Human Rights are Under Assault Globally, Says UN Secretary General

AFP

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres delivers a speech at the opening of the 61st session of the UN Human Rights Council.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned on Monday that human rights are under assault across the globe.

The UN Human Rights Council opened its sixty-first regular session in Geneva on Monday, hearing statements from the President of the General Assembly, the United Nations Secretary-General, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the Head of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs of Switzerland. 

António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General, said, during his address at the event, "human rights were under a full-scale attack around the world. When human rights fell, everything else tumbled."

"The rule of law is being outmuscled by the rule of force," he added.

"Around the world, human rights are being pushed back deliberately, strategically, and sometimes proudly," Guterres said.

"Humanitarian needs are exploding while funding collapses," Guterres said.

Guterres recalled that, in his first address to the Council as Secretary-General, he spoke of his deep personal commitment to human rights. 

He said, growing up under the Salazar dictatorship taught him that the denial of human rights corroded every aspect of society and that working for the United Nations had shown him how respect for human rights brought out the best in humanity.

In his final address to the Human Rights Council, Guterres appealed to the international community to not let the erosion of human rights become the accepted price of political expediency or geopolitical competition, and to not let power write a new rulebook in which the vulnerable had no rights and the powerful had no limits.

The UN human rights chief, Volker Turk, told the Council that the world faces the most intense competition for power and resources since World War Two, amid widespread rights violations.

The UN human rights chief has said his office is in "survival mode" due to funding cuts that have come alongside pressure on UN experts and U.S. disengagement.

The UN says funding shortages have prevented two investigations launched in 2025 - an inquiry into potential war crimes in Democratic Republic of Congo and a investigation into abuses in Afghanistan - from becoming operational.



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