International Organizations

NGO: Fulfill Abortion "Rights" Under SDG Framework

August 17, 2017

The nongovernmental organization Amnesty International delivered an oral statement to the UN Human Rights Council in June calling on the body to push governments to contribute to the fulfillment of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by recognizing women's "sexual and reproductive health" rights, which it interprets to include the right to an abortion.
NGO Warns of Risks in "Externalizing" Migration Policies

August 17, 2017

Amnesty International has published a briefing paper asserting that governments that "externalize" their migration policies, in partnership with other countries, risk violating a variety of global rights obligations and tend "to exacerbate the current unfair distribution of responsibility for protecting refugees between developed and developing countries."
UN Group: US Detention of Migrants Violates Rights

August 16, 2017

A report from the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to the UN Human Rights Council asserts that US detention of illegal migrants and asylum seekers after they cross the US border violates international human rights law, arguing that the US must only use arrest and confinement of migrants while they await trial as a "last resort."
UN Memo Warns of Major Problems in Peacekeeping Unit

August 16, 2017

George Russell reports that an internal memo authored by the UN's top commander in the Central African Republic warns of the lack of discipline and incompetence of a Congolese unit stationed in the country, signaling that the UN has not yet solved the major problems leading to the recent UN peacekeeping sexual-abuse crisis in Africa.
EU, Governments Agree to Collaborate on SDGs

August 16, 2017

EU institutions and EU member states agreed in June to "a comprehensive common framework for European development cooperation" entitled "New European Consensus on Development" requiring them to collaborate on the fulfillment of the UN's comprehensive social and environmental targets embodied in the organization's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).