As part of our work to end lethal disregard for people on the move, the Human Rights and Refugees Programme has collaborated to draft a joint letter calling on the Human Rights Council to undertake a global investigation into deaths, enforced disappearances, torture and other grave human rights violations faced by people in transit across international borders. Joined by 228 organizations (by 25 June), the letter highlights the global pattern of deaths and grave human rights violations in transit. The letter notes the interconnection of racism and human rights violations in transit. We believe that this additional mechanism is needed to complement the work of the Special Rapporteur on human rights of migrants, to sustain attention on this pressing issue, hear from migrants and their family members and engage political will to end the dehumanization of migrants.

Organizations and groups can add their support for the letter here: https://forms.gle/8JkUwy2i9u7GRiXG7 

On June 7, QUNO NY held a discussion on Sustainable Development Goal 16 titled “Spotlight on SDG 16: Providing Access to Justice for All’. The event brought together UN diplomats, colleagues from the UN system and civil society to unpack the ‘justice’ element of SDG 16, delving further into both reproductive and environmental justice. The discussion centered around the intersectionality of equal access to justice, strategies for translating SDG targets into tangible national laws and action plans and methods to improve data collection on equal access to justice.

Last November, States that took part in COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh agreed to pass a new funding arrangement for responding to loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change. Loss and damage (L&D) refers to the monetary and non-monetary losses and damages that people have experienced and will experience due to sudden and slow-onset events. Economic, or tangible, L&D includes the loss of property and livelihood, changes in labor and agricultural productivity, cost of medical treatments associated with climatic events, and so forth. Non-economic, or intangible, L&D includes but is not limited to the mental health impacts, loss of ecosystems, and loss of culture (places, artifacts, language, etc.) from climate change.

People who are most affected by and vulnerable to further L&D have contributed the least to the climate crisis. Therefore, is it morally right that those who are most responsible for the climate crisis should finance the new funding arrangement for L&D. Taking up the need to address L&D in an ethical manner, the Human Impacts of Climate Change programme published this month a new briefing paper on “Fair Sources of Finance for a New Loss and Damage Funding Arrangement.” The options offered in the paper are meant to present policy makers with feasible and fair sources of finance for funding the new L&D arrangement without taking money away from needed action into climate change mitigation and adaptation. Grounded in principles like polluter pays, historic responsibility, and needs based, the options center redressing fossil fuel harm, exploring existing financial instruments, and supporting a more just and equitable world. 

On 16 February 2023, Mr. Andres Naranjo, the Programme Associate for QUNO's Sustainable and Just Economic Systems (SJES), presented at the pre-plenary session of the WTO Dialogue on Plastic Pollution, offering insights on waste regulations and plastic pollution management based on the findings of QUNO's recently-released report, "Package-less and Reuse Systems Through Policy Intervention: rethinking packaging in international trade."

The presentation emphasized the need to shift from recycling-centric approaches to prioritizing higher-level strategies, including avoidance and reuse/refill systems. The report's analysis of thirty countries demonstrated that recycling and reuse measures were the least favored, while labeling emerged as the most significant measure in international trade. During the presentation, Mr. Naranjo advocated for policy incentives to accelerate the adoption of reuse systems in developing countries, as this could create local jobs and alleviate pressure on waste management systems. Furthermore, Mr. Naranjo stressed the importance of establishing clear definitions and working standards to facilitate international trade and assess the sustainability merits of various reuse practices and operations.

You can refer to the attached PowerPoint slides for Mr. Naranjo's presentation. 

QUNO UN representative Kavita Desai delivered an intervention at the multistakeholder consultations for the Summit of the Future convened by the Summit’s co-facilitators, the permanent missions of Germany and Namibia to the UN. Drawing on insights from the recently submitted Civil-Society UN Prevention Platform paper on the New Agenda for Peace, Kavita called for peace to be a focus, highlighting the need for the concrete and actionable steps to build peace to come out of the Summit.

The Civil Society-UN Prevention Platform, co-facilitated by QUNO and GPPAC, focused its annual discussion series on developing a joint submission for the New Agenda for Peace (NA4P), due to be published in June 2023. This paper aims to contribute to the drafting process for the NA4P and underscores areas of concern and interest from the discussion series that Platform partners and participants would like to see highlighted in the NA4P. This paper outlines six key proposals and an additional three that the Platform believes will ensure a comprehensive and forward-looking policy through the NA4P.

The 2016 Paris Agreement is an international agreement on climate change binding every country that has signed to act on the climate response. Countries are required to outline their climate actions through “Nationally Determined Contributions,” with developed countries leading on mitigation and finance. This 2-sider explains what the Paris Agreement is and how to get involved in
making sure that countries are responding to it. 

The climate negotiations under the UNFCCC are the main form of international climate action. Yet, there are many international and local initiatives outside of multilateral negotiations that push forward ambition and creativity on climate action. This 2-sider features a couple of these projects, offering insight into actions being taken below or beyond the state level by both state and non-state actors.

The impacts of climate change are shaping some of the oldest human practices: moving and creating places where we feel safe and at home. This 2-sider focuses on climate-induced movement, and the specific international laws that protect people who may need to move due to climate change.