GENEVA: The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has voted to adopt by a wide margin a draft covenant on the right to development as a human right that puts individuals at the centre of the development process.
Diplomats observers regarding the move, which was led by former Pakistan Ambassador Zamir Akram, as a major success for the Pakistani diplomacy.
Zamir Akram is currently the chair of the Geneva-based Council’s Working Group on the Right to Development.
Under terms of the Council’s resolution, it decided to submit to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) the draft international covenant on the right to development for its consideration and subsequent approval.
The vote in the 47-member Council was twenty-nine in favour to thirteen against, with 5 abstentions.
Developing countries’ struggle for right to development
The right to development as a human right has been pursued by developing nations, in keeping with the UN charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), for over the past four decades, to ensure that the right to development is recognized as a part and parcel of all human rights that are indivisible, interdependent, and interrelated.
Read Also: UNHRC Condemns South Sudan’s National Security Service for Threatening Media, Civil Society
However, the acceptance of this right has so far been opposed by the developed nations, leading to a stalemate on the issue.
In 2018, the Human Rights Council mandated the Chair of the Working Group, Akram, to draft a legally binding treaty on the right to development. A draft text was presented to the Council in its May 2023 session by the Pakistani envoy and adopted by it on Thursday.
