Monday, August 18, 2014 8:38 am  unwatch  38 

Genocide in Iraq: UN Watch to Launch UN Appeal by MPs, Human Rights Activists, at Rally in Geneva Tomorrow

Iraqi Yazidi and Christian leaders to unite with UN Watch supporters at Geneva’s Place des Nations on Tuesday, 1 pm; click here for details

GENEVA, August 18, 2014 – In response to shocking reports of mass slaughter and rape by the Islamic State in Iraq against numerous minority groups, UN Watch will hold a rally in front of the UN Human Rights Council tomorrow, featuring Yazidi and Christian leaders from Iraq, to launch an appeal for world action signed by parliamentarians and human rights activists around the globe.

The appeal will call for a UNHRC emergency special session to protect the right to life of vulnerable Iraqi communities now in very grave danger.

We need your support: attend the rally if you are in Geneva, or else join your voice to this critical appeal by signing the petition. 

 _________________

APPEAL FOR UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL EMERGENCY SESSION ON IRAQ 

To: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay
Excellency,
Faced with shocking reports of mass slaughter threatened by the Islamic State in Iraq (ISIS) against numerous minority groups, possibly amounting to genocide, we, an international coalition of parliamentarians, dissidents, and human rights activists, urge you—in the name of humanity—to call for and take immediate action to convene an emergency special session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, to protect the right to life of these vulnerable populations who are now in very grave danger.
Besieged Yazidis stranded on an isolated mountaintop are beginning to die of thirst. Ten of thousands of men, women and children fled their homes in northern Iraq, after Islamic State militants attacked the towns of Sinjar and Zunmar. “Children have died because of dehydration and lack of food,” Vian Dakheel, a Yazidi parliamentarian from Sinjar, said to the Iraqi parliament through tears. “My people are being slaughtered.”
Consider the past month alone:
  • Islamic State militants destroyed a half dozen of places of worship, including a 14th century mosque in Mosul. Desperate to save their holy sites, residents of one town formed a human chain around an 840-year-old minaret to save it from the Islamic State militants.
  • The UN Special Rapporteur on minorities expressed grave concern for the safety of Christians, Shia, Shabaks, Turkmen, Yazidis and other minorities in Iraq facing persecution on the grounds of their religion and ethnicity.
  • The Special Rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons stressed that the ongoing conflict has already displaced some 1.2 million people, mostly minority members who have fled the northwest of Iraq.

It is unconscionable for the world’s highest  human rights body—which is pledged, under UNGA Resolution 60/251, to prevent human rights violations and respond promptly to human rights emergencies—to continue turning a blind eye to the massacre, abuse, and intimidation of Iraqi civilians.

Accordingly, we urge you to end the silence and take action to convene a UNHRC Special Session that will:
1. Mobilize world action to protect vulnerable populations in Iraq from mass killing, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other gross and systematic violations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, including the right to life;

2. Establish an urgent, international and independent Fact Finding Mission to investigate the Islamic State for acts committed to destroy, in whole or in part, various national, ethnic, racial and religious groups in Iraq, constituting genocide as defined in the Genocide Convention, and to recommend urgent action to the UN Security Council, as well as to ensure individual accountability before the International Criminal Court; and

3. End the unacceptable protection gap of the past decade by reviving the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iraq which was terminated by the UNHRC without justification in 2004, thereby ensuring an early warning mechanism for the international community, with regular reporting to both the Council and the General Assembly.
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