On March 29th the NGO Committee on Freedom of Religion and Belief, NY, and the NGO Committee on Human Rights, NY, sponsored a meeting to discuss the topic of blasphemy. The presenters were Austin Dacey from the International Humanist and Ethical Union and Pamela Takiff of Human Rights First.

The International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) has called on the African Commission on Human and People's Rights (ACHPR) to work for the abolition of blasphemy laws throughout the continent. Speaking on Saturday, April 30th, at the 49th session of the ACHPR in Banjul, The Gambia, IHEU representative Leo Igwe said that blasphemy laws “justify and sanctify tyranny, hatred, intolerance, forced conversion, intimidation and violence.”

Speaking in a dialogue with the High Commissioner for Human Rights at the 16th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva today, 3rd March 2011, IHEU representative Roy Brown condemned the continuing selectivity of the Council, comparing the immediate and excellent response of the Council to the barbarity of the Libyan regime with its lack of effective response to many other crimes against humanity. Brown cited in particular the judicial murder of hundreds of people in Iran and the deaths of more than 200,000 innocent civilians in the Sudan.

In a joint statement with the Association for World Education, IHEU has strongly criticised the continuation of chattel slavery affecting more than 600,000 people in Mauritania and Sudan, exacerbated by weak legislation, corruption and complicity. The statement was made in French to the 12th session of the UN Human Rights Council.

In a travesty of democratic debate, only six non-governmental organizations were allowed to speak in the debate on the Sudan at the Human Rights Council on 16 June, and the first three selected to speak were organizations funded by the government of Sudan. Despite having registered to speak when the list had opened on 2nd June, IHEU were pre-empted by the apologists for the Sudanese Government under a UN rule giving preference to NGOs "not represented" in Geneva.

World Union of Progressive Judaism
Joint statement with the International Humanist and Ethical Union and
Association for World Education

HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL: 10th Session (2– 24 March 2009) Item 3, General Debate
Speaker: IHEU representative, David Cornut: Monday (am) 16 March 2009

The Prevention of Genocide

Thank you, Mr President.

IHEU has strongly condemned the execution of children in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Yemen and Pakistan and the practice of child marriage. In a statement to the annual meeting on the Rights of the Child held at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, IHEU called the continuation of child marriage "a disgrace" and judicial killing of children "the ultimate barbarity".

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jody Williams, who led a UN Human Rights Council mission to Darfur but whose team was denied admission to the country, submitted her report to the UN on 12 March. Based on evidence collected in nearby countries and refugee camps in Eastern Chad, the report comprehensively condemns the Sudanese government for its failure to protect its civilian population, accusing it of acting in concert with its proxy militias in human rights abuse in Darfur where some 200,000 people have died since the revolt began in 2003.

The UN Human Rights Council held a special session on 12 December 2006 to discuss the human rights crisis in Darfur. Thirty member states, forty observer states and 20 NGOs spoke at the session, which had to be extended for a second day. IHEU main representative Roy Brown was the only speaker to discuss one of the underlying causes of the conflict - rapid population growth - and of the need to address this issue in seeking any long-term solution to the conflict.

According to Sima Samar, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Sudan, the people there have seen little change in their everyday life since the formation of the Government of National Unity. In Darfur, she said, the Government had failed in its responsibility to protect the population from attacks in areas where it had control.