Robust accountability key to end cycle of repression against protesters and activists: UN expert

GENEVA (30 June 2023) – In the face of increased repression and serious human rights violations against protesters and activists around the world, victims have been denied justice while perpetrators have benefitted from a lack of accountability for their crimes, a UN expert said this week.

“This is leading to repetition and worsening of such violations,” said Clément Nyaletsossi Voule, UN Special Rapporteur on the right to peaceful assembly and association in his report to the Human Rights Council on Wednesday (28).

“The endemic impunity for serious human rights violations has generated cycles of repression. Time and again, we see that where civic space is threatened, authoritarianism and conflicts ensue,” Voule said.

His report found that hundreds of people have faced life changing injuries and disabilities due to the misuse or abuse of so-called “less-lethal weapons” in the context of assemblies. They are urgently in need of reparations.

Voule highlighted a widespread lack of political will to ensure accountability for serious abuses against activists and protesters, with many States resorting to a policy of negation, misusing ambiguous and restrictive laws to justify an excessive use of force, punish, criminalise and detain victims. He also shed light on States obstructing accountability or evading responsibility for crimes against protesters and activists, including by undermining the independence of national criminal justice systems. “By contrast, States have focused on investigating, prosecuting and sentencing activists and protesters,” the expert said.

“It is the responsibility of States to take into account the different needs of victims, to repair harm done and ensure non-recurrence. Reparations must not be used as another means to evade accountability and must be provided on top of legal prosecutions, not in lieu of them,” Voule said.

While the report recognises the primary role of States to bring perpetrators of abuses to account, the Special Rapporteur urged the international community to put accountability at the center of its efforts to protect and promote the rights to peaceful assembly and of association: “I call on Member States to respond in a timely and pre-emptive manner to serious abuses against activists and protesters by upholding international human rights standards,” the expert said.

Voule also presented three other reports to the Human Rights Council, including a follow-up to his June 2022 report on the impact of restricting civil society access to resources; a report emphasising the importance of protecting the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association for all workers, including those in the informal economy; and a report on his official visit to Brazil in 2022.