Third Committee: Social, Humanitarian and Cultural; International cooperation for social development continues to grow, but challenges remain.

The challenges of HIV/AIDS, sustainable development, human rights, organized crime and drug trafficking are not going away. These challenges formed only part of the agenda of the Third Committee.

The Committee recommended 70 resolutions for adoption to the General Assembly, which voted on 24 texts and adopted others unanimously. Many resolutions concerned human rights in specific countries, self-determination issues, globalization and the benefits of development.

A specific resolution, Access to medication in the context of pandemics such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, was voted 181 in favour to 1 against with the United States casting the negative vote. It calls on States to implement national strategies to provide access to comprehensive treatment, care and support for all individuals infected and affected by HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

Tilana Grobbelaar of South Africa, whose country is battling the pandemic, told the UN Chronicle about the changed climate among countries in cooperating in the battle against AIDS: "The way we reach agreements is, in my view, much different this year from the sort of battles we had before the first special session on HIV/AIDS [in June 2001], where the issue of affordability of drugs and treatment was highly opposed. Since 2001, the pharmaceutical industry globally has come around in this process and, therefore. I believe that we reach agreements at a level that is fair and principled."

Much more than AIDS was of concern to the African delegations. In the Committee debate on social development, many spoke about the "dismal development statistics", the failure of the World Trade Organization's conference in Cancun to achieve a "level playing field" in international trade, and the need for greater international assistance in eradicating poverty.

Rene Nsemi of the Democratic Republic of the Congo told the Committee that almost nine years after the World Summit for Social Development, the "initial reasons for its convening remained the same".

Mali continues to rely on agriculture as the driving force for its economic and social development, its representative, Cheick Sidi Diarra, told the Chronicle, adding that more than 70 per cent of the population lives in rural areas, and agriculture makes up 42 per cent of its gross national product. He asked for greater justice and fairness in international trade to promote economic and social development. He said: "We are a cottonproducing country, around 600,000 tonnes every year. But we have the resources to process only 1 per cent of it. We need basic transfer of technology and more investment. We sell only the raw material. What we would like to have is the possibility of foreign investment, to add value to our raw material and for jobs. Especially for our cotton exports, we have mostly western countries which provide subsidies to their producers. The resulting low prices affect Mali negatively and, in that context, it had asked for fairness. In 2002, subsidies cost us some $600 million, or $500 to $600 per Mali farmer. If we can do something about subsidies, it is good for us."

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The Committee also approved without a vote resolutions entitled Strengthening international cooperation in preventing and combating trafficking in persons and protecting victims of such trafficking. (see box on page 24) and Protection of migrants.

Cape Verde's representative, Ana Sapinho Pires, told the Committee that her country was negotiating bilateral agreements with destination countries to ensure that migrant women "fully enjoyed their human rights and justice". Cape Verde's diaspora is one of the largest for a country of its size, and its economy is dependent on remittances from them. In an interview with the Chronicle, she said that Cape Verde tackled its problems at two levels: information campaigns and bilateral agreements. "We explain to Cape Verdians the problem they can have in the reception country, because most of those countries are enforcing their own political [agendas] against their immigrants. So we try to explain to all potential immigrants that they need to have legal documents, and under what conditions to get there".

The Third Committee also passed without a vote the resolution International cooperation against the world drug problem. It urged countries to implement the Action Plan for the Implementation of the Declaration on the Guiding Principles of Drug Demand Reduction, and to counter illicit drug abuse among their population. Diego Simancas of Mexico told the Chronicle: "We spoke about a principle of change in attitude. One can speak of the producing and consuming countries, but actually there can be no accusers or accused. Production has gone up in countries that were traditionally seen as consuming countries, and consumption has gone up in producing countries, particularly synthetics and cannabis. Mexico is a production, transit and consuming country. The practical results of the notion of shared responsibility would be cooperation programmes among all countries involved in the drug trade."

The Committee also noted that the threat posed by the illicit drug problem and transnational organized crime were "twin evils". Therefore, the Committee unanimously recommended a landmark instrument--the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime--which was adopted by the Assembly. The treaty had been designed as the international community's response to the increasing globalization of organized crime. Forty-eight countries have so far ratified the Convention, which obliges them to incorporate the treaty provisions into their domestic laws.

Other resolutions adopted by the Assembly on the recommendation of the Third Committee included action on human rights in the administration of justice, violence against women, respect for national sovereignty and diversity of democratic systems in electoral processes as an important human rights.

An omnibus resolution titled Rights of the child was adopted by 179 in favour to 1, with the United States voting against. It called upon all States to "end impunity for perpetrators of crimes committed against children, and recognize the contribution of the International Criminal Court as a way to prevent violations of such human rights". The resolution also called upon all States to translate into action their commitment to the progressive and effective elimination of child labour, and to criminalize and effectively penalize all forms of sexual exploitation and sexual abuse of children. The Assembly approved another resolution. The right to food, which was adopted by 176 to 1 (United States), with Fiji and Israel abstaining. Noting that there were 840 million people around the world suffering from hunger and malnutrition, the Assembly reaffirmed that "hunger constituted a violation of human dignity". The resolution encourages all States to take steps to achieve the right to food and take action to address discrimination against women where it contributed to the malnutrition of women and girls. The resolution also took note of the Millennium Development Goal of reducing world hunger by half by the year 2015 and called on all international financial and development institutions to reach this goal.

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On 29 January in Brussels, Belgium, Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in accepting the Andrei Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, said: "When refugees cannot seek asylum because of offshore barriers, or are detained for excessive periods in unsatis-factory conditions, or are refused entry because of restrictive interpretations of the [1951 Refugee] Convention, the asylum system is broken and the promise of the Convention is broken."

The Committee recommended to the Assembly a resolution, Human rights and mass exoduses, urging the Secretary-General to continue to give high priority to consolidate and strengthen emergency preparedness and response mechanisms to identify all human rights abuses that contributed to mass exoduses of persons. The Assembly emphasized the responsibility of States and international organizations to cooperate with those countries, particularly developing ones, affected by mass exoduses of refugees and displaced persons. In addition, the Assembly urged States to uphold the civilian and humanitarian character of refugee camps and settlements, through effective measures to prevent the infiltration of armed elements. Another resolution, The right to development, noted that States held primary responsibility for the protection of human rights and for economic and social development. The United States. Israel and Palau voted against, while 173 countries voted in favour, with 5 abstentions (Australia, Canada, Georgia, Japan and Sweden). The resolution also recognized the need for strong partnerships with civil society organizations and the private sector in pursuing development initiatives. In addition, the Assembly recognized the need to address market access for developing countries and stressed the need to adopt measures at the national and global levels to ensure that the process of globalization was "fully inclusive and equitable".

Terrorism was another major aspect of the Committee's work. Two resolutions, Human rights and terrorism and Human rights and unilateral coercive measures, were adopted by a vote. The first, approved by 120 to 42, with 18 abstentions, "condemned the violation of the right to life, liberty and security suffered by victims of indiscriminate acts of violence" and called on countries to strengthen their national legislation to combat terrorism. In an interview with the Chronicle, Abdelouahab Osmane of Algeria, whose country introduced the resolution, said: "The main objective of this draft is to highlight the fact that terrorism, as a threat to peace and security, is a strong and grave violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms and to the most valuable of them, the right to life". Algeria as main co-sponsor (40 of them this year) "deeply regrets that some countries voted against this very important and universal resolution. A reflection should be engaged on the issue of non-state actors: we hope that a consensus could be reached in the future." The second resolution, on unilateral coercive measures, was adopted by a vote of 125 to 53. It urged countries to refrain from adopting any unilateral coercive measures "not in accordance with international law" and the UN Charter.

Human Trafficking

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) says that human trafficking reached "epidemic proportions" during the last decade, fuelled by economic disparity, high unemployment and the disruption of traditional livelihoods. Although the majority of trafficking victims are women, children and men are also affected. The United Nations Children's Fund estimates that cross-border smuggling in Western and Central Africa enslaves over 200,000 children. Unsuspecting parents often "sell" their children, believing they will be looked after, taught a trade and educated. Forced to work as bonded labourers in sweatshops, mines and plantations, trafficked men and children do the "three D-jobs": dirty, difficult and dangerous, says UNODC.

Trafficking is almost always a form of organized crime and traffickers have expanded the geographical scope of their activities into new markets. Humans, like narcotic drugs or weapons, are another commodity of criminal commerce. However, criminals are drawn to trafficking because of the relatively low risks and substantial profits.

The UNODC Global Programme against Trafficking in Human Beings manages a series of projects, among them: a technical cooperation project between the Czech Republic and Poland which aims to give the criminal justice system and civil society ways to combat trafficking and organized crime groups; an initiative in Nigeria, Togo and Benin that focuses on cooperation mechanisms between police, justice and investigation techniques.

Under the resolution approved by the Committee the Assembly asked that trafficking would be fought by strengthened local and national institutions, information campaigns on the techniques and methods of the traffickers, education programmes aimed at potential victims, and concentrating on post-conflict regions where trafficking is increasing.

--Jonas Hagen