On June 19th, the 53rd Human Rights Council session was opened at the Palais des Nations in Geneva. This session, as noted by High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, marks the 75th year since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Türk’s opening remarks began with a call to international cooperation – more specifically, for States’ cooperation with the UN’s special procedures in order to enact positive change and improve global human rights conditions. Other aims included an increased budget for UN treaty bodies as well as an official office of human rights to be implemented in every country, to better allow states to learn from each other. The Council also stressed the need for these offices to be gender balanced.

The session’s thematic discussion was dedicated to the deteriorating human rights situation in Afghanistan, specifically for women and girls, which is now being referred to by many activists as “gender apartheid”. For example, among other human rights violations to which they have been subjected, women in Afghanistan are no longer allowed to attend university. Official statements on the crisis were given by the president of the Working Group on discrimination against women and girls, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, and several Afghan human rights defenders, among others. 57 countries and 10 NGOs also delivered oral statements on the crisis, all reiterating their commitment to working towards a peaceful solution which returns empowerment to Afghan women. This is just one among many urgent human rights issues which will be addressed by council in the coming weeks.