GENEVA (31 January 2018) \u2013 The Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Human Rights Office on Wednesday issued a report detailing its work on producing a database of business enterprises engaged in certain, specific activities in the occupied Palestinian territory that are either explicitly linked to Israeli settlements or form part of processes that \u201cenable and support the establishment, expansion and maintenance of Israeli residential communities beyond the Green Line.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Human Rights Council mandated the Office in March 2016 to produce a database of all business enterprises engaged in specific activities related to Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory, in consultation with the Working Group on business and human rights, recalling the illegality of the settlements under international law.*<\/p>\n
The Human Rights Council resolution followed the report of the\u00a0Independent International Fact-Finding Mission to investigate the implications of the Israeli settlements on the civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights of the Palestinian people throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem\u00a0<\/em>which, in 2013, found that business enterprises had \u201cdirectly and indirectly, enabled, facilitated and profited from the construction and growth of the settlements.\u201d The Fact-Finding Mission\u2019s report provided a list of 10 activities that are either explicitly linked to the settlements or enable and support their establishment, expansion and maintenance.<\/p>\n The report details the strict and complex methodology used in carrying out the Human Rights Council\u2019s mandate. The Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Human Rights Office reviewed information that was publicly available or received from a variety of sources about an initial 307 companies. From these, 192 companies were screened in after excluding those that were not covered by the mandate, no longer engaged in the 10 listed activities or about which there were insufficient facts to support the allegations made. In some of the cases, further research revealed 14 additional business entities relevant to the companies that were screened in, including parent companies and their subsidiaries, resulting in a total of 206 companies that were screened in out of a total of 321 reviewed by the end of 2017. The majority of these companies are domiciled in Israel or the settlements (143), with the second largest group located in the United States (22). The remainder are domiciled in 19 other countries.<\/p>\n To date, given the limited resources available, the Office has contacted 64 of these companies, informing them of the listed activities that they appeared to be engaged in. The Office is considering the responses received to date and continues to work on making determinations regarding those companies\u2019 involvement in the listed activities. Once it has been in touch with all 206 companies, and subject to its determinations, the Office expects to release the names of all those companies engaged in listed activities.<\/p>\n Throughout the process, the Office has consulted the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Working Group on Business and Human Rights, and held extensive discussions with States, civil society, think tanks, academics and others.<\/p>\n \u201cThe violations of human rights associated with the settlements are pervasive and devastating, reaching every facet of Palestinian life,\u201d the report recalls. \u201cOwing to settlement development and infrastructure, Palestinians suffer from restrictions on freedom of religion, movement and education; their rights to land and water; access to livelihoods and their right to an adequate standard of living; their rights to family life; and many other fundamental human rights.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBusinesses play a central role in furthering the establishment, maintenance and expansion of Israeli settlements,\u201d the report adds, stressing that as part of the due diligence process for companies seeking to operate in a complex environment like the occupied Palestinian territory, \u201cbusiness enterprises may need to consider whether it is possible to engage in such an environment in a manner that respects human rights.\u201d<\/p>\n Considering the weight of the international legal consensus concerning the illegal nature of the settlements themselves, as laid out in Human Rights Council resolution 31\/36, and the systemic and pervasive nature of the negative human rights impact caused by them, the report notes that \u201cit is difficult to imagine a scenario in which a company could engage in listed activities in a way that is consistent with the Guiding Principles and international law.\u201d**<\/p>\n The report also challenges the explanations put forward by companies involved in the listed activities that the businesses provide jobs to Palestinian families and help to support the Palestinian economy. It states that the presence of settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory in fact serves to depress the Palestinian economy and reduce opportunities for Palestinian businesses to thrive, as well as having a direct effect on the job market. The report also emphasizes that the corporate responsibility to respect human rights exists over and above compliance with national laws and regulations. The Guiding Principles require businesses operating in conflict-affected areas \u2013 which include areas under occupation \u2013 to conduct enhanced due diligence, which entails taking active steps to identify and assess any actual or potential adverse human rights impacts as a result of business relationships. They stipulate that such companies should be prepared to \u201caccept any consequences \u2013 reputational, financial or legal \u2013 of the continuing connection.\u201d<\/p>\n Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra\u2019ad Al Hussein urged all businesses contacted by the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Human Rights Office in relation to its mandate under Human Rights Council resolution 31\/36 to cooperate with the Office, with a view to engaging in constructive dialogue.<\/p>\n \u201cI am satisfied, given the resource constraints and the unprecedented nature of such a request from the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Human Rights Council, that significant progress has been made in the Office\u2019s efforts to operationalize the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights,\u201d High Commissioner Zeid said. \u201cI urge all sides to avoid misrepresenting the contents of this report, which has been produced in good faith on the basis of the mandate laid down by the Human Rights Council. We hope that our work in consolidating and communicating the information in the database will assist States and businesses in complying with their obligations and responsibilities under international law.\u201d<\/p>\n ENDS<\/p>\n The report \u2013 A\/HRC\/37\/39 \u2013 is available on:\u00a0http:\/\/www.ohchr.org\/EN\/HRBodies\/HRC\/RegularSessions\/Session37\/Pages\/ListReports.aspx<\/a><\/p>\n The Human Rights Council resolution mandating the report is available on:http:\/\/ap.ohchr.org\/documents\/dpage_e.aspx?si=A\/HRC\/RES\/31\/36<\/a><\/p>\n * Human Rights Council resolution 31\/36 recalls reports of the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Secretary-General, resolutions of the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ General Assembly and Security Council, an advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice and the opinions of several human rights bodies reaffirming the illegality of the Israeli settlements in the occupied territory, including in East Jerusalem.<\/p>\n ** The Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights are available on:\u00a0http:\/\/www.ohchr.org\/Documents\/Publications\/GuidingPrinciplesBusinessHR_EN.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n This year, 2018, is the\u00a070th\u00a0anniversary<\/strong>\u00a0of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights<\/strong>, adopted by the Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ on 10 December 1948. The Universal Declaration \u2013 translated into a world record 500 languages \u2013 is rooted in the principle that \u201call human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.\u201d It remains relevant to everyone, every day. In honour of the 70thanniversary of this extraordinarily influential document, and to prevent its vital principles from being eroded, we are urging people everywhere to\u00a0Stand Up<\/strong>\u00a0for Human Rights<\/strong>:\u00a0<\/em>www.standup4humanrights.org<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" GENEVA (31 January 2018) \u2013 The Ä¢¹½ÊÓƵ Human Rights Office on Wednesday issued a report detailing its work on producing a database of business enterprises engaged in certain, specific activities in the occupied Palestinian territory that are either explicitly linked to Israeli settlements or form part of processes that \u201cenable and support the establishment, expansion […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":172,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"country":[],"document-category":[1329],"document-source":[1825],"committee-meeting":[],"document-subject":[1741,2137],"entity":[1729],"document-language":[6542],"class_list":["post-127534","document","type-document","status-publish","hentry","document-category-press-release","document-source-office-of-the-united-nations-high-commissioner-for-human-rights-ohchr","document-subject-human-rights-and-international-humanitarian-law","document-subject-settlements","entity-united-nations-system","document-language-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/127534","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/document"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/127534\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=127534"},{"taxonomy":"document-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-category?post=127534"},{"taxonomy":"document-source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-source?post=127534"},{"taxonomy":"committee-meeting","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/committee-meeting?post=127534"},{"taxonomy":"document-subject","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-subject?post=127534"},{"taxonomy":"entity","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/entity?post=127534"},{"taxonomy":"document-language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-language?post=127534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}