Issues Home About Contact Us Issue 25 /26 - May 2022 عربى
Editorial
Cause and Effect
The world has taken on another layer of crisis in the few months since the last publication of Land Times/أحوال الأرض.  Consistent with the theme of HLRN’s most-recent World Habitat Day report from the Violation Database (VDB), conflict, occupation and war have taken on new intensity with the highly predictable and at least partly provoked Russian invasion of Ukraine. As HIC’s statement More

Regional Developments
Green Transition in MENA
The economic slowdown associated with the COVID-19 pandemic and other simultaneous crises has done little to slow the climate crisis. Preliminary data show global greenhouse gas emissions (GHGE) increased in 2020 while the global average temperature in 2020 was about 1.2°C above pre-industrial level, dangerously close to the 1.5°C limit called for in the Paris Agreement. The world also fell More
CSOs Assess Sustainable-development Policies
 HIC-HLRN participated with Arab NGO Network for Development (ANND) in the “Regional CSO Forum on Sustainable Development,” on 13–14 March 2022 at Beirut, Lebanon. The gathering of diverse policy analysts representing the Middle East/North Africa region’s civil society covered the range of contemporary development issues represented in the Sustainable-development Goals (SDGs) in the regional context. The forum program was developed in More
HIC-HLRN & Partners in CCPR’s Israel Review
 On 28 February 2022, HIC-HLRN joined HIC Members and allies in joint statement before a formal briefing with the United Nations Human Rights Committee (CCPR) in advance of its fifth periodic review of Israel’s performance of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). The briefing focused on a joint parallel report by Addameer, Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association; Cairo More
Reporting on Housing and Land Rights in Western Sahara
 On the occasion of an upcoming review of the Kingdom Morocco’s human rights record before the UN Human Rights Council, HIC-HLRN has partnered with the Sahrawi Association in the United States of America (SAUSA) to submit a specialized report on housing and land rights conditions in Western Sahara, under Moroccan occupation since 1945. The organizations jointly submitted this new ‘stakeholder submission’ More
The Land and Its People: Palestine’s National Land Day
 HIC-HLRN issued the following statement on 30 March 2022, the Palestinian national Day of the Land, commemorating the uprising against Israel’s confiscation of Palestinian lands in the Galilee in 1976, which resulted in Israeli forces killing six local protesters. GENEVA and CAIRO, 30 March 2022—On this occasion of Palestine’s 46th Land Day and fourth anniversary of the Great March of Return More
Humanitarian, Economic & Social Situation in Syria
 At the beginning of this year, two important reports assessed the human rights and economic and social situation in Syria. The first, the report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic in February 2022  (A/HRC/49/77), and the other by the United Nations Country Team’s Sustainable Development Group (UNSDG), issued in March 2022, sets out the More
Jerash Workshop, on Land, Forests amid Climate Change
 The Debein Association for Environmental Development, a member of the Habitat International Alliance, and in partnership with the Housing and Land Rights Network, organized a workshop on forest and land management and climate change, and the interrelationship between them, which was held over three days from 17-19 February 2022, in Jerash Governorate, Jordan. The workshop dealt with the global policy More
CSOs’ Transition from Charity to Land Policy Engagement
 Amid the complexity and contradictions of Sudan’s political landscape, and the challenges related to protracted conflict and internal displacement, a new civil society partnership has emerged. HIC-HLRN and Sudan’s Center for Land and Environmental Governance (ISTIDAMA) have joined forces to support civic engagement in the reintegration and reconciliation of internally displaced persons (IDPs) through durable solutions in resettlement. The “twinning” More
Member News
Kenya Social Movement Network (KSM-Net)
Kenya Social Movement Network (KSM-Net) is a collective of community-led social movements formed in Kenya’s informal settlements. It was established in the 2011, after the promulgation of the Kenya Constitution 2010, as a vehicle to mobilize communities, movements and related networks under one umbrella that communities could draw on for advocacy action on matters land More
International Developments
Ukraine: Housing Rights Violations as Crimes of War
While war raged anew on the continent of Europe, HIC-HLRN monitored yet another military conflict and occupation. This new outbreak of war in Ukraine follows HLRN’s monitoring exercise in 2021 using the Violation Database as a tool for documenting the patterns of housing and land rights violations and displacement in situations of conflict despite the calls for both a moratorium More

HIC-HLRN Addresses UN SR Report on Housing Segregation
On 16 March 2022, Habitat International Coalition addressed the UN Human Rights Council’s 49th regular session in the interactive dialogue with the UN Special Rapporteur (SR) on adequate housing Balakrishnan Rajagopalon the subject of his recent report to the UN General Assembly and his latest reporton discrimination and spatial segregation in housing. The following incorporates that oral intervention with an More
Cautious Optimism: Human Rights & Climate Action
Can the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in the context of climate change contribute to environmental and climate justice? The report issued by the World Health Organization (WHO) this April raised an alarm by revealing that 90% of the world`s population breathes polluted air. The report presents more harsh facts, adding that 6 million people are dying due to polluted More
The Latest on the Climate Emergency
Climate scientists from 195 countries have newly warned that actions to avoid climate catastrophe have been too little and too late. This failure is the subject of two reports from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) over the past eight months. A new, third report presents what we can do to reverse the damage. Limiting global warming to More
CSOs, Indigenous Peoples Urge Food Crisis Action
HIC representatives André Luzzi of Brazil and Hala Barakat of Egypt have taken on new roles with the Civil Society and Indigenous Peoples’ Mechanism (CSIPM) for relations with the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS). Luzzi and Barakat have facilitated the Urban Food Insecure constituency of the CSIPM since 2019 and 2021, respectively and, as of March 2022, they More
Call for Cases of Violations amid Climate Change
For the purposes of sharing experience inter-regionally and support climate-justice advocacy priorities, generally, and to prepare for CoP27, in particular, Habitat International Coalition’s Housing and Land Rights Network (HIC-HLRN) will produce its October 2022 World Habitat Day report on housing and land rights violations related to climate change. HLRN is calling for such cases to record in the Violation Database (VDB), More
Action for Gender and Land Policy Impact
In a joint initiative between HIC Members, with support from the HIC General Secretariat, Reference Centers (HIC-HLRN, HIC-MENA, and HIC-AL), and the University College London-based Knowledge in Action for Urban Equality (KNOW) program, HIC has successfully completed the first two of three co-learning spaces as part of the “Connecting across Human Rights Related to Habitat: Civil Society Action for Gender More
Tanzania: Maasai Face Eviction for UAE Tourism
The Maasai (mɑːsaɪ’) are a Nilotic people inhabiting northern, central and southern Kenya and northern Tanzania, speaking an eastern Sudanic language (usually called Maa). They are among the internationally best-known local population, due to their residence near the many game parks of the African Great Lakes, and their distinctive culture and dress. They are one of the very few indigenous More
Frustrated Hopes at NERC 36
The Regional Office of FAO for Near East and North Africa (NENA), organized the 36th session of the biennial Regional Conference for the Near East (NERC), with the senior officer meeting held on 10–13 January and the ministerial meeting on 7–8 February 2022. Hosted by Iraq in Baghdad, the hybrid sessions this year convened under the theme "Restart and Recover: More
Urgent Action over eKhenana Land Defender Murders
On Tuesday, 8 March 2022, South African land rights defender Ayanda Ngila was shot and killed in broad daylight in the eKhenana Commune, a portion of land that is home to 109 families in the informal settlement of Cato Manor, near Durban. Ngila was a leader of the shack dweller’s movement Abahlali baseMjondolo, and is believed to be the 19th More
Ecuador Court: FPIC for Indigenous Peoples
Consistent with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, Ecuador’s Constitutional Court has recognized indigenous peoples’ right to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC). This new ruling is a potential step toward the environmental justice that has been denied to indigenous peoples over centuries of colonization. In January 2018, the Cofán indigenous people’s Guardian Indigena of Sinangoe, comprising 20 people More
 
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