The UN will move toward a legal treaty that penalizes transnational corporations which violate human rights, after a vote at the 26th UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) session last week.
Key language included in the resolution includes a decision to “establish an open-ended intergovernmental working group on a legally binding instrument on transnational corporations and other business enterprises with respect to human rights, the mandate of which shall be to elaborate an international legally binding instrument to regulate, in international human rights law, the activities of transnational corporations and other business enterprises.”
The vote was split. Twenty states voted in favor, including Ecuador and South Africa, who proposed the resolution. Additionally, more than 80 nations and 600 organizations supported the resolution.
Fourteen states voted against, including the US, who said that “this legally binding instrument will not be binding for those who vote against it,” and EU states. Some nations who voted against did so expressly because of political pressure. “We vote with the EU. If we do not, it can become very unpleasant for us”, one representative was quoted as saying to Friends of the Earth International.
The opposing states also lobbied other countries to side with them, threatening the loss of developmental aid and foreign investment.
Thirteen nations abstained.
There is already a voluntary framework in place at the UNHRC to support human rights. The resolution to move from the voluntary framework to a more strict one was led by Ecuador in 2013, and was supported from the outset by 80 nations.
Cheryl Bretton