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This paper examines the role of the European Parliament as an international moral tribune for the promotion of human rights through a qualitative case-study design. It focuses on the emblematic Ayotzinapa case, which involved the enforced disappearance of 43 young rural students and the killing of other six civilians in Mexico in September 2014. The paper innovatively analyses the parliamentary diplomacy activity of four Members and their respective political groups: Franziska 'Ska' Keller (Greens/EFA, Germany), Josep-Maria Terricabras i Nogueras (Greens/EFA, Spain), Estefanía Torres Martínez (GUE/NGL, Spain) and Teresa Jiménez-Becerril Barrio (EPP, Spain), during the 8th parliamentary term (2014–2019). It addresses: How does the European Parliament, acting as an international moral tribune, exercise its role in promoting human rights in practice? Importantly, how do individual members and their political groups contribute to fulfilling this role? The research findings reveal that the phenomenon of parliamentary diplomacy on human rights is highly complex, challenging the mainstream notion that the European Parliament is a monolithic player acting as a moral tribune in international relations. Results also provide important insight for understanding the (micro-)processes of parliamentary diplomacy and their relevance for human rights advocacy within the European Union's external relations and its Member States'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy responses to COVID-19 have illuminated how children and young people's human rights were all too often side-lined by adult concerns. With mounting queries during the first 'lockdown' in Scotland (March 2020), the Children and Young People's Commissioner Scotland asked the Observatory of Children's Human Rights Scotland to undertake an independent Children's Rights Impact Assessment of COVID-19 emergency public health measures on children and young people in Scotland. The resulting analysis proved not only productive for immediate policy advocacy but had broader lessons about how states parties can respect, protect and fulfil children and young people's human rights at times of crisis and disaster. This requires challenging adult approaches and orientations to policy, so all of children and young people's rights to provision, protection and participation are met, especially groups of children and young people who may be at particular risk of rights' violations. This editorial outlines the process and substantive learning from the independent CRIA, from a range of experts, including children and young people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How and why states legislate against hate crime and what role various actors – including human rights movements and international bodies – play in enacting change is attracting increased scholarly interest. Drawing upon primary, mixed-methods research, with Poland as our case study, this paper seeks to understand how new transnational advocacy opportunities change the way local activists push for improved legal protection from anti-LGBT violence. Using Keck and Sikkink's (1998) 'boomerang' model as our interpretative frame, we observe how Polish LGBT groups systematically work with intersectional and transnational networks to feed their grievances to international human rights institutions, which, in turn, apply pressure on the government to amend hate crime laws. We argue that such externalisation of hate crime as a policy issue is a result of the closing of political opportunity structures at home and the simultaneous appearance of advocacy opportunities abroad along with increased resources being made available to the LGBT movement. While the state still hesitates to change the law, there are signs that calls for a new approach to addressing hate crime, promoted by activists and international organisations, are increasingly being heard by bureaucrats in Warsaw, even if there is currently no political will to make any changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas (UNDROP) is one of the most ambitious UN declarations. We analyse the policy and legal challenges of protecting these rights vis-à-vis India's indigenous Adivasi peasants. Longstanding social and political mobilizations have enabled Adivasis to secure significant statutory and legal rights, which address the goals of land rights and food sovereignty, sustainable development, and socially just climate action. However, powerful actors and agencies opposed to these rights hold considerable sway over India's political and judicial institutions. For example, contrary to its reputation as an activist court, India's Supreme Court has failed to protect Adivasi rights. Such countermobilization against Adivasi rights, especially by some environmental groups advocating for the enclosure of Adivasi lands for the sake of wildlife and biodiversity conservation, underscores the difficulty of enforcing economic and social rights. This article offers five key insights to inform future human rights advocacy and praxis to protect the rights enshrined within UNDROP. Our analysis identifies synergies between international human rights activism and the national and subnational struggles to protect peasant rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subject of this article is the role of the International Court of Justice (ICJ or Court) in interpreting human rights treaties. The article first sets out the limits of the Court's jurisdiction on human rights questions. Second, it analyses the ICJ's interpretive techniques, based also on cases concerning general treaty interpretation, in order to examine whether the Court has adopted an interpretive methodology comparable to some of the techniques of the ECtHR. It places this analysis within the broader debate as to whether a specialised approach to interpretation is required in the context of human rights treaties. Third, it considers a further important role that the ICJ can play in adjudicating on the relations between human rights and other issues of international law, including diplomatic protection, State immunities and international humanitarian law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This criticism as well as the standard setting exercise that ultimately resulted in the I UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples i ( I UN Declaration i ) triggered the ILO revision of the "outdated" C107. And, since the I UN Declaration i affirms that Indigenous peoples have the right of self-determination, it reinforces the ILO position that C169 must now be read together with the I UN Declaration i - and that the two instruments are "compatible and mutually reinforcing" as the ILO itself has confirmed.[7] Though the ILO has formally recognised that the I UN Declaration i and the ILO C169 should be read together, this is not consistently done in practice within the ILO. [Extracted from the article]

Also, not to be forgotten, was the importance of countries having ratified the predecessor, Convention 107 (remaining in force in 17 countries) and its role in facilitating dialogue in countries like Bangladesh. She also stated that the ratification of the Convention had reduced the level of conflict between indigenous peoples and the government encouraging other states to also ratify the Convention. More than 70 countries, it was mentioned, have been asked to ratify C169 in the Universal Periodic Review and 40 countries through the treaty bodies underlining important complementarities. From the lack prioritisation in the regular ILO budget to lack of UN-wide ownership, ratifying countries were encouraged to work with the ILO Governing Body to increase funding for indigenous rights issues. [Extracted from the article]

Human rights are an increasingly common language of advocacy for civil society organisations, but are these groups using the same words to mean different things? Although the spread of human rights has been well examined, little attention has been paid to the content of these rights as understood by civil society actors in diverse settings. Focusing on this gap in the literature, this paper examines how personnel in human rights-based non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Botswana and neighbouring South Africa perceive human rights. Drawing on interview-based case studies of two human rights-based organisations operating at the national level, I analyse how activists draw on domestic context to interpret human rights. This paper argues that personnel in these NGOs understand and articulate human rights in distinct ways that are shaped by and responsive to the contexts in which they live and work. Emerging from a more homogenous consensus-based culture, Botswana respondents are more likely to integrate cultural concepts, emphasise inclusion and understand human rights as timeless and innate. Reflecting South Africa's progressive constitution, unequal society and a history of struggle, South African respondents highlight contrast, agency, change over time and the law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The protection and promotion of human rights is experiencing increased commitment around the globe. Many organisations, groups and movements have strategically employed 'rights-based' agendas in order to advance issues and accomplish particular objectives. However, despite this ongoing mainstreaming and dominance, there is little time to reflect on the efficacy, sustainability and shortcomings of taking rights-based approaches. In this introduction to the volume 'Beyond 'rights-based approaches'?' we think critically about – and beyond – 'rights-based' approaches. As part of our review of the existing literatures (which we organise around three key waves in rights-based focused research), we introduce new research that seeks transformative solutions to systemic patterns of injustice, while considering the real changes in peoples' lives. Central to our discussion is the proposal and then the deployment of a new framework, based on a 'process/outcome axis'. From this vantage point we identify and discuss how our contributors challenge the prevailing assumptions and practices in the fight for human dignity, by addressing the gap between theory and practice, and between scholars, activists and practitioners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemporary scholarship has overwhelmingly focused on 'rights-based approaches' (RBAs) to development as being the principle way that development and human rights have merged in NGO practice. This article focuses on development-orientated campaign strategies, and in so doing challenges the ongoing RBA fixation by considering two praxis developments: (1) despite firm rejections of RBAs, alternative human rights strategies are being embedded in contemporary NGO practice, and; (2) over the past six years key changes in wider NGO campaigning contexts and environments have led to a further development in human rights approaches. Drawing on empirical findings from a ten-year in-depth research project on NGO practice, this article not only tracks developments in campaign practice, but also proposes two new models for consideration. These models – 'rights-framed' and 'rights-referenced', as practiced by influential NGOs – offer an innovative, strategic and instrumental embedding of a human rights discourse and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What do people do when they are said to 'have rights', but the practice of human rights has been neutralized or indeed inverted by states, depriving them of meaningful protection and the power to actualize them? Beyond offering limited protection and presenting an uplifting vision of what a universal regime of justice might look like, can the human rights regime actually guide movements of fundamental change, or at least help create a critical political space? These are some of the questions raised in this article. Since Israeli impunity towards the human rights regime and the support it receives from governments constitute a major challenge to the efficacy of that regime, and since Israel has pioneered many of the assaults on the global human rights regime, the authors evaluate these questions from the point of view of an Israeli political/human rights organization one of its authors (Halper) heads: the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD). Given the weakness of human rights implementation, we ask whether grassroots civil society organizations like ICAHD may provide the basis for new global initiatives of rights enforcement from below, and new counter-hegemonic movements to put rights into practice and so help transform the twenty-first-century world-system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the war on drugs, undocumented international migration in Mexico is facing a serious human rights crisis. Each year, hundreds of thousands of migrants, above all from Central America, cross Mexico to reach the United States. Through their journey they risk extortion, kidnap, ill treatment, torture, forced disappearance, forced labour, sexual abuses, and death. Ironically, in the last few years, migrants' rights has become a profession for many people. Never before have there been so many rights-based organisations and human rights practitioners in Mexico working in the promotion and defence of migrants' rights. This article is a sociologically driven analysis that seeks to critically examine the role of human rights organisations and practitioners working in the field of transmigrants' rights in Mexico. The article analyses how human rights practitioners and rights-based organisations talk about the suffering and violence routinely experienced by transmigrants in Mexico; and identifies the most visible implications of that discourse. It argues that legalism over-dominates practitioners' work and agendas: practitioners address the problem of undocumented migration through a narrow legalistic lens that ignores or fails to challenge the wider political and social conditions that make the abuses possible in the first place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human rights organisations (HROs) are the principal arbiters of the social problems that are documented and decried as human rights issues. They do so, however, within specific contexts, and through lenses that render some social and political problems more visible and amenable to human rights advocacy than others. This article examines the case of a controversial atrocity denial law passed in Cambodia in 2013 to reflect on how rights-based organisations think about and intervene in the social and political worlds that they inhabit. The law was a response to statements from an opposition leader that questioned the authenticity and 'staging' of a key site of atrocities perpetrated under the Khmer Rouge (1975–1979), circumscribing the opposition's ability to tap popular strands of anti-Vietnamese feeling. Rights groups, in theory, were confronted with a classical dilemma within human rights: the curtailment of free expression against the potential harm of hate speech. I situate the responses of HROs in context and explore three questions about the work and worldviews of HROs: the politicisation of human rights techniques and interventions; the (in)visibility of forms of structural violence in relief of abuses by the state; and the solubility of rights-based advocacy within prevailing populisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Free, prior, informed consent (or 'FPIC' as it is known) has emerged in recent years in international policy and civil society circles as the focal rights-based approach to safeguard indigenous rights in the context of industrial projects in indigenous territories. FPIC refers to a process whereby indigenous peoples affected by a project have the free choice, based on sufficient and timely information, of whether and how a project occurs, according to their systems of customary decision-making. However, despite this increasing and widespread endorsement in international policy and law, FPIC remains contentious, with governments voicing reluctance to confer 'veto' rights to indigenous peoples, and companies unsure on how to implement FPIC in practice. This article critically examines how FPIC emerged as the focal rights-based approach to ensuring indigenous peoples are not negatively impacted, and benefit from extractive projects such as oil and gas, and mining, while discussing some of the various challenges from industry perspectives in trying to implement FPIC in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study takes off from the critical ideas on the foundations of human rights, from the particular point of the subject of rights, and suggests that the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) has the potential to liberate the position of the human subject in human rights law, and therefore can act as a guidance in thinking about the current and future prospects of human rights and its underlying concepts. It is argued that by looking at the spirit and purpose of the CRPD, some embedded traditional concepts, namelyhuman dignityandautonomy, can find a better meaning and purpose, by adopting a critical screening and by introducing a relatively new concept, namelyvulnerability. The study will briefly refer to general criticism surrounding the idea of human rights, in particular relation to the issue of the ‘subject of rights’, in order to picture the theoretical environment where human rights of persons with disabilities are expected to appear. Departing from the point where criticisms leave us, CRPD’s approach to the human subject will enter the picture within the concepts of dignity, autonomy and vulnerability. Finally, the study will demonstrate the presence and interpretation of these concepts in the convention by targeting a specific article of the convention and present a final assessment between CRPD and contemporary human rights theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many human rights defenders operate from within higher education institutions, research institutes, academies, societies and ‘think-tanks'. Many of these academics, researchers and lecturers would recognise themselves as human rights defenders because their academic work is consciously paired with rights-promoting education and advocacy. Others may not set out to be human rights defenders, but are cast in the role after being targeted for attack. Human rights claims arising out of such attacks on intellectual-HRDs, if brought, typically do not include claims for violations of academic freedom. As a result the standards are underdeveloped relative to other human rights claims and the scope of academic freedom violations globally. This may be in part due to a negatively reinforcing lack of familiarity with issues of academic freedom and the available standards for protection among human rights advocates, and in part to the fact that attacks on academic freedom often manifest as violations of other rights under which claims are brought (e.g. wrongful detention or torture). This article argues that existing human rights law would sustain claims for violations of academic freedom as independently and interdependently derived from the rights to freedom of opinion and expression and the right to education. This article argues that including academic freedom claims in such cases has the benefit of providing an additional basis for relief while strengthening the claim for relief on a manifested violation by providing evidence of motive and intent. Including academic freedom claims also has the independent value of addressing the wider harms to the claimant-victim and society that result from attacks on intellectual expression and are not reached by relief on the manifested violation alone, including harms to a claimant-victim's creative, intellectual or expressive work, and widespread chilling effects on creativity, teaching, publication and the free exchange of ideas in society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public support for human rights in the UK remains limited, partly as a result of misleading media coverage, as well as political hostility. The UK Human Rights Act, in particular, has been under sustained attack and is now threatened by the Conservative Party's drive to repeal it. We analyse recent quantitative and qualitative data on public attitudes in order to learn how to increase public support for human rights practice and principles. The conclusion we reach is that, in order to increase support for human rights in the UK, a central objective should be to shift the focus of human rights discourse so that it better reflects the every-day concerns of the UK public. We consider that this would best be achieved through emphasising socio-economic rights. This could be an especially relevant strategy in the current austerity context which presents both opportunities and threats with regard to mobilising support for human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the recent jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights on the issue of domestic violence, with a particular focus onValiulienev.Lithuania. It seems that to date the court's jurisprudence on this issue is somewhat inconsistent, and withValiulienev.Lithuaniathe court was given an opportunity to clarify its approach in this area. There are certainly a number of positive aspects to the court's judgment; however there are also difficulties with the approach of the court in this case. Overall it is to be hoped that the judgment inValiulienev.Lithuaniawill mark the beginning of a more coherent jurisprudence regarding domestic violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pursuit of material rewards, particularly foreign aid, is often cited as a motivation for the ratification of human rights treaties by developing countries with poor human rights records. This article suggests that proponents of this rewards thesis have misinterpreted the relationship between ratification and foreign aid. It argues that aid-receiving countries ratify human rights agreements not because they expect to be rewarded with increases in aid, but rather because they fear that having a poor human rights reputation leaves them at risk of being targeted for aid sanctions. Thus, ratification serves to deflect criticism of their human rights practices and makes it easier politically for donors to justify maintaining aid flows to human rights abusers. These claims are tested using data drawn from 152 aid-receiving countries during the years 1981–2010. No evidence is found to support the claim that states are rewarded with increases in aid after ratification occurs. However, levels of dependence on foreign aid and respect for human rights do appear to have an interactive effect on ratification. States with poorer human rights records tended to ratify more human rights treaties when they were more dependent on foreign aid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of this inquiry is to unravel whether states are obliged, under international human rights law, to adopt a National Human Rights Action Plan (NHRAP), and if so, what is the nature and the scope of this obligation. To this end, a textual analysis of nine core human rights conventions is conducted. The results of this analysis show that each of these conventions places upon states parties an immediate obligation to adopt a NHRAP which must be geared towards realising the rights embodied in the conventions. If states parties fail to adopt a NHRAP or if their plan is not in line with realising human rights, in either case, they may be deemed to be in violation of the conventions. By contrast, the fulfillment of this obligation could set a society on the road towards development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past decade, a number of events in France – from thebanlieuesriots in 2005 to 2011's burqa ban and the dismantlement of Roma camps by both Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande – have propelled debates around immigration, integration and citizenship to the forefront of French politics. At the intersection of these debates are France's undocumented migrants, known assans-papiers. This article examines five French organisations' advocacy strategies to defend the rights ofsans-papiers. Drawing from interviews with members of the organisations and an analysis of various advocacy materials (reports, petitions, videos, posters, etc.), the article identifies those representations ofsans-papiersthat appear most prominently in the organisations' communications. Furthermore, it aims to explore the tensions between these representations and those values that are not only propounded by the organisations themselves, but are thought to animate human rights more broadly. In light of these tensions, the article considers the complexity and limited feasibility of ‘doing’ rights in a way that upholds certain values considered central to the human rights framework, particularly equality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines what human rights advocates can do for people like Edward Snowden. It argues in favour of lobbying governments to change laws regarding such individuals, in the US and elsewhere. It also suggests that such groups be judicious in their choice of action, and use crowd-sourcing for financial help. In order to make that argument, this article examines whether existing whistleblower protections apply to people such as Snowden, and what the significance is of Snowden's revelations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Indigenous rights have developed in a very different trajectory than minority rights within the United Nations. This is remarkable given that indigenous rights were once seen as simply contained within the larger umbrella of minority rights, and that many groups can claim access to both the differing bodies of rights. The article proposes a model to explain the differences in the strength and effectiveness of minority and indigenous rights structures at the UN. This model characterises transnational campaign pressure as a key variable to explain the differences. Transnational networks have been studied for their effect on the transfer of norms from international to domestic spheres, but the effect of their pressure on the structures of international organisations has not been considered. The model highlights the effects that transnational networks have on the UN human rights structures. Yet the path of future development of indigenous and minority rights at the UN is uncertain. Understanding the effects that transnational networks have on UN human rights structures and how those structures in term impact upon the strength of minority and indigenous rights is an area ripe for continued research. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An increasing number of local, national and international nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) are diligently working for the promotion and protection of human rights in the Muslim societies, and not without success. However, at times, some of these NGOs are perceived to be agents of ‘Western colonisation’ who attempt to undermine traditional structures and customs. Such attitudes are particularly prevalent in many Muslim countries such as Pakistan, which has suffered under colonial regimes for long periods of time. Thus it becomes important to frame human rights and peace-building efforts within the religio-cultural contexts of the community itself and to identify who can be effective agents of peace building and human rights. This article argues that human rights and peace building are inextricably linked and that any peace-building effort must incorporate mechanisms to enhance human rights. One of the main ways in which human rights can be enhanced in a conflict environment is to incorporate it in the critical educational institutions. This article looks at the madrasa training programme, undertaken by the International Center for Diplomacy (ICRD) in Pakistan that included human rights education within an Islamic framework, as a case study, and discusses its effectiveness and required areas of improvement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article addresses the important nexus between macro level responses and micro level processes when dealing with the aftermath of gross human rights violations. It focuses on the case of Guatemala and the issue of financial compensation for people affected by the internal armed conflict. One of the key mechanisms of the horror of the counter-insurgency war was the forced mass involvement of the civilian population through the imposition of the Civil Defence Patrols in rural indigenous communities. This raises the thorny question of who is victim in a micro reality of blurred lines between victims and perpetrators. Several socio-political parameters ensured that two distinct compensation programmes were created: one aimed at compensating the ex-civil patrollers; and a National Reparations Programme for the victims. Ethnographic accounts from Maya Q'eqchi' victims and ex-civil patrollers reveal that these two state initiatives expose frustration and incomprehensiveness among the beneficiaries towards both programmes and reveal a mismatch between macro initiatives and micro reality, which undermines the fragile process of rebuilding community trust. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article aims to bring a human rights perspective to corruption monitoring. While research has been done to explore the link between human rights and corruption, whether and how a human rights perspective could help to improve corruption monitoring has not been examined yet. The article is divided into four parts. The second part examines the rationale of both human rights monitoring and corruption monitoring, and how the former can help to improve the latter. The third part discusses the development and characteristics of both human rights indicators and corruption indicators. It also discusses the creation of indicators for monitoring corruption from a human rights perspective. The fourth part examines how a framework for monitoring corruption from a human rights perspective could be developed. It maps the different possibilities in the light of three existing frameworks of related fields. The fifth part discusses monitoring corruption from a human rights perspective in operation. It studies the kinds of data that could help to improve corruption monitoring and deals with the actors who should be involved in the monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Privacy is at the core of civil rights from which all other human rights and freedoms flow. Since the twentieth century, and particularly since 9/11, rapid deployment of information and surveillance technologies in the name of national security has grave implications for individual privacy and human rights. This article reviews major strands in contemporary privacy-security debate, while critiquing existing conceptualisations of privacy that are inadequate in the context of multifaceted and ubiquitous surveillance technologies post 9/11. Further, this paper contends most privacy-security debate overlooks unequal consequences for targeted populations (e.g. people of Middle Eastern, Arab or South Asian descent and Muslims). Finally, the paper emphasises the need for more accountability on part of the watchers and more expansive notions of privacy and security to uphold the well-being of individuals, society and democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The use of child soldiers has been universally condemned as abhorrent and inhumane and has been declared a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court 1998, (ICC) and the Optional Protocol 2000. Yet over the last decade, hundreds of thousands of children have fought and died in conflicts around the world. In 2006, the UN estimated that more than 300,000 children were actively involved in armed conflict. Given this, in an historic moment in the prosecution of child soldiering, on March 17, 2006, Thomas Lubanga was the first person arrested under warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes against children, charged with enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15 years to participate in hostilities in the mineral rich, North Eastern Ituri district of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) between September 2002 and August 2003. The major finding of this article is that there is an abject lack of international support for the major international instruments prohibiting child soldiering, especially by the United States, China and Russia; that many demobilisation, disarmament and reintegration programmes (DDR) face a serious lack of funding, with many girl soldiers falling outside DDR programmes and that the current minimum age of 15 is too low. This article recommends that an international summit be convened and all relevant international instruments be amended to set a new minimum age of 18 for voluntary recruitment, 21 for active combat service and a new international commitment to be made to prohibit and prevent the use of child soldiers. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The responsibilities that a court carries in a country with a written constitution are very onerous – much more onerous than the responsibilities of a court without a written constitution. Because here, they do not just interpret the laws but also the provisions of the constitution, and, are thus entrusted with giving meaning to the cold letter of the constitution. The courts thus act as the supreme interpreter, protector and guardian of the supremacy of the constitution by keeping all authorities – legislative, executive, administrative, judicial or quasi-judicial – within legal bounds. The judiciary has the responsibility to scrutinise all governmental actions and it goes without saying that in a constitution having provisions guaranteeing fundamental rights of the people, the judiciary has the power as well as the obligation to protect the people's rights from any undue and unjustified encroachment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The World Bank should mainstream human rights in its operation given the high level of influence it has on many people's lives. In spite of the Bank's tendency to avoid any involvement in human rights issues in the past, it has recently stated that it officially takes human rights into account in its work. This article pinpoints and examines obstacles toward the goal of human rights mainstreaming by the World Bank through the analysis of the Bank's reaction to its critics. Human rights are viewed by the Bank merely as ways and means to development and the Bank's human rights commitments cannot be taken literally. Thus, there is still a gap between its human rights goals and reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers the author's insights on the issue of human rights on the expertise provided by Fundamental Rights Agency Legal Experts (FRALEX) to European Union (EU) Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) on the study "Homophobia and discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation in the EU member states." The author says that the legal analysis of study has been drafted by the legal experts group FRALEX, which provided the background materials on legal issues. He is critical on who takes the responsibility for study on homophobia, either FRALEX or Oliver de Schutter. He also points out that the study has no impact if members of FRALEX have the responsibility in publishing it and there will be confusion between expertise and advocacy.

Human rights indicators and human rights impact assessment have become subjects that attract a wide interest within the human rights community and among donor agencies and development NGOs. This interest has evolved parallel to a growing interest in implementation of human rights projects and in the application of human rights-based approaches to national and international development. The article discusses practices of human rights impact assessment. A particular emphasis is put on the need to focus on how indicators are defined as part of a wider process of defining goals and objectives of human rights change. Organisations are often unclear about their objectives; they tend therefore to have unclear strategies of change that are conducive to international human rights. It is argued that the construction of indicators should be seen as an integral part of defining a viable strategy of human rights change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]