Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (General)

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Social movements and grassroots leaders from across the Americas, Africa, and Asia came together in Nairobi, Kenya in 2008 to organize and participate in three full days of strategic meetings of the Social Movement Working Group to support mutual-learning amongst social movements, strengthen solidarity and support between social movements and NGOs, and to organize solidarity visits to stand in support and learn from Kenyan social movements in their struggle.

Earlier this month Liberian environmental justice lawyer Alfred Lahai Brownell led a briefing on Bridgestone/Firestone's continued violations of child rights and environmental destruction.  As the leading lawyer on case the against Firestone, Brownell's research work with plantation workers influenced an Alien Tort Claims Act case filed against Firestone in the United States.

Amnesty International welcomes the Obama administration's first full contribution to assess the human rights performance of governments around the world, and in particular, the Country Reports' expanded coverage of press freedoms and discrimination against vulnerable groups. However, for a thorough assessment of global human rights, the Country Reports should be more comprehensive and include all rights, not only civil and political, but also economic, social and cultural rights.  

Geneva/Guatemala: Several international organisations and networks that presented a report on the Right to Food call attention at national and international levels to the situation of hunger and malnutrition existing in Guatemala. They demand that the Right to Food be declared a national priority. Moreover, they urge to cease violence and threats against social, community, indigenous, peasant and trade union leaders, and to effectively protect human rights defenders.

Indigenous Achuar From the Peruvian Amazon Face Off
Against Occidental Petroleum Over Destruction of Pristine Rainforest

(Los Angeles, CA) - A key hearing was held yesterday in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in the landmark environmental and public health case brought by indigenous Peruvian Achuar and the U.S. NGO Amazon Watch against Los Angeles-based oil giant Occidental Petroleum (OXY). The appeals court's decision will likely determine whether OXY will have to defend its 30 year-old legacy of massive pollution in the northeastern Peruvian Amazon in a courtroom in Los Angeles, just miles from its world headquarters, or whether the case will move to Peru.

It has been more than two years now since the start of the largest financial meltdown and global economic recession in over fifty years. And yet, how have our governments responded to this crisis in such a way as to uphold people's fundamental dignity and human rights? ESCR-Net--together with AWID, CESR, Center of Concern and the Center for Women's Global Leadership--present this joint report analyzing government responses to the crisis from a human rights perspective.

The United Nations Draft Guiding Principles on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights are currently being developed to provide guidance on the implementation of existing human rights norms and standards in the context of the fight against extreme poverty.