BHR

Academic Calls for Lawyer Guidance on "Climate Justice"

August 07, 2017

Sara Seck of the Centre for International Governance Innovation writes on progress by the International Bar Association and others in developing business and human rights (BHR) guidance for attorneys and calls for more activity linking this global BHR legal movement with lawyer action promoting "climate justice."
MEP Seeks EU-wide Integration of BHR Agenda

August 07, 2017

Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Heidi Hautala calls for EU institutions to implement several action items from the global business and human rights (BHR) agenda, including imposing binding human rights due diligence requirements on all companies and formulating an EU-wide action plan on responsible business conduct.
Paper: UN Visit to Canada Should Spur BHR Reforms

August 07, 2017

A paper from the Centre for International Governance Innovation asserts that the May visit of the UN Working Group on business and human rights (BHR) to Canada provides an opportunity for the country to adopt a "national action plan" that clarifies links between the country's policies on BHR issues, indigenous rights, and global warming.
NGOs Complain of Corporate Lawsuits Against Activists

August 04, 2017

Two representatives of the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre warn that companies are using "judicial harassment" - such as suing for defamation or for destruction of property - to block "accountability" from human rights activists across the globe.
NGOs: EU Must Address Foreign "Land Grabs"

August 04, 2017

A group of nongovernmental organizations has published a report asserting that EU institutions and member states have been complicit in their businesses' human rights-violating "land grabs" in foreign countries and calling on officials to address these problems through measures such as human rights impact assessments and an EU-wide mechanism to evaluate complaints.
NGO: FIFA Must Show Concrete BHR Commitments

August 03, 2017

An article published by Amnesty International expresses concern that the recent moves of the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) to host meetings in Bahrain and to partner with state-owned Qatar Airways signal its intent not to follow through on pledges to embed the global business and human rights (BHR) agenda in its policies.
NGOs Push G20 to Coordinate on BHR Policies

August 03, 2017

An event hosted in Berlin by a set of nongovernmental organizations focused on pressing Group of 20 countries (G20) to coordinate on measures forcing businesses to take action on "identifying, avoiding, mitigating, and remedying" violations of the business and human rights (BHR) agenda throughout their complex, global supply chains.
NGO Calls on France to Facilitate BHR Lawsuits

August 03, 2017

The nongovernmental organization Sherpa has issued a press release praising parts of the recently published French National Action Plan on business and human rights (BHR), including reinforcement of a "duty of care" standard for businesses on BHR issues, but calling for additional provisions facilitating the filing of BHR lawsuits against French companies.
Paper: French Law Pursues BHR "Due Diligence" Principles

August 03, 2017

The International Bar Association (IBA) has published an article describing how a recently passed French law imposing a duty of "vigilance" on companies to monitor and report their efforts to reduce their negative global business and human rights (BHR) impacts is based in the corporate duty of "human rights due diligence" set out in the UN Guiding Principles on BHR.
AU Develops Continental BHR Action Plan

August 03, 2017

According to Romola Adeola of McGill University's Centre for Human Rights and Legal Pluralism, the African Union's (AU) plans to develop a continent-wide action plan to implement the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (BHR) will help countries address BHR issues relating to land acquisition and environmental pollution.