U.N. raises concerns about human rights records in over 40 nations

GENEVA (AN) — Killings, torture and other outrages are going on across dozens of nations fueled by wars and conflicts in places like Ukraine, Syria and Mali, the new U.N. human rights chief said in an appeal for peace.

Among the worrying situations, the U.N.'s Volker Türk told the U.N. Human Rights Council on Tuesday, are the "unparalled" repression of women in Afghanistan and "grave concerns" for large-scale arbitrary detentions and family separations in the Xinjiang region of China, which recently agreed to open "channels of communication" with the U.N. human rights office.

But Russia's war in Ukraine also has affected many countries in southern Africa that are hard-hit by economic blows, including from the COVID-19 pandemic, and by rising food, fuel and fertilizer prices and debt repayments, Türk said. It's pushing millions more people into poverty.

Syria's 12 long years of bloodshed from civil war "is a microcosm of the wounds inflicted by utmost contempt for human rights," with last month's devastating earthquake along Turkey's border adding to the tragedy, he said, while in Mali, the security situation "is particularly alarming" due to armed groups "capitalizing on intercommunal hostility," undeterred in carrying out attacks against civilians.

"Contempt for the human being reaches agonizing levels when war breaks out, and violence becomes a daily occurrence," said Türk, a United Nations career diplomat from Austria who was appointed to head the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, or OHCHR, in Geneva last year.

"One quarter of humanity is living today in places affected by conflict, and it is civilians who suffer the most," he noted in an annual report and oral update. "Peace is precious and it is fragile – and we must nurture it."

Tyranny to persecution

Türk, a former top policy aide in U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres' office, is responsible for promoting and protecting the human rights and freedoms set out in the U.N.'s 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

On the eve of International Women's Day, he described the repression of women in Afghanistan as "unparalleled, contravening every established belief system. Women and girls’ rights to make choices about their lives and participate in public life have been, or are being, eliminated as we speak. This repression and persecution of women constitute a clenched fist around Afghanistan’s economy and its future. Such a tyranny must not escape accountability."

He noted that OHCHR's highly anticipated and long overdue report issued by his predecessor last year found China may have committed crimes against humanity in its arbitrary detention and persecution of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, prompting widespread calls for accountability and the Chinese government's scorn.

"In the Xinjiang region, my office has documented grave concerns – notably large-scale arbitrary detentions and ongoing family separations – and has made important recommendations that require concrete follow-up," he said, without specifying how his office will follow up.

But his office has "opened up channels of communication with a range of actors to follow up on a variety of human rights issues, including the protection of minorities, such as for Tibetans, Uyghurs and other groups," he said, adding his office also has broader concerns for "severe restrictions" on citizens and the impact of the national security law used to crack down after Hong Kong's huge protests.

Türk said he's concerned about the prospect of deepening instability in Burkina Faso, where his office documented at least 1,076 victims of violations and abuses in the last half of 2022. "Armed groups are responsible for most of these incidents, but the military's operations take a growing toll on civilians," he said.

And in the Horn of Africa, he pointed to a need for "continued monitoring and reporting" on abuses in Ethiopia's Tigray region despite a recent ceasefire. A two-year conflict killed an estimated half a million people before ending with a peace accord last November.

Eritrean refugees in Ethiopia also feared retaliation by Eritrean forces operating there, and he said that with "Eritrea’s continued military presence in Tigray, we have received reports that Eritrea is further increasing its use of forced and prolonged conscription, a practice that is akin to enslavement and the main driver of refugee outflows. This needs to be reversed, urgently, for the country to be placed on a path for sustainable development."