QUNO New York newsletter from June 2013.

Features articles on:

• Letter from the Director
• Update from QUNO Geneva
• Beijing Meeting on UN Peacemaking, Peacekeeping, and Peacebuilding
• A Workshop for Incoming Members of the UN Peacebuilding Commission
• The Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues Comes to New York
• Update on the Post-2015 Development Agenda
• QUNO Annual Review

A user-friendly Guide to using Human Rights System for Conscientious Objectors. Together with the Centre for Civil and Political Rights, War Resisters International and Conscience and Peace Tax International, QUNO has made this guide available on-line and on paper. The Guide, in its own words, “is mainly intended as a web publication […], which allows users a quick overview of relevant human rights mechanisms applicable to their situation. While it can be read as a book, its main use is as an interactive guide. It is aimed at conscientious objectors to military service anywhere in the world who struggle for the recognition of their right to conscientious objection, or against discrimination for being a conscientious objector, and who want to use international or regional human rights systems in their struggle. It can also be used by local or national organizations of conscientious objectors to military service, or by human rights NGOs supporting conscientious objectors to help them to access international or regional human rights systems.”

See also: OHCHR Guide on Conscientious Objection to Military Service.

The statement encourages the Independent Expert to consider the following:

• The role that peacebuilding approaches can play in fulfilling procedural rights, in order to achieve both substantive rights and effective environmental poliy, and
• How small farmers, rural communities and marginalised sections of society can effectively participate in consultation and decision-making processes that relate to their environment.

Geneva's newsletter from January to March 2013. Featured stories:​

• QUNO engagement with climate talks
• Natural resources, conflict and cooperation
• Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners
• Highlights from QUNO New York

Geneva's newsletter from September to December 2012. Featured stories:

• Supporting children of prisoners
• World food security
• After the Millenium Development Goals
• Highlights from QUNO New York
• News in brief and publications

As the UNFCCC moves towards new arrangements under the Durban Platform, facilitating trust among its Parties will be vital to enabling and encouraging States to stabilise their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and prevent dangerous levels of climate change. An effective and positive monitoring system can be an important part of building mutual trust between Parties to an international Convention, increasing confidence that all Members will fulfill their obligations by providing support for implementation while also identifying areas of non-compliance. This paper is a contribution by the Quaker United Nations Office to a discussion on what effective monitoring under the UNFCCC and its Protocols might look like, offering a small sample of approaches adopted by other international bodies and discussing some of the merits of each. 

Exploring the complex interlinkages between climate change, resource scarcity, violent conflict and cooperation.

This submission welcomes the UN Secretary General’s report on the death penalty, in which the children of sentenced persons are recognized. It updates states about recent QUNO efforts to highlight the effects of parental execution or sentencing on children.

See also:

• Lightening the Load of the Parental Death Sentence on Children
• Children of Parents Sentenced to Death: How are they affected? How can they be supported?
• Briefing Paper: Children of Parents Sentenced to Death
• Report: Children of Parents Sentenced to Death

This is the report on the QUNO-IIED panel at the World Trade Organisation Public Forum held in September 2012 in Geneva.