Human Rights and Gender Equality
One of the greatest achievements of the United Nations has been the creation of a comprehensive body of human rights law which defines a broad range of internationally accepted rights and established human rights mechanisms to promote and protect these rights and assist governments in carrying out their responsibilities under international human rights law.
Since the United Nations Charter (1945) and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), human rights law has expanded to encompass specific standards for women, children, persons with disabilities, minorities, migrant workers and other vulnerable groups. This body of law aims to secure their rights and protect them from discriminatory practices.
The UN supports the state to meet its obligations to promote, protect and fulfill the human rights of all. UN agencies in the country integrate human rights and gender equality norms into all of their work.
UN agencies in FYR Macedonia support national counterparts in promoting human rights and gender equality mechanisms and ensuring the effective protection and enforcement systems at national level.
In addition to the individual work of UN agencies in the country, the UN system ensures coordination, enhanced information exchange, as well as joint planning and decision-making through the UN Human Rights and Gender Theme Group.
The Group leads efforts to mainstream gender across the UN’s work. As the UN works towards reaching the three goals of the UN Development Assistance Framework, the group also ensures the application of the human rights based approach in all work. In particular, the group
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ensures that human rights approaches and gender equality are applied throughout UN programmes
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provides advice and support on international standards and mechanisms for human rights and gender equality to government and civil society
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Advocates for human rights and gender equality
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promotes dialogue and cooperation between stakeholders to support the respect, protection and fulfillment of human rights and gender equality commitments in the country
Publications and Resources
The Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights: Publications
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/PublicationsResources/Pages/Publications.aspx
The Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights: Library
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Library/Pages/Index.aspx
Universal Human Rights Index: Research Tools
http://www.universalhumanrightsindex.org/
Finding UN Human Rights Documents
Additional Sources for Human Rights Research
A Toolkit: Gender Mainstreaming in Practice
Asylum Levels and Trends in Industrialized Countries 2010
Asylum Levels and Trends in Industrialized Countries First Half 2011
UN Documents and resources in national languages
Info Corner
NEW!!! Call for proposals for the ACT Project (Assisting Communities Together).
The ACT Project makes available small grants to grass-roots civil society organisations to carry out human rights education activities at the community level. In this 8th round, the ACT Project will award three grants of up to US$ 7,000 each to support projects focusing on DISCRIMINATION with focus on PARTICIPATION OF YOUNG MEN AND WOMEN IN POLITICAL AND PUBLIC LIFE. Projects should last 6 months and be implemented before March 2013.
The deadline for applications is 15 June 2012.
For more info: http://www.un.org.mk/files/news/media-releases/ACT_8_CALL_FOR_PROPOSALS.pdf
To download the application form: http://www.un.org.mk/files/news/media-releases/ACT7_ApplicationEN.doc
NEW!!! United Nations Voluntary Fund on Contemporary Forms of Slavery opened the 2013 call for applications.
The Fund allocates grants of maximum US$15,000 for civil society projects aiming to provide humanitarian, legal and financial assistance to individuals whose human rights have been severely violated as a result of contemporary forms of slavery (chattel slavery, serfdom, forced labour, debt bondage, the worst forms of child labour including children in armed conflict, forced and early marriage, sale of wives, widow inheritance, trafficking in persons, sexual slavery, and sale of children).
Deadline for submission is 31 May 2012.
Application Guidelines: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Slavery/Pages/SlaveryFundMain.aspx
Follow up to UNDEF call for proposals
UNDEF informs that because of the large number of proposals (2,868) the assessment will take until mid 2012 and will be highly rigorous and competitive. For the criteria and more details: http://www.un.org/democracyfund/Docs/UU13.pdf
The state reports to UN treaty and regional human rights bodies
http://www.mfa.gov.mk/default1.aspx?ItemID=266
Some of the core treaties
http://www.justice.gov.mk/multilaterala/
UN Partner Agencies
