Human rights and issues related to terrorist hostage-taking

At its twenty-first session, the Council took note of the preliminary report submitted by the Advisory Committee at its ninth session and decided to grant the Advisory Committee extra time in order to allow it to submit an interim report on the subject at its twenty-second session and the final study at its twenty-fourth session.

At its tenth session, the Advisory Committee discussed a draft final report in view of submitting the final study to the Council at its twenty-fourth session in September 2013 (A/HRC/AC/10/2): Arabic | Chinese | English | French | Russian | Spanish

The final report was submitted to the Council at its twenty-fourth session in September 2013 A/HRC/24/47.

At its twenty-first session, the Council took note of the preliminary report submitted by the Advisory Committee at its ninth session and decided to grant the Advisory Committee extra time in order to allow it to submit an interim report on the subject at its twenty-second session and the final study at its twenty-fourth session.

At its tenth session, the Advisory Committee will discuss a draft final report in view of submitting the final study to the Council at its twenty-fourth session in September 2013.

> Human rights and issues related to terrorist hostage-taking: Draft final report prepared by Wolfgang Stefan Heinz on behalf of the drafting group of the Advisory Committee A/HRC/AC/10/2
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Background:

In its resolution 18/10 entitled “Human rights and issues related to terrorist hostage-taking”, the Human Rights Council requested the Advisory Committee to prepare a study on the topic, paying particular attention to the impact of terrorist hostage-taking and actions taken pursuant thereto, including ransom payments, on the human rights of hostages and of the local communities concerned, and to the role of regional and international cooperation in this field. The Council also requested the Advisory Committee to focus in particular on an assessment of the adequacy of the response contained in existing international human rights instruments to the challenges referred to in the resolution 18/10.

At its eighth session, the Advisory Committee set up a drafting group consisting of Latif Hüseynov (Chair), Wolfgang Stefan Heinz (Rapporteur), Obiora Chinedu Okafor, Shigeki Sakamoto, Ahmer Bilal Soofi and Jean Ziegler. Ms. Cecilia Rachel V. Quisumbing joined the drafting group at the 9th session of the Committee.

At its ninth session, the Advisory Committee took note of the progress report on human rights and issues related to terrorist hostage-taking (A/HRC/AC/9/CRP.1). The Committee agreed to invite all interested stakeholders, including Members States, international organizations, national human rights institutions and non-governmental organizations, to contribute to the study (see the Note Verbale), and requested the drafting group to finalize the study in the light of such contributions and the discussions at the ninth session, and to submit a draft final report to the Committee at its tenth session, with a view to submitting it to the Human Rights Council at its twenty-fourth session.

The note verbale prepared and dispatched by the Advisory Committee; as well as the contributions received may be found at the following links:
Note Verbale
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