76th Session of the United Nations General Assembly
UN General Assembly Third Committee General Debate
Delivered by DPR Andre Lipand
October 1, New York
Mr Chair,
Estonia aligns itself with the statement made on behalf of the European Union.
The situation of human rights will be under close scrutiny of this Commission in the next 2 months. We believe that human rights, which are universal, inalienable, indivisible, interdependent and interrelated, are closely intertwined with the achievement of the UN objectives on security and development.
Mr Chair,
Among the broad range of issues that the upcoming session focuses on, I would like to touch upon the following:
The COVID-pandemic has increased the risks for the most vulnerable, while limiting the means to protect their rights. This includes violence against women and girls. Empowering women and girls is a priority in Estonia’s human rights activities as well as our development cooperation and humanitarian aid. We support the full inclusion of a gender perspective in our deliberations in the 3rd Committee as well as throughout the UN, including the Security Council. In the framework of Generation Equality, Estonia has taken commitments under the Action Coalition on Technology and Innovation. As a catalytic member of the Compact on Women, Peace and Security we encourage all colleagues to become a signatory to the Compact.
COVID-19 has added to the challenges regarding the protection of children affected by armed conflict. We therefore underline the importance of the renewal of the mandate of the Special Representative of the Secretary General on children and armed conflict. Estonia continues to provide support to UNICEF as well as the Special Representative to support their activities to protect children.
Access to information and freedom of expression, including media freedom is key. On average a journalist is killed for bringing information to the public in every five days. The lack of accountability and impunity of the perpetrators of crimes against journalists and media workers needs to end. We see a highly worrying trend of governments shutting down and restricting access to the Internet in order to silence dissenting voices. As a member of the Freedom Online Coalition and of the Media Freedom Coalition we stress the importance of freedom of expression online and offline. To underline our efforts in this regard, Estonia will organize the next global conference on Media Freedom.
We commend the indispensable role of human rights defenders, who put their life at risk defending others. We are deeply concerned about the continued frequent reprisals against the human rights defenders cooperating with the UN, in particular women human rights defenders. We need to move from documenting reprisals to preventing and responding to these by ensuring full accountability.
Mr Chair,
We reiterate the importance of upholding international humanitarian law and international human rights law in Afghanistan and the responsibility of any future government to uphold human rights, including for women, children and persons belonging to minorities. We underline the need for the full, equal and meaningful participation of women and for the continued monitoring of the human rights situation in Afghanistan.
For more than a year, the human rights situation has been deteriorating at the centre of the European continent, in Belarus. We have reiterated consistently and tirelessly: all political prisoners must be released immediately, all perpetrators of the crimes must be brought to justice and punished, democratic elections must be held. Estonia will organize the Arria formula meeting on 8th of October to discuss the situation in Belarus.
We remain concerned about the grave violations of international law, including extensive violations of human rights in the illegally annexed Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol. Respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity and the prohibition of the use of force are fundamental principles of international law.
We are gravely concerned about the violations and abuses of human rights and the systematic sexual and gender-based violence in the Tigray region of Ethiopia. We underline the importance of the monitoring of these violations as well as full accountability.
Last but not least, without justice for victims, there will not be any real peace in Syria. The UN must act decisively against the widespread and systematic violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law. We need to make use of the mechanisms created since the very beginning of the conflict to improve accountability.
Thank you.
