Human Rights Council to hold 16th special session on 29 April on the situation of human Rights in the Syrian Arab Republic

BACKGROUND RELEASE

27 April 2011

The Human Rights Council will hold a Special Session on Friday, 29 April on “the situation of human rights in the Syrian Arab Republic”. The session will start at 11 a.m. in Salle XX of the Palais des Nations in Geneva.

The Special Session was requested by the United States on behalf of 16 Member States, including Belgium, France, Hungary, Japan, Mexico, Norway, Poland, the Republic of Korea, the Republic of Moldova, Senegal, Slovakia, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and Zambia. A Special Session can be requested if it has the support of at least one third of the 47 Member States of the Council, that is to say 16 Member States.

The request for the Special Session was also supported by the following Observer States: Austria, Australia, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia and Sweden.

This will be the sixteenth Special Session held by the Human Rights Council. The last Special Session was held on 25 February on the situation of human rights in Libya. The Council has also held Special Sessions on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon, Darfur in Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Côte d’Ivoire, as well as on the world food crisis, the world economic and financial crises and in support of the recovery process for Haiti following the earthquake of 12 January 2010.

__________

For use of the information media; not an official record