Human Rights

      
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During the devastating 23 year long conflict in their country, thousands of Afghans - men, women and children, were killed, wounded, tortured, lost their friends and relatives, had their houses burned down and their property destroyed or stolen. They have been violently deprived of their most basic rights: right to life, right to education, right to work, right to basic medical care, right to be free from torture and humiliating treatment, right to freely express their opinion, to elect their leaders and to contribute to the improvement of their lives individually and collectively.

In the framework of the Bonn Agreement, the Transitional Authority of Afghanistan committed itself to promote and respect human rights. UNAMA is helping Afghan authorities to achieve that goal.

UNAMA’s work in Human Rights includes:

- Supporting the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, established in the Bonn
  Agreement as the national institution in charge of defining the Human Rights agenda in
  Afghanistan.

- Protection activities, focused in particular on the needs and rights of the most vulnerable segments
  of the population such as returnees, internally displaced persons, women heads of households and
  unaccompanied minors.

- Investigation and monitoring of abuses and violations and recommending corrective actions to the
  Government.

UNAMA Human Rights officers work in Kabul and in the Mission's regional offices in Bamiyan, Gardez, Herat, Jalalabad, Kandahar, Mazar-i-Sharif and Kunduz. They receive complaints from individuals or groups, victims or witnesses of abuses and violations and they investigate them.

UNAMA's investigators will ask many questions, but they will always respect the wish of the victim or complainant: if his or her wish is to maintain the confidentiality of the complaint, no one outside of UNAMA will be informed. If UNAMA is asked to intercede with the authorities to stop the violation, it will do so. UNAMA will also intervene in an ex-oficio capacity with the authorities, the AIHRC or other relevant bodies if it believes that human rights abuses are being carried out.

UNAMA has so far investigated cases of abuses against specific ethnic groups, against NGOs, civil society organizations and political activists, abuses often perpetrated by local commanders against the defenseless civilian population and, in particular, against women.

Considerable attention has been devoted in the recent period to the issue of mass graves in Afghanistan, particularly in the North of the country. UNAMA, together with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva (OHCHR) and the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), will support the forensic investigations of these graves in an impartial and objective way.

UNAMA's human rights teams also monitor the impact of recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction activities on human rights.

What is equally important, UNAMA is helping Afghans develop their own capacity to protect and promote human rights. UNAMA will stay in Afghanistan only a limited period of time. It cannot assume the role that belongs to Afghans: to make their country a better, more peaceful one, able to guarantee security and prosperity to all its citizens, men and women, regardless of their ethnic origin, political affiliation or personal beliefs.

The most important role in promoting human rights in Afghanistan has been assigned to the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission.

The Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission is led by Dr. Sema Samar, a well-known human rights activist. She has ten fellow-Commissioners responsible to carry out the specific aspects of the Afghan National Human Rights Program. This program includes:

- Strengthening the Commission itself: capacitating its staff to investigate human rights, to receive
  and process complaints, to manage a data-base, strengthening the presence of the Commission in
  the country through the opening of satellite regional offices.

- Designing and implementing a program of human rights education.

- Promoting the human rights of women.

- Organizing a nationwide debate on options on transitional justice, which, in simpler words means, a
  debate on how to address the abuses of the past, to achieve peace with justice and to promote
  national reconciliation.

UNAMA supports the Afghan Human Rights Commission in all these activities. A special support-project is being launched to empower the Afghan Human Rights Commission and enable it to fully deploy its capacities throughout the country and respond to the great expectations of the Afghan people. Many donor countries have already announced their willingness to financially contribute to this project.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights - English