UN / LATIN AMERICA HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT

Latin America remains the most unequal and most insecure region in the world, the United Nations reported today (12 Nov), calling for inclusive economic growth and enhanced security and justice institutions as the most efficient ways to reduce insecurity. UNTV

• Categories: News & Features / News Stories / Unifeed
• Video Length: 00:02:09
• Production Date: 12 November 2013
• Asset Language: Original
• Subject Topical: HUMAN RIGHTS; CRIMES; CRIMINAL JUSTICE
• Geographic Subject: LATIN AMERICA
• MAMS Id: U131112e

Description

STORY: UN / LATIN AMERICA HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT
TRT: 2.09
SOURCE: UNTV
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH/ NATS

DATELINE: 12 NOVEMBER 2013, NEW YORK CITY

Shotlist

FILE, RECENT, NEW YORK CITY

1. Wide shot, UN Secretariat exterior

12 NOVEMBER 2013, NEW YORK CITY

2. Wide shot, ECOSOC Chamber
3. Med shot, panel
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Helen Clark, UNDP Administrator:
“Levels of violence and crime in the region have climbed. Over the past 25 years the number of robberies in the region has tripled. The WHO has recently referred to the high and in some countries growing homicides rates as reaching epidemic levels.”
5. Med shot, audience
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Heraldo Munoz, Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean of the UNDP:
“Today, the discussion of the citizen security in Latin America is highly politicized. What we are saying is that in each country the government, the opposition, political parties and civil society should think about possibility of arriving at a national agreement for citizen security as a state policy based on ample consensus and consultations that will have measures in short, medium and long term.”
7. Med shot, audience
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Heraldo Munoz, Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean of the UNDP:
“We need to actively safe-guard the rights of victims, regulate and reduce the crime triggers – alcohol, drugs and fire arms, and strengthen the regional coordination. To end, we feel there is no single magical solution for insecurity, only integrated, multidimensional approach that can be sustained through time.”
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Helen Clark, UNDP Administrator:
“Without citizen security, country’s effort to achieve the development objectives can be and often are curtailed or frustrated. The report diagnose the scope and the scale of the region’s citizen security challenges and offers a number of recommendations based on experience of what seem to have worked and what doesn’t on how countries could lift citizen security.”
10. Wide shot, pan left, ECOSOC Chamber

Storyline

Latin America remains the most unequal and most insecure region in the world, the United Nations reported today (12 Nov), calling for inclusive economic growth and enhanced security and justice institutions as the most efficient ways to reduce insecurity.

According to the 2013-2014 Regional Human Development Report, “Citizen Security with a Human Face: evidence and proposals for Latin America”, the region experienced both economic growth and increased crime rates over the past decade, with more than 100,000 murders per year during that time.

While homicide rates stabilized and even fell in some of the countries, the perception of security worsened with robberies hiking threefold in the past 25 years. Helen Clark, the UNDP Administrator added that “in some countries growing homicides rates are reaching epidemic levels”.

The report focuses on six main overlapping threats that negatively impact the region: street crime; violence and crime committed by and against the youth; gender-based violence; corruption (the misappropriation of public property, whose provision is the responsibility of the state); violence committed by state actors and organized crime.

The assessed experiences confirm that protecting the rights to life, to dignity and to physical integrity is essential to citizen security, which, as a public good, is a responsibility of the state, the report highlights.
Among other findings, the report notes that young men are the most affected by crime and violence, and yet are the most common perpetrators.

It also highlights gender violence as a persistent threat and obstacle to human development, public health and human rights in the region.

In addition to the human impact, the insecurity is affecting the region’s economic potential. Without the excess mortality due to homicide, the region’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) would have been 0.5 per cent higher, equivalent to a potential gain of more than $24 billion in 2009.