow to the special reporter to answer the questions.

Thank you very much for the questions.

Responding to the first one.

I need to note that the situation of receiving responses

from the countries which impose sanctions is very problematic.

As I have already mentioned,

I sent three calls for contributions and invited everyone

to participate in the development of the tool.

However, at the moment I did not receive information coming from the

imposing sanctions,

although from the purpose of

impartial impartiality, I need to say that in general

many institutions might probably be interested and I

am talking about the UN institutions to respond.

At the same time, they never did it because the mechanism never existed.

So the

I'm talking not about the development of the methodology,

only I am talking about the wars

rising and I am using this press conference as one of the means to R

the

vs. And there will be a side event tomorrow

at 2 p.m. when I will try to demonstrate

the functionality of the tool developed. And I hope very much that the

UN agencies will start doing that

because I need to admit that for example,

the UN country teams have always been extremely useful

when sharing information with me concerning the negative impact of

unilateral coercive measures as well as over compliance

with unilateral coercive measures

on human rights. In the countries I have visited,

coming to the assessment of the impact of unilateral sanctions,

there is no precise answer because the question asked is too broad.

I am always trying to advocate for the evidence

based approach and to be extremely specific when we

refer to the negative humanitarian impact and that was

the purpose of the establishment of the monitoring tool.

There is an agenda

to my report presented to the Human Rights Council last Friday,

which basically reflects the humanitarian impact of unilateral

sanctions on the indicators included in this survey,

and it reflects so far this information only so therefore

it is

possible to identify which areas are affected the most, and what is the

difference between the countries affected by unilateral sanctions.

At the same time,

I would like to repeat again that we are

not talking about the impact of unilateral sanctions.

Only

we are talking about the humanitarian and comprehensive impact of

all types of unilateral sanctions imposed by all states.

Also,

the impact of the means of the enforcement in the format of secondary sanctions,

criminal civil customs or any other penalties which might be faced

as well as over compliance of these sanctions. So basically it

is not possible to differentiate between the impacts.

We assess the comprehensive impact

at the same time. Unfortunately, I have to admit that in some countries

the imposition of unilateral sanctions is

not affecting specific human rights only.

But quite often it affects the vital human rights, including the right to life.

And therefore,

for example, if people do not have access to food,

the people do not have access to medicine.

At the very end, they might die.

There is not a single instrument at the moment to calculate precisely

what is the number of people passing away due to the impact of sanctions,

because always there are several reasons.

But at the same time, what we can conclude is that if people have no food,

if people have no medicine, if they have no gasoline and they have to use dirty water,

they got sick, they suffer and they will die at the very end.

That's why my intention is in order to be able to

discuss the negative humanitarian impact and to assess the consequences of

the unilateral sanctions and over compliance We need to be very

sure that we collect and verify information from all possible sources.

So I hope that at the moment when the platform will start to function properly,

I will be more precise on the point.

The point which I also need to mention that we are

talking about the impact not on the countries under sanctions only

today.

Unfortunately,

in the view of the more active use

of the means of enforcement of unilateral sanctions,

many countries which are not under primary

sanctions appear to be under secondary sanctions.

The entities of this company of these countries

might face civil and criminal charges more,

or there could be a transborder effect

as, for example, in

countries like Syria or Venice,

the economic situation become extremely affected by unilateral

sanctions and no proper infrastructure is available.

Naturally, we start to absorb the immigration flows.

We start to absorb the attempts to get necessary medicine

or food or to get jobs across the border,

which also makes

imposes severe burden and restrictions on the neighbouring countries.

In some situations, when we come, we can even talk about the

intercontinental effect and one of the cases which I cited in my communication is,

for example, the access to fertilisers

and when, for example, sanctions imposed on Russian and Belarus and fertilisers

prevent the access to fertilisers for many developing countries,

including in Africa, which used to be 100%

dependent on the pottage fertilisers coming from these two countries.

So the purpose is to assess the impact on different group of countries

and to be able to say that we have the specific evidence and can go further

to identify the means of remedies of responsibility and redress.

To be able to advocate for accountability, we need to know what are the evidences.

If we have evidence on the table, we cannot deny that the impact exists

as concerned the time when

it will be done.

Um, well,

basically, the very primary

format is already online.

As I have already mentioned, I will demonstrate what we have at the moment,

and it's already possible to submit information via this survey

as concerned the functionality.

I expect that we will continue to work on the improvement

of the database within the next year and a half,

at least

Any other questions

I see none

any, uh,

some concluding observations by the special.

I would like to use this chance to thank all of you once again for

participation in this press conference to invite all

interested stakeholders to come or to join remotely

this side event tomorrow.

And naturally I invite all stakeholders in all parts of the world,

including states, research institutions, nongovernmental organisations,

UN agencies, to participate in monitoring.

It is not possible to get one figure only. We need to be able

to get information from various sources to verify

this information and that the only way how,

by joint efforts we will be able to

establish and to proceed with evidence based approach.

I believe that knowing the facts is an important means

for the solution of the problem.

Thank you very much.