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GENEVA / HRC SPECIAL SESSION ISIS
STORY: GENEVA / HRC SPECIAL SESSION ISIS
TRT: 4:49
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 1 SEPTEMBER 2014,GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1. Wide shot, Palais des Nations
2. Wide shot, Human Rights Council, Palais des Nations
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Ms. Flavia Pansieri, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights:
“OHCHR human rights officers in Iraq continue to gather strong evidence that serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law have been committed in areas under the control of ISIL and associated groups. This includes targeted killings, forced conversions, abductions, slavery, sexual and physical abuse and torture, and the besieging of entire communities on the basis of ethnic, religious or sectarian affiliation. Mosques, shrines, churches, and other religious sites and places of cultural significance have also been deliberately destroyed.”
4. Med shot, Iraqi delegate
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Flavia Pansieri, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights:
“In the course of numerous interviews conducted by OHCHR staff in camps for internally displaced, families have reported forced recruitment by ISIL of boys as young as 15. Some of these boys who subsequently managed to escape told their families that they had been positioned on front-lines during military operations, to shield ISIL fighters; others said that they had been forced to donate blood for treatment of injured fighters.”
6. Med shot, Qatar delegate
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Flavia Pansieri, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights:
“On 17 July, ISIL members in Mosul started marking the houses of Christians and Shi’a with "Property of the Islamic State". Families were given an ultimatum to convert, pay a protection tax, leave – after abandoning all their belongings and savings to ISIL fighters – or face execution.”
8. Med shot, EU delegates
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Flavia Pansieri, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights:
“OHCHR has also received reports that in recent months the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and anti-ISIL armed groups have perpetrated violations of human rights and humanitarian law that may amount to war crimes.”
10. Wide shot, Human Rights Council
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Flavia Pansieri, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights:
“The reports we have received reveal acts of inhumanity on an unimaginable scale. I am particularly concerned about the persecution that is taking place. As I have just outlined, several groups in Iraq are intentionally and severely deprived of fundamental rights contrary to international law by reason of their ethnic and religious identity. This is a crime against humanity under international law.”
12. Med shot, Human Rights Council
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Chaloka Beyani, Chairperson of the Coordination Committee of Special Proceedures:
“Verified reports detail that ‘ISIL’ is systematically hunting members of ethnic and religious groups and giving them the ultimatum, “convert or die”.
|14. Med shot, US delegation
15. SOUNDBITE (English) Chaloka Beyani, Chairperson of the Coordination Committee of Special Procedures:
“A rapid assessment must be made of the capacity of Iraqi forces, including Kurdish forces to respond to threats posed by the ISIL and to protect civilians as the highest priority. Where this capacity is lacking, solutions must be found in coordination with the international community and in compliance with international law. The principle of the Responsibility to Protect populations at risk of atrocity crimes falls both on the Iraqi Government and the international community.”
16. Med shot, UK delegation
17. SOUNDBITE (English) Chaloka Beyani, Chairperson of the Coordination Committee of Special Procedures:
“While some of the most horrific reports emerging from Iraq remain to be verified, many of the warning boxes have already been checked. We join our voices to those who have stressed that atrocities by ISIL currently ongoing in Iraq appear to amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity and reveal a risk of genocide. The Special Advisors of the Secretary-General on the prevention of genocide and the responsibility to protect, the CERD as well as other fellow rapporteurs have also pointed to the risk of genocide. Iraq and the international community must realize the potential threat of mass atrocities and must prepare to act accordingly to prevent further grave human rights abuses wherever possible.”
18. Wide shot, Human Rights Council
United Nations said Monday ISIL forces are committing atrocities amounting to crimes against humanity against minorities while Iraqi government forces have executed detainees and shelled civilian areas in acts that may constitute war crimes.
Addressing the Human Rights Council at the start of a special session on the situation in Iraq, UN Human Rights Deputy Chief Flavia Pansieri said that the conflict is having a grave impact on Iraqi civilians, particularly women and children.
She added "the reports we have received reveal acts of inhumanity on an unimaginable scale."
Pansieri noted “several groups in Iraq are intentionally and severely deprived of fundamental rights contrary to international law by reason of their ethnic and religious identity. This is a crime against humanity under international law.”
Referring to Iraqi government forces, she said “OHCHR has also received reports that in recent months the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and anti-ISIL armed groups have perpetrated violations of human rights and humanitarian law that may amount to war crimes.”
Chaloka Beyani, Chairperson of the Coordination Committee of Special Procedures, said “a rapid assessment must be made of the capacity of Iraqi forces, including Kurdish forces to respond to threats posed by the ISIL and to protect civilians as the highest priority. Where this capacity is lacking, solutions must be found in coordination with the international community and in compliance with international law. The principle of the Responsibility to Protect populations at risk of atrocity crimes falls both on the Iraqi Government and the international community.”
He added “while some of the most horrific reports emerging from Iraq remain to be verified, many of the warning boxes have already been checked. We join our voices to those who have stressed that atrocities by ISIL currently ongoing in Iraq appear to amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity and reveal a risk of genocide. The Special Advisors of the Secretary-General on the prevention of genocide and the responsibility to protect, the CERD as well as other fellow rapporteurs have also pointed to the risk of genocide. Iraq and the international community must realize the potential threat of mass atrocities and must prepare to act accordingly to prevent further grave human rights abuses wherever possible.”
Iraq’s government asked the UN’s top human rights body Monday to investigate alleged crimes against civilians committed by the Islamic State group. Diplomats were weighing the request at a daylong special session of the 47-nation Human Rights Council on Iraq and the extremist group.
A draft resolution put forward by Iraq would set up a U.N. fact-finding mission to investigate alleged abuses by the group.
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