UN Human Rights Council renews mandate of Commission on Human Rights on Syria
Mar 25, 2021
Geneva [Switzerland], March 25, : The United States co-sponsored a resolution led by the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Jordan, Kuwait, Netherlands, Qatar, and Turkey that highlighted ongoing atrocities by the Assad regime in Syria and renewed the mandate of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria (COI).
The UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) on Wednesday (local time) renewed the mandate of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria (COI) at the 46th Session of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC).
"The United States successfully advocated to include a request for OHCHR to resume a civilian casualty count. Given that the 46th session of the HRC coincided with the 10th anniversary of the peaceful Syrian uprising, the United States reaffirmed the need for accountability, the release of those arbitrarily detained by the regime, and a political resolution to the conflict," the official statement said.
The United States said it stands with Syrian survivors of the Assad regime's crimes and "will continue to strongly support Syrian human rights defenders, the COI, the International Impartial Independent Mechanism for Syria, and other UN mechanisms and agencies as they document the regime's egregious abuses."
The 46th Session of UNHRC held keeping in mind the human rights struggle, particularly in addressing systemic racism, galvanizing more than 155 members of the international community to join The UN Human Rights Council and help to acknowledge and denounce the dehumanizing legacy of racial discrimination.
The US also advanced responses to dire human rights situations through resolutions, joint statements, and interventions in; Belarus, Burma, Burundi, Egypt, Eritrea, Iran, Nicaragua, North Korea, Russia, Sri Lanka, Syria, Venezuela, South Sudan, and Yemen.
The ongoing civil war in Syria, started in 2011, after violence flared in the city of Daraa, on objectionable political graffiti. The UN envoy for Syria reported an estimate of 400,000 Syrians who were killed in the first year of the war. The violence rapidly escalated and the country descended into a civil war which is continuing for ten years now.
As of January 2021, 13.4 million people inside Syria were in need of some form of humanitarian assistance, including 6 million in acute need, according to the UN.
