«Il n‘y a pas un monde développé et un monde sous-développé, mais un seul monde mal développé»
Transnational corporations (TNCs) have become major and powerful actors.
The activities of transnational corporations are a source of multiple human rights violations
In many cases, especially when victims are from the Global South, impunity prevails. TNCs are indeed able to evade national jurisdictions because of the unprecedented economic, financial and political power they command, their transnational character, their economic and legal flexibility and the complex structures they use to carry on their activities.
Since the late 90s, the CETIM is firmly committed to ending the impunity of transnational corporations and ensuring access to justice for the victims of their activities. The CETIM supports social movements, trade unions and organizations representing victims and affected communities from the Global South in their efforts to access the UN human rights protection mechanisms. And the CETIM is involved to their sides in the campaign for new binding international norms to end impunity, providing its support for their participation in the negotiations and the presentation of their proposals.
Access to justice for victims of TNCs
The question may seem absurd given that poverty limits the capacity of individuals to exercise their freedom, to enjoy their most fundamental rights, to live in dignity, and to take their place fully in society. How, for example, can one enjoy the right to free expression or the right to vote when one can neither […]
Continue reading1. Despite the fact that the Draft “Norms”1 for transnational corporations and other business enterprises approved by the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights2 is far from being a panacea on the subject of control and legal framework of transnational corporations. The latter had a sharp reaction against on a document of […]
Continue reading1. The world recently commemorated the sixtieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz in January 1945, followed by the liberation of several other Nazi concentration camps1. Auschwitz was the biggest concentration and death camp organized by the Nazi machinery, where millions of people where sent2 and submitted to hard labour, hunger, executions, crematorium ovens and […]
Continue reading1. Although the United Kingdom – United States coalition, as occupying power, had absolutely no right over Iraq and its resources, the coalition has privatized the bulk of this sovereign country’s economy then handed it over to foreign corporations in the name of reconstruction. Paul Bremer, the civil administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority named […]
Continue readingBy publishing his report on the reform of the United Nations, on the 21st of March 20051, the UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan caused quite a stir. Entitled ‘In Larger Freedom: towards development, security and human rights for all’ the document starts impressively, however, the contents hardly live up to the title’s promise. In fact, although […]
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