18 April 2012: Navi Pillay, UN Human Rights High Commissioner, called on all UN State parties to ensure that human rights are integrated in the discussions and final outcome of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20).

In an open letter to all UN Member States, Pillay laments that the draft outcome document of Rio+20 does not take sufficient account of human rights safeguards. In contrast, she notes that the 27 principles enshrined in the Rio Declaration place human beings and their right to a healthy and productive life at the centre of concerns for sustainable development.

She underscores that the incoherence among international human rights standards, environmental strategies and economic policies can undermine all three, as strategies based on the simple pursuit of economic growth are doomed to fail and in the process compromise the environment and people’s rights. Pillay highlights examples of strategies leading up to landlessness, homelessness and economic dispossession. She also stresses that such strategies have also excluded women from decision making, and diverted scarce food-growing lands for the production of biofuels, threatening the lands and livelihoods of indigenous peoples. Pillay concludes with a call for participatory, accountable, non-discriminatory and empowering development as a more sustainable outcome. [Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) Press Release] [UN Press Release] [OHCHR Open Letter]