WORKSHOP ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND TRANSNATIONAL COMPANIES : OPENING THE WAY TO A LEGALLY BINDING INSTRUMENT
Geneva, 11-12 March 2014
[Exerpt from the Declaration]
The CETIM has been following the debate in the UN on corporate accountability since more than thirty years and it has been doing a lot of research and publications on this matter. We have been witness of the increasing power of transnational corporations and the parallel dismantling and failure of all attempt at the United Nations to seriously monitor and control their activities. The neoliberal era has led to a dramatic increase in the power and rights enjoyed by TNCs while the few obligations and regulations that existed at the international level have been dismantled and are now terribly weak. We are now facing a situation of impunity. Massive human rights violations committed by TNCs remain unpunished, in particular when they occur in developing countries, and the lack of regulation creates systemic economic problems, as has shown the recent crisis.