The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is mandated to promote and protect the enjoyment and full realization, by all people, of all rights established in the Charter of the United Nations and in international human rights laws and treaties.
Established: 1993
Website: http://www.ohchr.org/
The Office's priorities are set out in two key strategic documents:
A - The OHCHR Plan of Action and the Strategic Management Plan, a document released on a 2 year basis at its forth edition.
The OHCHR Management Plan (OMP) 2012-2013 articulates OHCHR’s overall direction in implementing the human rights mandate of the United Nations, and in particular, to implement the human rights section of the Secretary-General’s Strategic Framework.
In keeping with results-based management, OHCHR has translated its mandate into eleven identifiable changes, broad and not time-bound:
Global Expected Accomplishments:
1. Increased compliance with international human rights standards by all States entities, including national human rights institutions and the judiciary, as well as by domestic laws, policies and programmes.
2. Increased ratification of international and regional human rights instruments and review of reservations of international human rights instruments.
3. Justice and accountability mechanisms established and functioning in compliance with international human rights standards to monitor, investigate and redress civil and political as well as economic, social and cultural human rights violations.
4. Increased number of measures taken to improve access of discriminated groups and particularly women, to justice and basic services.
5. Rights-holders, specially discriminated groups and particularly women, increasingly use existing national protection systems and participate in decision-making processes and the development and monitoring of public policies.
6. Increased compliance and engagement by States with UN human rights mechanisms and bodies (treaty bodies, special procedures, Human Rights Council/Universal Periodic Review).
7. Increased number and diversity of rights-holders and national human rights institutions and civil society actors acting on their behalf making use of UN and regional human rights mechanisms and bodies.
8. International and regional human rights law and institutions progressively strengthened and/or developed.
9. Enhanced coherence and consistency of UN human rights mechanisms and bodies.
10. International community increasingly responsive to critical human rights situations and issues.
11. Increased integration of human rights standards and principles, including the right to development, into UN system policies and programmes with respect to development, humanitarian action, peace and security and economic and social issues.
B - The Thematic Expected Accomplishments specify the thematic areas in which the Office intends to produce results in a specific planning cycle.
For the biennium 2012 – 2013 OHCHR sharpened the focus on the following thematic priorities:
• Countering discrimination, in particular racial discrimination, discrimination on the grounds of sex, religion and against others who are marginalized.
• Combating impunity, and strengthening accountability, the rule of law, and democratic society.
• Pursuing economic, social and cultural rights and combating inequalities and poverty, including in the context of the economic, food and climate crises.
• Protecting human rights in the context of migration.
• Protecting human rights in situations of conflict, violence and insecurity.
• Strengthening international human rights mechanisms and the progressive development of international human rights law.