Libya: Bachelet Appoints Independent Fact-Finding Mission Experts

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said the deteriorating security situation in Libya and the absence of a functioning judicial system underscored the importance of the work of a team of independent experts to document human rights violations and abuses.

The High Commissioner today announced the appointment of the members of the Independent Fact-Finding Mission on Libya. The members are: Mohamed Auajjar (Morocco), Tracy Robinson (Jamaica) and Chaloka Beyani (Zambia and UK).

The Fact-Finding Mission on Libya was established by the Human Rights Council on 22 June 2020, inter alia, to document alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law and international humanitarian law by all parties in Libya since the start of 2016.

“This body of experts will serve as an essential mechanism to effectively address the widespread impunity for human rights violations and abuses committed, and can also serve as a deterrent to prevent further violations and contribute to peace and stability in the country,” said Bachelet.

Summary executions and other unlawful killings, torture and ill-treatment, gender-based violence, including conflict-related sexual violence, abductions, enforced disappearances, as well as incitement to violence on social media, continue to be committed in a climate of complete impunity, Bachelet said.

She added that human rights defenders, activists and journalists have also been attacked and have fled the country.

The Independent Fact-Finding Mission on Libya will provide an oral update at the Human Rights Council in September 2020. A comprehensive written report on the situation of human rights in Libya, including on efforts to prevent and ensure accountability for violations and abuses of human rights with recommendations, will follow in 2021.

Members’ biographies:

Mohamed Auajjar, from Morocco, is the former Minister for Justice of the Kingdom of Morocco, a position he held from 2017 to 2019. He served as Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Kingdom of Morocco to the United Nations in Geneva and international organizations between 2014 and 2017. Mr. Auajjar also served as Minister for Human Rights of the Kingdom of Morocco, from 1998 to 2004 and has been a member of the Moroccan parliament between 2002 and 2007. He is a Founding member of the Moroccan Organization for Human Rights and the author of numerous articles on Democracy and Human Rights. Auajjar graduated in public law from the Mohammed I Oujda University.

Tracy Robinson, from Jamaica, is a Senior Lecturer and Deputy Dean (Graduate Studies and Research) in the Faculty of Law at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona Campus, Jamaica, where she currently teaches family law, constitutional law and Commonwealth Caribbean human rights. Robinson was a member of the Inter-American Commission (IACHR) between 2012 and 2015 and served as its President between 2014 and 2015. At the IACHR, she was the Inaugural Rapporteur of the Rights of LGBTI Persons and the Rapporteur on the Rights of Women. She holds a Master of Laws from Yale University, a Bachelor of Civil Law from the University of Oxford, and a Bachelor of Law from the University of the West Indies.

Chaloka Beyani, from Zambia and the UK, is an Associate Professor of International Law in the Department of Law at the London School of Economics, where he teaches International Protection of Human Rights, International Human Rights, Human Rights of Women, International Criminal Law; and United Nations Law, Refugees, Displaced Persons and Migrants. He has been a Legal Advisor, Consultant and Expert to a number of United Nations agencies, the European Union, the Commonwealth Secretariat and the African Union. He was a member of the Government of Kenya Constitutional Review Committee of Experts that drafted the 2010 Constitution of Kenya 2009-2010. He also served as a Government of Mozambique mediator to the peace process that lead to the Peace agreement in Mozambique in 2019. He served as a Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons from 2010- 2016 and as Chair of the Coordination Committee of Special Procedures from 2013-2014.

Full text of HRC Resolution 43/39

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