The shelling of Jabalia Elementary Girls’ School in Gaza on July 30 by Israeli forces was a shocking example of modern military action. The shelling was the sixth time a United Nations school has been…
The Srebrenica massacre of July 1995 is one of the most horrendous atrocities of post-war European history. The mass killing of 7,000 to 8,000 Bosnian Muslims accompanied by the deportation of 25,000 to…
On Thursday July 17, 298 people lost their lives when Flight MH17 was downed in eastern Ukraine. Almost immediately accusations were made that the aircraft had been shot down by pro-Russian separatists…
The sanctions against Russia just announced by the EU and the US are widely reported to be the harshest since the end of the Cold War. The package includes cutting off Russia’s state-owned banks from international…
Following the shocking news of the destruction of flight MH17, foreign minister Julie Bishop wasted no time in boarding a plane for the United Nations in New York. Australian diplomats engaged in intense…
The UN Security Council made a little bit of history this week when it passed Resolution 2165. It allows the humanitarian aid to be delivered to rebel-held areas of Syria without government approval. Instead…
Kicking goals is a whole lot easier when you’re running hard, with a clear line of vision. But amid so much backpassing and confusion on climate policy in Australia, it could be easy to lose sight of what…
On July 5, the Daily Mail mounted yet another attack on the pesky human rights folk who have the temerity to question the coalition government’s welfare agenda. The article, headlined “The Brazil Nut strikes…
The United Nations Human Rights Council is tasked with the universal protection and promotion of human rights, and is the UN’s principal human rights body. Yet it is being used by known rights abusers…
Society generally has a clear idea of what constitutes a crime, and those in positions of power are usually held to very high standards. Politicians charged with making decisions on the needs of society…
The guilty verdict and jail sentence handed to Australian journalist Peter Greste and his Al Jazeera English colleagues Mohammed Fahmy and Baher Mohammed by an Egyptian court for conspiring with the Muslim…
The Global Summit To End Sexual Violence in Conflict is underway in London. It is an extraordinary manifestation of UK soft power, the influence of global social movements, celebrity diplomacy and digital…
The passing of a decade has not dulled the sense of outrage at the UK involvement in the Iraq War, and the news that the Iraq Inquiry can only publish the “gist” of Tony Blair’s talks with George Bush…
In March, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon reported to the General Assembly on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Ban expressed concern that women in Iran “are subject to discrimination…
After the Scottish National Party had a bad result at the 1992 general election, deputy leader Jim Sillars famously accused the Scots of being “90-minute patriots”. His point, to paraphrase wildly, was…
This week marks the tenth anniversary of the the United Nations Security Council adopting resolution 1540. The resolution – an important, but perhaps underappreciated, element of the non-proliferation…
The high seas cover about 50% of Earth’s surface and host a major share of the world’s biodiversity, but remain largely ungoverned. With increasing threats to open ocean ecosystems, now more than ever…
In the wake of this month’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report on ways to cut global greenhouse gas emissions, accusations began to fly in the media that the report had been censored…
It seems an anomaly that among the 15 autonomous, specialised agencies within the United Nations – such as the FAO, WMO, WHO, or UNESCO – there is no dedicated environmental organisation. This secondary…
The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights has released a report on the human rights situation in Ukraine. It outlines the main areas of concern and needs for action, and sets out a framework…