Local Government

At its twenty-fourth session, Council adopted resolution 24/2 A/HRC/RES/24/2 - العربية | 中文 | English | Français | русский | Español on local government and human rights, in which it took note of the research proposals made by the Advisory Committee in August 2012 (A/HRC/AC/9/6), which included a research proposal on local government and human rights, presented to the Human Rights Council for its consideration and approval in accordance with its functions as described in paragraphs 75 to 78 of the annex to Council resolution 5/, and requests the Advisory Committee to:

1. to prepare, from within existing resources, a research-based report on the role of local government in the promotion and protection of human rights, including human rights mainstreaming in local administration and public services, with a view to compiling best practices and main challenges, and to present a progress report on the requested research-based report to the 27th session of the Council (September 2014); and

2. seek the views and inputs of Member States, relevant international and regional organizations, the OHCHR and relevant special procedures, as well as national human rights institutions and non-governmental organizations, in order to prepare the above-mentioned research-based report.

The resolution also encourages the Advisory Committee, when elaborating the above-mentioned report, to take into account, as appropriate, the recommendations made by the human rights treaty bodies, at the universal periodic review and by the special procedures, as well as the work done on the issue by relevant United Nations agencies, funds and programmes within their respective mandates.

At its twelfth session in February 2014, the Committee established a drafting group tasked with the drafting of the report and designated the following experts as members of the drafting group: Mr. Coriolano, Ms. Elsadda, Mr. Hüseynov (Rapporteur), Ms. Reyes Prado, Mr. Seetulsingh (Chairperson) and Mr. Yigezu.

The Committee also requested the drafting group to submit a draft progress report to the Advisory Committee, after circulating it to all members of the Advisory Committee for approval electronically, before the thirteenth session of the Committee, with a view to its submission to the Council at its twenty-seventh session, taking into account the replies to the questionnaire distributed after the discussion at the twelfth session of the Committee.

At its thirteenth session in August 2014, the Committee took note of the draft report prepared by Mr Hüseynov and approved it as progress report, which was submitted to the twenty-seventh session of the Human Rights Council (A/HRC/27/59). The Committee also recommended that the Council request it to submit a final report to the Council at its thirtieth session. Ms. Pabel subsequently joined the drafting group and was designated to replace Mr Seetulsingh as Chairperson of the drafting group and Ms. El Sadda was designated to replace Mr Hüseynov as rapporteur for this study.

At its twenty-seventh session in September 2014, the Council adopted resolution 27/4 (A/HRC/RES/27/4), which took note with appreciation of the Committee’s progress report and requested the Advisory Committee to continue its research and to submit a final report on the role of local government in the promotion and protection of human rights to the Human Rights Council at its thirtieth session (September 2015). The Council also requested the Committee, when elaborating the final report, to include therein the main challenges faced by local governments in the promotion and protection of human rights, and to make recommendations on tackling those challenges based on best practices in human rights mainstreaming in local administration and public services..

In line with Council resolution 24/2, requesting the Committee to seek the views and inputs of different stakeholders, the following questionnaires were prepared and disseminated by the Committee in March 2014 to Governments, local authorities, international and regional organizations, intergovernmental organizations, national human rights institutions and civil society organizations: