PRESS RELEASE
7 June 2001
Contact:
(917) 215-8182
The
Habitat II+5 review is an occasion to scrutinize both the progress made as well
as the grave shortcomings in the implementation of the Istanbul Declaration and
habitat II Agenda. Even as we sit here in the UN General
Assembly, we are deliberating about a larger world in which we are now
witnessing the globalization of homelessness. Brutal force evictions continue unabated
throughout the world, in both the developing and developed countries, despite
international recognition of the practice as a gross violation of human
rights. There is no progress for
millions of peoples living under occupation and alien domination, where
governments carry out regular assaults on the habitat of the indigenous peoples
they seek to repress and eventually eliminate from coveted lands. Some 1.6 billion people live in poor
housing conditions, 70% of whom are women.
Between 30 and 70 million children live on our streets and 1.7 billion
persons live without access to clean water, while 3.3 billion live without
proper sanitation. We are
witnessing a trend wherein governments increasingly abandon their authority and
responsibility in the fulfillment of the human right to adequate housing to
self-interested private actors and external forces.
Moreover,
it is state behaviour that creates these living conditions that deprive the
effected people of their human dignity, harm their health and threaten their
very lives.
Clearly,
this is a time not just for celebration, but for serious reflection; and this
reflection is only possible when it is undertaken jointly by all parties
involved in the agenda. In this
context, the role of civil society in developing and implementing that agenda
cannot be undermined without jeopardizing the entire effort. As recognized partners in the habitat II Agenda's formulation and
implementation, in view of what we are witnessing today, we feel it is our
responsibility strongly to protest both the process and outcome of the present
special session:
The
dilution of NGOs role and their exclusion from the drafting negotiations have
far-reaching implications and sets a dangerous precedent that contradicts the
goals and spirit of UN partnership and risks reversing all the gains made since
1994 with respect to the process and substance toward implementing the habitat Agenda.
The
abandonment of the relevant human rights principles and commitments, already
reaffirmed in the Istanbul Declaration and Habitat II
Agenda
The
relevant human rights guidance and norms that have emerged also in this review
period are equally vital to solving problems of housing and human
settlements. The State delegations
gathered here deliberately have categorically rejected any acknowledgement of
the human right to housing and other related standards that guide states in the
field of human settlements. As
articulated by Mme. Virginia Dandan, chair of the Committee on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights, at this session "this is a step backwards from the Habitat
Agenda."
What became
apparent in the PrepComs leading up to this meeting has proved true: that this
process has failed both the tests of a fair assessment and an inclusive
process. Without these two
complementary elements, the future implementation of the habitat II Agenda is impossible. The New York Declaration, as it stands,
is evidence of a failure to live up to the noble standards we jointly set for
ourselves five years ago. The urgent imperative is not to issue a new and weaker
UN document, but to summon the requisite political will simply to go back to
implementing the already-existing standards, including the human right to
adequate housing, for women, youth, elderly, men and children across the world.
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