GENEVA – The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) carried out final discussions of its 35th session in Geneva, Switzerland, on June 22-23, adopting 36 resolutions and a presidential statement, including a draft resolution on climate change and human rights co-created by Việt Nam.

This year’s resolution on climate change, co-created by Việt Nam, the Philippines and Bangladesh, focuses on climate change’s impacts on migrants’ enjoyment of their rights and on cross-border migration. It calls on countries to issue climate change response policies which are in line with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

In the resolution, the UNHRC decides to organise a discussion on “human rights, climate change, migrants and persons displaced across international borders” to contribute to the intergovernmental process leading to the Global Compact on safe, orderly and regular migration in December 2017. It also asks the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to consider this theme and report to the UNHRC’s 37th session.

Aside from the three co-creating countries, the resolution was also co-sponsored by nearly 50 other countries.

Other resolutions approved by the UNHRC included those relating to the prevention of discrimination and the eradication of violence against women and girls, the right to education, youth and human rights, and migrants.

At the 35th session, Ambassador Dương Chí Dũng, head of Việt Nam’s permanent delegation to the UN, the WTO and other international organisations in Geneva, and other members of the Vietnamese delegation had many speeches at discussions on different issues.

They stressed that the UNHRC needs to work harder to promote dialogue and constructive cooperation while persisting in seeking balanced and satisfactory solutions to disputes.

The Vietnamese delegation also engaged in many common speeches of ASEAN, Francophone countries and other countries with the same viewpoints at discussions on issues of shared concern.

At this session, Việt Nam co-sponsored the resolutions on the contribution of development to the enjoyment of all human rights, and on the eradication of discrimination against persons affected by leprosy and their family members.

It also worked with Australia, Germany, Madagascar and Fiji to successfully organise a fringe event on promoting and protecting coastal women’s rights amid climate change. The function drew more than 50 representatives of countries, UN agencies and non-governmental organisations.

The next session of the UNHRD is scheduled to be held in Geneva in September 2017. — VNS