13th United Nations Forum on Business and Human Rights

Session co-organized by the Working Group on Business and Human Rights, in collaboration with PAX; Quaker United Nations Office; Asser Institute for International and European Law; Global Rights Compliance; Heartland Initiative; American Bar Association Center for Human Rights; and Essex Business and Human Rights Project, University of Essex 

Brief description of the session:
States, manufacturers, investors and advisers all have responsibilities, whether under international law or the UNGPs, to ensure that weapons are not used to commit violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, are otherwise misused or diverted, or supplied to actors subject to international sanctions. Due diligence should also consider any involvement in prohibited or indiscriminate controversial weapons, including nuclear weapons. As the arms industry is increasingly exempted from mandatory human rights due diligence, this session will shed light on other frameworks which, taken together, can contribute to ensuring adequate human rights due diligence, responsible arms trade, and access to remedy for victims.

Key objectives: 

• Ensure that States and businesses are aware of their responsibilities in relation to arms production and trade, regardless of recent exclusions from legislation.
• Identify how States and the arms sector can conduct appropriate (heightened) HRDD with end-use monitoring to prevent, mitigate and remedy human rights or IHL violations and diversion.
• Provide guidance on how investors can minimise their portfolio exposure to risks associated with arms production and trade.

Key questions:

• Beyond export controls, what measures can States take to ensure responsible business conduct in the arms sector?
• How can the defense sector fulfil its responsibility to respect human rights by conducting appropriate HRDD to identify, prevent and mitigate the adverse human rights impacts of its business activities (ranging from the production of indiscriminate controversial weapons to the sale of conventional weapons to high-risk actors)?
• What are the avenues for civil society and victim representatives to achieve accountability for civilian harm caused by irresponsible arms transfers?
• What practical challenges are faced by investors in developing exclusionary screening criteria that address the intrinsic risks associated with controversial arms production and high-risk arms trade, including the emergence of new technologies?
• How can financial sector actors promote the implementation of the UNGPs and other global norms that seek to prevent such harms?

Background to the discussion:
As recognised by the UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights, despite regulatory frameworks, "arms products and services are still exported to States where they are used to commit a wide variety of human rights violations, including potential war crimes and crimes against humanity". Against the backdrop of rising global tensions, investors who seek to avoid portfolio exposure to risks associated with indiscriminate weapons and/or high-risk arms trade are also facing increased calls to financially back the defense sector. The recent exclusion of the arms sector, and large aspects of the financial sector’s activities, from the scope of the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive underscores the need to implement well-established legal and normative frameworks to ensure human rights compliance of states, companies and investors alike.

Background reading:

• UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights. Responsible business conduct in the arms sector: Ensuring business practice in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (2022).
• ESG investment framework for the theme: controversial weapons and the trade in weapons with high-risk countries (2020).

Session co-organized by the Working Group on Business and Human Rights, in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and Southern Voices

Brief description of the session:
The shift from solely voluntary guidelines to a smart mix of measures that includes an enforceable legislative framework based on Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence (HREDD) could have significant positive impact on the business environment and livelihoods of stakeholders across value chains, including farmers, workers, small and medium-sized enterprises that form the foundation of many global value chains. However, this shift does not come without risks. If not implemented in an inclusive way, taking into account the needs and contexts of different value chain stakeholders, HREDD legislation may impose additional burdens and costs in production countries and/or for businesses, potentially leading to the unintentional exclusion of value chain actors or to disengagement. For an inclusive approach, it is vital to foster an ecosystem that embraces the perspectives of all stakeholders, including those from the Global South.
Therefore, the adoption and implementation of HREDD policies and legislation must be accompanied by meaningful support for all actors in the value chain, including stakeholders in supply chains. This includes empowering them to meet higher sustainability standards. It is essential that local knowledge about the development context, as well as the social and economic dynamics in these regions, be incorporated into the implementation process. This means that HREDD should be contextualized to reflect the diverse aspirations, needs and development contexts of all stakeholders throughout the value chain, including knowledge of the regulatory landscape in production countries.

Article 20 of the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) 2024 includes the notion of accompanying measures to make implementation possible in diverse contexts and support companies, stakeholders in supply chains and local producers to conduct meaningful and impactful HREDD. For the directive to be truly effective, it must be implemented in a way that fosters cooperation between buyers, suppliers, and stakeholders in both consumption and production countries.

An inclusive and collaborative approach is essential to ensuring that the directive, as well as other HREDD initiatives, lead to positive outcomes for all value chain actors and to make sure that concerns of potential oversight and invisibilities of critical issues facing the workers and farmers in supply chains are addressed. Open dialogue is crucial to understanding the impact of HREDD legislation on local communities and integrating these insights into policymaking.

Key objectives of the session:
- Strengthening partnerships between value chain actors in consumption and production countries influenced by HREDD legislation.
- Inspiring governments to develop HREDD policies and legislation, by sharing the advantages of HREDD legislation, such as creating level playing fields and competitive advantage of businesses.
- Showcasing EU CSDDD as an example of an enforceable legislative framework related to HREDD, with an implementation process that includes inclusive dialogue, engagement of producer countries and accompanying measures.
- Capturing perspective from the Global South to inform the implementation of HREDD legislation and the development of accompanying support measures.
- Sharing good examples of multistakeholder approaches, partnerships and HREDD activities.
 
 
 

Session co-organized by the Working Group on business and human rights and 7amleh. 

Interpretation in English, French and Spanish 

(Version française ci-jointe)
(Versión en español adjunta)

Brief description of the session: 
From user-facing platforms to humanitarian tools and services, the tech sector, and in particular social media, has an ever-increasing impact on individuals and groups in the most vulnerable situations, including people of African descent and communities of colour. The failure to address the dissemination of hatred that incites discrimination on social media seriously undermines the promise of business and human rights - that is to provide a framework to prevent and remedy abuses by businesses, including tech companies, of internationally recognized human rights. Where online content moderation systems fail to effectively detect such content, it can risk increasing incitement to violence, and can hinder the enjoyment of a variety of human rights online and offline, including the right to life, the right to physical integrity, the right to health, freedom from non-discrimination,. As the Secretary General of the United Nations indicated in the organization’s Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech, hate speech is a menace to democratic values, social stability and peace. 

Regardless of investment and resources, social media companies face specific challenges in their content moderation efforts to mitigate the spread of such harmful content. Electronic communication services, social media platforms and search engines provide an ideal environment for the delivery of a range of narratives, including those that may constitute incitement to discrimination and violence.. Individuals or groups systematically targeted by incitement to violence or discrimination, including racist attacks, are generally left without any effective means of defense, escape or self-protection, and often find themselves in situations of enhanced vulnerability. There is an increasing recognition of the deep impact of such systemic oppressions on mental health. As various studies have shown, harassment alone in comparatively limited environments can expose targeted individuals to extremely elevated and prolonged levels of anxiety, stress, social isolation and depression and significantly increases the risk of suicide, which may amount to psychological torture. Broadly speaking, incitement to discrimination and/or violence, including on the basis of race, not only affects targeted groups of people, but exercises greater influence on society at large, exacerbating divisions,  fractures and strengthening polarization within society. The above-mentioned elements become more meaningful when we consider the rising importance that young people attach to cyberspace, and the latter's potential to influence their choices and values. In this context, this session will explore the potential of collaboration by different stakeholders to ensure a smart mix of measures that leads to a human rights-respecting approach in online content moderation for social media platforms. 

Key objectives of the session: 

• Analyze current initiatives in the context of content moderation in relation to incitement to hatred and discrimination targeting people of African descent and ethnic and racial minorities on social media. 
• Identify good practices and challenges, including a smart mix of measures to protect and respect human rights in the context of social media content moderation. 
• Discuss concrete steps and actions that States, businesses, civil society organizations, and other stakeholders can and should take to implement the UNGPs for social media content moderation, and provide affected individuals and groups with effective access to remedy. 

Key discussion questions: 

• What are the challenges for rights-respecting content moderation, especially in the Global South and in non-English speaking markets?  
• How can social media companies mitigate potential adverse human rights impacts through rights-respecting content moderation and human rights due diligence processes?  

Session co-organized by the Working Group on Business and Human Rights and the Indigenous Caucus 

Interpretation provided in English, Spanish and French.

Brief description of the session: 

Globally, there is rapid increase in the demand for land and its resources. Businesses, including investors, are pursuing large-scale land acquisition for economic projects related to  food, fuel, minerals, renewable energy,  and conservation and more.  However, transparency and participation are often lacking in these acquisition processes, enabled by poor or inexistent accountability mechanisms and legal frameworks to protect the rights holders, in particular Indigenous Peoples.
Indigenous Peoples make up more than 6% of the world’s population and hold an estimated 20% of the Earth’s land mass - one-half to one-third of the collectively-held land globally. However, they have formal legal ownership of less than 10% of this land. As a result, their lands are constantly under threat of unfair and forced acquisition for business investments, often leading to  serious abuses  of Indigenous Peoples '  rights  and those of their  defenders.
This session will engage relevant stakeholders in discussing how land acquisitions have been or should  be integrated into businesses human rights due diligence processes across their value chains. It will also explore the types of smart mix of measures that may help governments protect  Indigenous Peoples’ rights in the context of land acquisition, in particular with regard to the requirement to obtain a  Free, Prior and Informed Consent from the concerned Indigenous Peoples. .
Key objectives of the session:
 

• To contextualize the growing trend of large-scale land acquisition for business activities, and their impacts on Indigenous Peoples ' rights.
• To examine  practices and lessons learned regarding  different measures adopted by governments to protect the rights of Indigenous Peoples in the context of large-scale land acquisition.
• To discuss  what kinds of a smart mix of measures could support the Free, Prior and Informed Consent from Indigenous Peoples with regard to land acquisition.
• To discuss emerging practices from businesses, including investors,  to prevent, mitigate and account for adverse impacts of  land acquisitions on Indigenous Peoples rights, including the right of participation and FPIC.

Session co-organized by the Working Group on Business and Human Rights, IndustriALL, OECD Watch, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) & German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) & German Federal Ministry for Labour and Social Affairs (BMAS)

Interpretation provided in English, Spanish and French.

Brief description of the session: 
The UNGPs emphasize that access to effective remedy for business-related human rights abuses should be enabled through a remedy ecosystem involving complementary State-based judicial mechanisms, State-based non-judicial grievance mechanisms, and non-State-based grievance mechanisms to ensure the best possible outcomes for rightsholders. Guiding Principle 25 lays out that States must take appropriate steps, through judicial, administrative, legislative and other means to ensure that those affected by business-related impacts have access to effective remedies. Furthermore, Guiding Principle 31 sets out the criteria of effectiveness for non-judicial grievance mechanisms to be effective. A key element of effective remedy is the centrality of rights holders and assurance of victims’ own satisfaction with the remedial mechanism and remedy provided.
This session will discuss different types of grievance mechanisms based on experiences from across regions, including state-based and non-state based mechanisms; those based on binding or non-binding regulations; and enforceable and non-enforceable mechanisms. Panelists and the audience will collectively evaluate whether they facilitate effective remedy for victims and reflect on the core strengths of the various approaches.
The session will identify the practices of remedial mechanisms necessary to ensure effective remedy and accountability for corporate impacts. The session will also consider how various paths to remedy can complement each other to give rights holders choice in obtaining a bouquet of remedies suited to the unique circumstances of their case.  

Key objectives of the session:
Provide examples of different grievance mechanisms and cases of successful and unsuccessful remediation to highlight best and less good practice.
Debate whether a smart mix of measures support an effective remedy for victims.
Discuss how the nature of the mechanisms and of outcomes, including in terms of enforceability enable effective remedies for rights holders.
Identify key objective elements needed to ensure victims can access effective remedies, based on practical cases.

Key questions : 
What barriers to effective remedy hinder access through courts and how can these be overcome, including during development of new judicial paths under due diligence and similar legislation?
What elements of internal or cross-company grievance mechanisms are key to ensure victims access to effective remedies?
What benefits can non-judicial grievance mechanisms bring to facilitate access to effective remedies and upon which conditions?
How should companies’ implementation of remedies be enforced and monitored?
What can states do to overcome power imbalances between companies and vulnerable communities seeking remedies?

Background of the discussion:
Binding measures, such as laws, regulations, and judicial processes, can be essential for establishing a strong foundation for accountability, while accountability can also be established by voluntary measures (or grievance mechanisms) in a dialogue-based approach based on binding foundations, or accompanied with sanctions or a rigorous follow up. Indeed, decisions of NHRI, NCP or internal or cross-company grievance mechanisms can bring about significant outcomes for victims in terms of reparation, with victims at the centre. These voluntary mechanisms can be especially important in contexts where legal systems are slow, judicial mechanisms hardly accessible, giving rights holders alternative routes to remedy.

Key background materials
Enhancing the effectiveness of non-State-based grievance mechanisms, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
Enhancing the effectiveness of State-based non-judicial mechanisms, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
Enhancing the effectiveness of judicial mechanisms
Report on access to effective remedy for business-related human rights abuses (A/72/162), UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights