UN makes debt a human rights issue; report due in March

The United Nations new Special Rapporteur on the Effects of Foreign Debt will make his first report to the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights at its next meeting 22 March to 28 April 1999.

The appointment of the special rapporteur was important and controversial because it makes debt a human rights issue as well as a financial one, and because it reflected an explicit rejection of the World Bank/IMF HIPC Initiative as inadequate.

The special rapporteur is Reinaldo Figueredo of Venezuela and he was appointed in August 1998 for three years; his first report will only be oral.

The Human Rights Commission made the decision to appoint the special rapporteur on 17 April 1998 in Resolution 1998/24.

“Foreign debt constitutes one of the main obstacles preventing the developing countries from fully enjoying their right to development,” according to the resolution. And it instructs the special rapporteur to pay “particular attention to:

(a) The negative effects of the foreign debt and the policies adopted to face it on the full enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights in developing countries;

(b) Measures taken by Governments, the private sector and international financial institutions to alleviate such effects in developing countries, especially the poorest and heavily indebted countries.”

The Commission called on “non-governmental organizations and the private sector to cooperate fully with the Special Rapporteur”. Submissions can be made in writing to:

Reinaldo Figueredo
Special Rapporteur on the Effects of Foreign Debt
Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
United Nations Office in Geneva
1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland

For consideration for his report in March, submissions would need to be made by mid-February.

The UN High Commission on Human Rights has 21 special rapporteurs on thematic issues, including racism, child slavery, and extreme poverty.

The appointment of the special rapporteur was controversial, and it was only approved by 27 votes to 16, with 9 abstentions. The resolution was proposed by Cuba. Japan opposed the appointment on the grounds that debt was not a human rights issue; the US opposed it on the grounds that it would “impose external conditions on terms which the debtors and creditors had already agreed upon.”

The resolution also recognised “a need for more transparency in the activities of international financial institutions” and called for “political dialogue between creditor and debtor countries within the United Nations system, based on the principle of shared interests and responsibilities.” Finally, it requested the “United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to pay particular attention to the problem of the debt burden of developing countries, in particular of the less developed countries, and especially the social impact of the measures arising from the foreign debt.”

The UN High Commission on Human Rights has passed resolutions on foreign debt and human rights in each of its annual session over the past few years. The appointment of the special rapporteur is based on a special report to the High Commission (E/CN.4/1998/24) on 5 January 1998.

In particular, the report criticised the World Bank/IMF Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative for “the inflexibility over the timing of debt relief, the excessive proliferation of conditionalities and the lack of an analytical basis for debt relief eligibility.”

It also said that “the international community should adopt more effective measures to resolve the external debt problem of developing countries for a more effective promotion and realisation of the right to development. There should be an initiative for a comprehensive, rather than piecemeal, resolution of this problem covering commercial, bilateral and multilateral debt, and also involving reduction of debt stock.”

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations in 1948 contains a number of economic rights which should take precedence over the payment of debt service. These include:

Article 25: Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control. ...

Article 26 Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. ...

The Special Rapporteur on the effects of foreign debt, Reinaldo Figueredo, has been a member of the Truth Commission in El Salvador with the UN. He has also held posts with the Venezuelan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and has been a member of the National Congress.