New Tools Expand Access to Inter-American Human Rights Doctrine

Last month, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) formally announced the availability of a new online database of its decisions and other documents. [IACHR Press Release: Repository] The database, hosted by the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS), is the first such tool created with the IACHR’s involvement. The new site adds to a list of recent efforts by the IACHR

Read more

Human Rights Day 2020

On this day in 1948, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, recognizing the inherent dignity and fundamental rights of all human beings. In May of that year, the countries of the Americas adopted a similar text, the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man. Both instruments reflect an understanding that life lacks

Read more
civil society meets with IACHR

New Report: Civil Society Access to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights

The International Justice Resource Center (IJRC) has published its second report in an ongoing series examining the barriers to civil society’s engagement with supranational human rights oversight bodies. See IJRC, Civil Society Access to International Oversight Bodies: Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (2019). This edition analyzes the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), a principal autonomous organ of the Organization

Read more

Forced Sterilization as a Human Rights Violation: Recent Developments

In recent years, international advocacy has contributed to increased awareness of forced sterilization as a human rights violation, including as a result of our work at the International Justice Resource Center (IJRC). Around the world, healthcare providers and others continue to sterilize people without their informed consent, most often targeting those who are Indigenous, living with HIV, are persons with

Read more

Human Rights Day 2018: Universal Declaration of Human Rights at 70

Today marks the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the seminal proclamation adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 10, 1948. See UN General Assembly, Resolution 217 A(III), Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 10 December 1948. The UDHR’s adoption followed that of the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man, making it

Read more

IACHR Holds Colombia Responsible for Unsolved Killing of Human Rights Defender

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) recently published its merits report in a case concerning the 1988 extrajudicial killing of Colombian human rights defender Valentín Basto Calderón, which has gone unsolved. See IACHR, Merits Report No. 45/17, Case 10.455, Valentín Basto Calderón et al. (Colombia), 25 May 2017. Bystanders Pedro Vicente Camargo, who was also killed, and his daughter

Read more