1059 Results
Quotes
Quotes based on international documents, law, and treaties- "Online intermediaries and digital media should implement the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and conduct due diligence to ensure that their products, policies and practices, including in the areas of collection of private data and microtargeting of messages, do not interfere with human rights."
- "Digital actors should, as relevant, be transparent about the use and any practical impact of any automated tools they use, albeit not necessarily the specific coding by which those tools operate, including inasmuch as those tools affect data harvesting, targeted advertising, and the sharing, ranking and/or removal of content, especially election-related content."
- "The Committee reaffirms that a person’s status as a person with a disability or the existence of an impairment (including a physical or sensory impairment) must never be grounds for denying legal capacity or any of the rights provided for in article 12. All practices that in purpose or effect violate article 12 must be abolished in order to ensure that full legal capacity is restored to persons with disabilities on an equal basis with others."
- "States parties must refrain from denying persons with disabilities their legal capacity and must, rather, provide persons with disabilities access to the support necessary to enable them to make decisions that have legal effect."
- "In its concluding observations on States parties’ initial reports, in relation to article 12, the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has repeatedly stated that States parties must “review the laws allowing for guardianship and trusteeship, and take action to develop laws and policies to replace regimes of substitute decision-making by supported decision-making, which respects the person’s autonomy, will and preferences”."
- "In order to fully realize the equal recognition of legal capacity in all aspects of life, it is important to recognize the legal capacity of persons with disabilities in public and political life (art. 29). This means that a person’s decision-making ability cannot be a justification for any exclusion of persons with disabilities from exercising their political rights, including the right to vote, the right to stand for election and the right to serve as a member of a jury."
- "The Committee further recommends that States parties guarantee the right of persons with disabilities to stand for election, to hold office effectively and to perform all public functions at all levels of government, with reasonable accommodation and support, where desired, in the exercise of their legal capacity."
- "States have a positive duty to facilitate and protect the exercise of the right to freedom of peaceful assembly. This duty should be reflected in the legislative framework and relevant law enforcement regulations and practices. It includes a duty to facilitate assemblies at the organizer’s preferred location and within ‘sight and sound’ of the intended audience. The duty to protect also involves the protection of assembly organizers and participants from third party individuals or groups who seek to undermine their right to freedom of peaceful assembly."
- "Law enforcement agencies should adopt a human rights-based approach to all aspects of the planning, preparation and policing of assemblies. This means they take into consideration their duty to facilitate and protect the right to freedom of peaceful assembly."
- "Force should only be applied to the minimum extent necessary, following to the principles of restraint, proportionality, minimization of damage and the preservation of life."
- "Those seeking to exercise the right to freedom of peaceful assembly should have recourse to a prompt and effective remedy against decisions disproportionately, arbitrarily or illegally restricting or prohibiting assemblies."
- "States should ensure accessibility and provision of reasonable accommodation."
- "Force must not be used unless strictly unavoidable, and where employed must be limited in accordance with the requirements imposed by international human rights law, including international norms and standards on the use of force."
- "Individuals must be free to participate in shaping decisions that will effect them and in policy formation during times of crisis as at other times; public participation is crucial to surmount any crisis, and civil society must be regarded as an essential partner of governments in this endeavor."
- "States have a positive obligation to promote the right to freedom of peaceful assembly. This requires States not merely to refrain from interfering with assemblies, but also to take positive steps to enable individuals to express their views, including through protecting assemblies from attacks by third parties and by otherwise facilitating the ability for the right to freedom of assembly to be exercised."
- "Participants in assemblies must have clear and effective avenues to bring legal action against authorities where their right to freedom of peaceful assembly is infringed, including in cases involving the illegitimate banning or imposing of restrictions on assemblies; violence or retaliations against assembly participants, their family members, journalists or observers; mass surveillance; harassment; and public defamation and smear campaigns."
- "The Security Council, (...) 3. Encourages Member States to increase their funding on women, peace and security including through more aid in conflict and post-conflict situations for programmes that further gender equality and women’s empowerment, as well as through support to civil society, and to support countries in armed conflict and post-conflict situations, including through capacity-building, in their implementation of women, peace and security resolutions (...)."
- "The General Assembly, (…) 8. Calls upon all States to enhance the political participation of women, accelerate the achievement of equality between men and women and, in all situations, promote and protect the human rights of women with respect to voting in elections and public referendums and being eligible for election to publicly elected bodies on equal terms with men."
- "The General Assembly, (…) 17. Reiterates the role of civil society and the importance of its active engagement in the promotion of democratization, and invites Member States to facilitate the full participation of civil society in electoral processes."
- "(b) Refrain from engaging in violence against women and exercise due diligence to prevent, investigate and, in accordance with national legislation, punish acts of violence against women, whether those acts are perpetrated by the State or by private persons."
- "By Governments: (a) Commit themselves to establishing the goal of gender balance in governmental bodies and committees, as well as in public administrative entities, and in the judiciary, including, inter alia, setting specific targets and implementing measures to substantially increase the number of women with a view to achieving equal representation of women and men, if necessary through positive action, in all governmental and public administration positions."
- "By Governments: (…) (b) Take measures, including, where appropriate, in electoral systems that encourage political parties to integrate women in elective and nonelective public positions in the same proportion and at the same levels as men; (c) Protect and promote the equal rights of women and men to engage in political activities and to freedom of association, including membership in political parties and trade unions."
- "By Governments: (…) (e) Monitor and evaluate progress in the representation of women through the regular collection, analysis and dissemination of quantitative and qualitative data on women and men at all levels in various decision-making positions in the public and private sectors, and disseminate data on the number of women and men employed at various levels in governments on a yearly basis (...). "
- "Female journalists and other female media actors face specific gender-related dangers, including sexist, misogynist and degrading abuse; threats; intimidation; harassment and sexual aggression and violence. These violations are increasingly taking place online. There is a need for urgent, resolute and systemic responses."
- "Online harassment, threats, abuse and violations of digital security tend to target female journalists and other female media actors in particular, which calls for gender-specific responses."
- "Although there are limitations to the right of association, such limitations must be construed strictly, and only convincing and compelling reasons can justify limitations on freedom of association. Limits must be prescribed by law, necessary in a democratic society, and proportional in measure."
- "Political pluralism is critical to ensuring effective democratic governance and providing citizens with a genuine opportunity to choose how they will be governed. Legislation regarding political parties should promote pluralism as a means of guaranteeing participation by all persons and groups, including minorities, in public life, which should also allow for the expression of opposition viewpoints and for democratic transitions of power."
- "Therefore, taking also into account the recommendation of the Parliamentary Assembly that the restrictions at present authorised by Article 16 with respect to political activity by aliens are excluded144 , the Commission and the OSCE/ODIHR take the view that only the possibility of aliens to establish political parties can be restricted under Article 16. Nevertheless, the latter provision should not be applied in order to restrict the membership of aliens to political parties."
- "Political parties can for instance introduce provisions in their statutes to promote gender equality. These could include, for example, a minimum representation of each sex or women’s sections in decision-making structures, electoral lists, nominations and appointments."
- "Measures to help promote adequate national minority representation might include reserving a set number of parliamentary seats for specific minorities, waiving the threshold for the number of votes received so that parties representing national minorities may be represented in parliament and the provision of electoral material, including ballot papers, as well as voter education and campaign materials in minority languages."
- "Countries with an electoral system based on proportional representation and party lists may introduce temporary special measures that would promote not only a high proportion of women candidates, but also a rank-order rule, such as a "zipper" system, where male and female candidates alternate, or where one of every three candidates through the list is from the less represented gender. Rank-order rules of this type remove the risk that women will be placed too low on party lists to have a genuine chance of being elected. It is also advisable to promote that if a female candidate withdraws her candidature, she is replaced with another woman."
- "Countries with a majoritarian electoral system are recommended to introduce provisions that promote systems whereby each party chooses a candidate from among at least one female and one male nominee in each district, or to find other ways to promote increased representation of women in elected politics. "
- "EMBs are well-placed to ensure that the data they collect are disaggregated by sex. This data allow an EMB to identify any gender gaps in registration, turnout or staffing levels and where such gaps are identified, to monitor any progress in closing them. Ensuring that any data collected are sex-disaggregated may require legislative reform or changes to electoral regulations."
- "EMBs can consider different initiatives to target women specifically, such as through women-only registration centres or queues, mobile registration and providing information on the requirement to enrol and gender training for registration staff."
- "Violence against women in elections is an increasingly apparent trend that requires a concerted response from EMBs, often in partnership with other stakeholders, including the security sector, political parties and CSOs. (...) EMBs can act to mitigate VAWE [violence against women in elections] on election day itself. Operational decisions, including the location, staffing and layout of polling stations, impact the perception of VAWE risks. Women voters are significantly more likely to be victims of polling day violence than men and violence against women voters occurs most frequently in rural settings."
- "Reserved seats can be used to ensure the representation of specific minority groups in the legislature."
- "International election observation has the potential to enhance the integrity of election processes, by deterring and exposing irregularities and fraud and by providing recommendations for improving electoral processes."
- "An international election observation mission therefore should not be organized unless the country holding the election takes the following actions: (…) b. Guarantees unimpeded access of the international election observer mission to all stages of the election process and all election technologies, including electronic technologies and the certification processes for electronic voting and other technologies, without requiring election observation missions to enter into confidentiality or other nondisclosure agreements concerning technologies or election processes, and recognizes that international election observation missions may not certify technologies as acceptable."
- "An international election observation mission therefore should not be organized unless the country holding the election takes the following actions: (…) c. Guarantees unimpeded access to all persons concerned with election processes, including: i electoral officials at all levels, upon reasonable requests, ii members of legislative bodies and government and security officials whose functions are relevant to organizing genuine democratic elections, iii all of the political parties, organizations and persons that have sought to compete in the elections (including those that qualified, those that were disqualified and those that withdrew from participating) and those that abstained from participating, iv news media personnel, and v all organizations and persons that are interested in achieving genuine democratic elections in the country."
- "An international election observation mission therefore should not be organized unless the country holding the election takes the following actions: (…) d. Guarantees freedom of movement around the country for all members of the international election observer mission."
- "An international election observation mission therefore should not be organized unless the country holding the election takes the following actions: (…) e. Guarantees the international election observer mission’s freedom to issue without interference public statements and reports concerning its findings and recommendations about election related processes and developments."
- "An international election observation mission therefore should not be organized unless the country holding the election takes the following actions: (…) f. Guarantees that no governmental, security or electoral authority will interfere in the selection of individual observers or other members of the international election observation mission or attempt to limit its numbers."
- "Citizens have an internationally recognized right to associate and a right to participate in governmental and public affairs in their country. These rights may be exercised through nongovernmental organizations monitoring all processes related to elections and observing procedures, including among other things the functioning of electronic and other electoral technologies inside polling stations, counting centers and other electoral facilities, as well as the transport of ballots and other sensitive materials. International election observation missions should evaluate and report on whether domestic nonpartisan election monitoring and observation organizations are able, on a nondiscriminatory basis, to conduct their activities without undue restrictions or interference."
- "Non-partisan observation and monitoring of elections by citizen organizations is part of participating in public affairs, which “relates to legislative, executive and administrative powers” and “covers all aspects of public administration, and the formulation and implementation of policy….”(UNHRC General Comment 25, paragraph 5.) Non-partisan election observation and monitoring by citizen organizations exercises the right of association that is central to the functioning of nongovernmental organizations, as well as the right to seek, receive and impart information that is vital to transparency and is included in the freedom of expression protected by articles 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the ICCPR."
- "Non-partisan election observation and monitoring by citizen organizations is the mobilization of citizens in a politically neutral, impartial and non-discriminatory manner to exercise their right of participation in public affairs by witnessing and reporting on electoral developments through: independent, systematic and comprehensive evaluation of legal frameworks, institutions, processes and the political environment related to elections; impartial, accurate and timely analysis of findings; the characterization of the findings based on the highest ethical standards for impartiality and accuracy; the offering of appropriate recommendations for obtaining genuine democratic elections; and advocating for improvements in legal frameworks for elections, their implementation through electoral related administration and removal of impediments to full citizen participation in electoral and political processes."
- "The lack of adequate security for deployment of observers/monitors or not being provided accreditation and access to electoral facilities or other factors may prevent systematic scrutiny of election processes."
- "Article 29 does not provide for any reasonable restriction or exception for any group of persons with disabilities. Therefore, an exclusion of the right to vote on the basis of a perceived or actual psychosocial or intellectual disability, including a restriction pursuant to an individualized assessment, constitutes discrimination on the basis of disability, within the meaning of article 2 of the Convention."
- "Accordingly, the Committee concludes that article XXIII, paragraph 6, of the Fundamental Law, which allows courts to deprive persons with intellectual disability of their right to vote and to be elected, is in breach of article 29 of the Convention, as is article 26, paragraph 2, of the Transitional Provisions of the Fundamental Law."
- "Accordingly, the Committee is of the view that, by depriving the authors of their right to vote, based on a perceived or actual intellectual disability, the State party has failed to comply with its obligations under article 29 of the Convention, read alone and in conjunction with article 12 of the Convention."
- "In general: the State party is under an obligation to take measures to prevent similar violations in the future, including by: (…) (ii) Enacting laws that recognize, without any “capacity assessment”, the right to vote for all persons with disabilities, including those with more need of support, and that provide for adequate assistance and reasonable accommodation in order for persons with disabilities to be able to exercise their political rights."