QUNO's December 2019 issue of the Geneva Reporter newsletter is available below. This special issue highlights some of the ways the Quaker commitment to peace is reflected in QUNO's work programmes, and also features an interview about our work on integrating human rights & sustaining peace; news from our recent event on climate justice and peacebuilding; trade for peace, an update on our work supporting the right to conscientious objection to military service, and a QUNO Q&A with David Elliott.

A Government Official’s Toolkit: inspiring urgent climate action includes 12 concise cases, 231 quotes referenced to over 100 published papers (including the IPCC Special Reports on: Global Warming of 1.5C Climate Change and Land Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate). This publication is written to support government officials—at local, regional and national levels—who are concerned about the impact of climate change on their citizens, their country, and the planet. It offers a range of concise cases to help you engage with different concerns, and integrate scientific, rights-based, and Indigenous knowledge and approaches throughout the Toolkit.

Read QUNO New York's newsletter, In & Around the UN, featuring articles on:

• Opening of the High-Level Political Forum
• The Quaker Peace & Social Witness visit to New York
• QUNO's participation in New York Yearly Meeting summer sessions

and more from New York.

On 25 September, QUNO’s NY Director, Andrew Tomlinson, spoke at a high-level panel discussion arranged in the sidelines of the 74th Session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly. The Ministerial level event, Delivering on Peace: Peace and Political Transitions, held at UN headquarters and convened by the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Kenya to the UN, examined country-specific approaches to targeting the root causes of violence and furthering the peacebuilding and conflict prevention agendas.

 The Quaker United Nations Office (QUNO) is committed to the abolition of the death penalty in all its forms. We believe that bringing light to the issue of the impact of the parental death penalty on children contributes to the broader abolitionist movement and can contribute to the eradication of the death penalty worldwide.

The issue of the impact on children of parents sentenced to death or executed is applicable to all countries, and at all stages of the process, from arrest through to post-execution; there are parents everywhere. Focusing on the experience of the children who are affected can help in turn to humanize those sentenced to death, by representing them as people who give and receive love—as individual human beings, and not only as the crimes they may have committed.

This set of briefing tools is intended to inform decision makers, including defence lawyers, sentencers and legislators, and also diplomats and State representatives, of the impact on children and the relevant international legal standards in order to change policy and practice.

French and English language versions are available below.

While recognition of conscientious objection in national law is a huge step towards ending violations of the rights of those who refuse to fight, human rights based processes need to be in place to ensure that the right can be exercised in practice. On this basis the Human Rights Council mandated a report from the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights, delivered in June 2019, that examines barriers to the right to conscientious objection and provides a checklist of  recommendations for States when implementing policy. This document is QUNO's contribution to the report.

At the 40th session of the Human Rights Council, QUNO delivered an oral statement (and submitted a written counterpart providing further information) focussing on the ways in which the sentencing to death or execution of a parent violates the best interests principle, particularly where the death sentence is mandatory, and often violates the child's right to non-discrimination. 

This edition of A Government Official's Toolkit  has been lightly edited and re-organized into a smaller format.

This and the original publication were written to support government officials—at local, regional and national levels—who are concerned about the impact of climate change on their citizens, their country, and the planet. The publication is organized into 12 concise cases, including approaches to effective and sustainable climate action policy. Our aim is to connect you with research available at the international level. All points are quoted from, and linked to, the original, peer-reviewed papers. 

An executive summary of Protection of the Rights of Children of Parents Sentenced to Death or Executed: An Expert Legal Analysis, researched and written by Professor Stephanie Farrior.