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	UN Experts urge Action on serious Human Rights Concerns in Several Countries by United Nations News   23 Oct 2006   United Nations experts urged the international community to act quickly to address serious and deteriorating human rights situations in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), Sudan, Myanmar, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and Sri Lanka, with specific actions recommended in several instances.   A full-fledged international human rights monitoring mission should be urgently sent to Sri Lanka, where fierce fighting between the Government and Tamil rebels erupted again recently, to ameliorate an impending crisis of major proportions, said Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur’s on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.   An international criminal tribunal should be established in the DRC to deal with crimes committed there since 1994, said an independent UN human rights expert, Titinga Frederic Pacere.   Both made their recommendations to the UN’s Third Committee (which deals with social, humanitarian and cultural matters) on Friday in hearings that continue today.   The UN Special Rapporteur for human rights in the Sudan, Sima Samar, said the situation in Darfur had dramatically deteriorated, despite the signing of the peace agreement in May 2006, and warned that the conflict is spilling across borders, with militia attacking civilians in Chad and the Central African Republic.   The immediate international priority should be to ensure human rights protection and humanitarian assistance to vulnerable populations in the Sudan, she said, urging the international community to provide the necessary financial and technical support to the African Union mission there.   Special Rapporteurs monitoring developments in North Korea and in Myanmar noted that they have been unable to visit these countries during the past two years or more.   Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, Special Rapporteur for human rights in Myanmar, said grave human rights violations continue with impunity, adding there was “urgent need” to better coordinate Member States’ approaches to encouraging democratic transition there.   Reporting on North Korea, Vitit Muntarbhorn said while egregious human rights transgressions continued the international community should continue its humanitarian aid for the North Korean people.   23 October 2006   UN human rights expert laments food aid cuts to DPRK which shares the blame.   The reluctance of donors to provide aid to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) following its reported nuclear test is causing rising hunger in the country and exacerbating the suffering of groups already facing a grim human rights situation, a United Nations independent expert warned today.   Food aid to the DPRK has already been cut drastically this year, leaving close to 2 million of the country’s most needy people without adequate calories, warned Special Rapporteur Vitit Muntarbhorn at a press conference in New York.   He said the Pyongyang authorities should shift the “serious waste of money on arms” to more productive development uses, including sustainable agriculture, to avoid the periodic famines the country has faced.   In a report submitted to the General Assembly last week, he noted that the UN World Food Programme (WFP) would be attempting to distribute aid to 1.9 million of the most needy North Koreans but that this year the amount available had been slashed to 75,000 tons of food, down from 500,000 tons per year previously.   “There are major concerns in regard to the rights to food and life, the rights to security of the person and humane treatment, the rights to freedom of movement, asylum and refugee protection, and various political rights such as self-determination, freedom of expression, association and religion,” Mr. Muntarbhorn wrote in his report.   He also called on the DPRK to reform its prison and judicial systems and to stop punishing citizens who are forcibly returned after trying to escape to other countries.   On Friday, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) urged donors to “continue their life-saving programmes” even while UN sanctions are imposed on the country for the nuclear test.   Working with WFP and other partners, UNICEF has treated about 70 per cent of the severely malnourished children in the country but roughly one third of all mothers are still malnourished, a rate that has not improved since 2002.
	Online Conversation about the prolonged Human Rights Crisis in Chechnya by Human Rights Education Associates Chechnya   On Thursday, 19 October 2006, HREA will organise a public chat session on the human rights crisis in Chechnya. Russian human rights defenders and experts from the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) will respond to questions about the background of the conflict, the nature of the human rights violations, and efforts undertaken by inter-governmental organisations like the Council of Europe and Organization for Cooperation and Security in Europe (OSCE) to end the conflict, among other topics.   Ten years after the catastrophic 1994-1996 war, which killed almost 100,000 people and reduced the capital of Grozny to rubble, the armed conflict in Chechnya still continues. Both parties in the conflict, the Chechnyan rebels and the Russian authorities and army, continue to violate human rights and humanitarian law, including acts of torture, extrajudicial executions and disappearances. Civilians have been the prime victims of this armed conflict, which started in 1993 when Chechnya wanted to break away from the Russian Federation. The recent murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who wrote her last news story about human rights abuses in Chechnya, demonstrated once again that the conflict is far from resolved.   Featured guests will be Damelya Aitkhozhina (Russian Justice Initiative), Joachim Frank (IHF), Krassimir Kanev (Bulgarian Helsinki Committee), Eliza Moussaeva (IHF) and Ole Solvang (Russian Justice Initiative). They will respond to questions, explain the background of the conflict and take comments throughout the day. You can submit questions in advance. The chat will be held on Thursday, 19 October and the dialogue is available on the link below. Visit the related web page
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