VZCZCXYZ0001
RR RUEHWEB

DE RUCNDT #1091/01 3371537
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 031537Z DEC 09 ZDK
FM USMISSION USUN NEW YORK
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 7745
INFO RUEHBS/USEU BRUSSELS
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA 3964

UNCLAS USUN NEW YORK 001091 
 
DEPT FOR IO/HR, DRL/MLGA, PRM/PIP, S/GWI 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM SOCI UNGA
SUBJECT: THIRD COMMITTEE SPECIAL RAPPORTEURS ON HUMAN RIGHTS 
 
¶1. SUMMARY: As part of the annual discussion of human rights issues 
in the UN General Assembly, numerous Special Rapporteurs on thematic 
issues made presentations to the UNGA Third Committee.  Below are 
summaries of the hour-long presentations by the Special Rapporteurs 
for Right to Health, Right to Food, Housing, VAW, TIP, Migrants, and 
Right to Education.  The summaries for presentations for Special 
Rapporteurs on Torture, Myanmar, DPRK, Palestine, Freedom of 
Religion, Human Rights Defenders, Human Rights while Countering 
Terrorism, and Extrajudicial Executions are reported Septel. END 
SUMMARY. 
 
RIGHT TO HEALTH 
--------------- 
 
¶2. Anand Grover, Special Rapporteur on Physical and Mental Health, 
said on October 21 that guaranteeing informed consent is fundamental 
to achieving the enjoyment of the right to health through practices, 
policies and research that are respectful of autonomy, 
self-determination and human dignity.  He said that structural 
inequalities exacerbated by stigma and discrimination mean that 
individuals from certain groups are disproportionately vulnerable to 
having their informed consent compromised. 
 
RIGHT TO FOOD 
------------- 
 
¶3. Olivier de Schutter, Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, 
noted on October 21 that there were a billion hungry people in the 
world, even though more food was being produced.  He said the single 
most important thing he had achieved in his mandate was his work 
with the Food and Agriculture Organization to reform the Committee 
on World Food Security, which created a global strategic framework 
that would hold states accountable on their achievement of the right 
to food.  The full report is at: www.un.org. 
 
¶4. Responding to Olivier de Schutter, the delegate of Argentina said 
that extortionist policies from the world's leading producer 
countries had led to tariff distortions, thus, fuelling food 
insecurity.  He asked about the relationship between the 
protectionist trade policies and the right to food.  Mr. De Schutter 
said it was not acceptable for the market to be distorted by limited 
access and subsidies. 
 
HOUSING 
------- 
 
¶5. Raquel Rolnik, Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing, said on 
October 23 that people of the lowest incomes tended to be located in 
the most hazard-prone sites in cities.  She noted that disasters 
caused by extreme weather reflected a failure of urban planning. 
She stated that access to affordable and well-located housing was 
needed to avoid unplanned settlement expansions and housing for the 
poor should be placed at the center of urban planning.  The full 
report is at: www.un.org. 
 
VAW 
--- 
¶6. Rashida Manjoo, Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, 
explained on October 23 that the 2009 thematic report to the HRC 
attempted to demonstrate how power operated not only through 
coercion, but also through the structure that governed the 
distribution and use of resources, benefits, privileges and 
authority within the home and society at large.  She said the report 
focused on the feminist critique of the dichotomy drawn between 
political and civil rights and economic and social rights.  She said 
she also looked at the link between violence against women and 
women's access to economic and social rights.  The full report is 
at: www.ohchr.org 
 
¶7. Responding to Ms. Manjoo, the delegate of Syria called attention 
to the situation of women in the Occupied Palestinian Territories 
and asked for her opinion on the serious violations by Israel 
against women in Gaza, including the occupied Syrian Golan.  Ms. 
Manjoo stated there was a continuum of violence there, where 
oppression that resulted from patriarchy was feeding into the 
occupation.  She said follow-up work was needed to study violence 
before, during and after conflict, and to discover what the impacts 
of continued occupation were on women and children. 
 
TIP 
--- 
 
¶8. Joy Ngozi Ezeilo, Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, 
urged Member States on October 23 to fight the surreptitious 
transnational crime in a spirit of cooperation and with a human 
rights perspective.  She proposed a global action plan with 
quantifiable time-bound targets to galvanize the political and 
economic will of Members States.  She said such a plan should 
facilitate sustained technical assistance for identifying and 
 
protecting victims and should link anti-trafficking initiatives to 
the MDGs to address the root causes of human trafficking.  The full 
report is at: www.un.org. 
 
¶9. In responding to the Special Rapporteur, the delegate of Egypt 
noted that the number of states that had not ratified the Palermo 
Protocol was over 60.  The delegate further noted that if the world 
community was not going to come together now, then the whole 
international effort was going to be a "big fat failure." 
 
MIGRANTS 
-------- 
 
¶10. Jorge Bustamante, Special Rapporteur on the human rights of 
migrants, said on October 26 that over the course of his mandate he 
had visited Mexico, Guatemala, Romania and the United Kingdom.  He 
commented that during the period between January 2008 and June 2009, 
he had received communications regarding allegations of arbitrary 
detention, repatriation to countries of origin where there was 
threat of torture, threats to life and security, and summary 
executions.  He said most countries had two major protection gaps: 
1) lack of specific provisions on children in most migration laws; 
and 2) the need to take into account the specific conditions and 
needs of migrant children in public polices in general.  He found 
this year had been particularly alarming with regard to migrant 
rights, with outbreaks of hostility and xenophobia against the 
backdrop of the economic slowdown.  The full report is at: 
www.un.org. 
 
EDUCATION 
--------- 
 
¶11. The Special Rapporteur on the right to education, Vernor Munoz 
Villalobos, stressed on October 27 that preventing a person from 
learning was paramount to denying them life.  He said the 
educational systems that were structured purely by a "utilitarian 
paradigm" could strengthen prejudice and marginalization.  He added 
that states needed to interpret the concept of education broadly and 
promote a lifestyle of learning, which was the only way to lead to 
respect and understanding between people.  The full report is at: 
www.un.org. 
 
Rice