Rights chief decries disinfo attacks on UN

GENEVA

The U.N. rights chief decried on Monday disinformation and other attacks that aim to "undermine the legitimacy" and work of the United Nations and other institutions, describing them as "profoundly destructive".

Speaking at the opening of the U.N. Human Rights Council's main annual session, Volker Turk slammed widespread "disinformation that targets U.N. humanitarian organisations, U.N. peacekeepers and my office".

"The U.N. has become a lightning rod for manipulative propaganda and a scapegoat for policy failures," he warned.

"This is profoundly destructive of the common good, and it callously betrays the many people whose lives rely on it."

During his opening speech, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights stressed that the United Nations was "uniquely equipped to enable states to discuss and resolve pressing global issues".

"This convening power is particularly vital now, when the magnitude of conflict, planetary peril and digital transformation requires urgent solutions," he said.

Turk pointed to "the pain and the slaughter of so many people in the Middle East, Ukraine, Sudan, Myanmar, Haiti and so many other places around the world" which he described as "unbearable".

Without mentioning it explicitly, he seemed to allude to the recent attacks on the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, amid Israeli allegations of "collusion" with the Hamas militants whose Oct. 7 attack on Israel sparked the brutal war raging in Gaza.

"U.N. humanitarian agencies assist hundreds of millions of people to stay alive," stressed Turk, who himself is not welcome in Israel, where the authorities accuse him and his office of bias in favour of the Palestinians.

Turk also voiced concern that ongoing negotiations on a number of vital issues did not appear to focus enough on the human rights aspect.

"Negotiations on treaties on pandemic prevention and on cyber-crime, as well as on plastic pollution; and global discussions about the regulation of artificial intelligence — all these talks that are currently under way ... are not sufficiently taking into account human rights obligations, and the human rights harms that could be done," he warned.

The U.N. rights chief appealed for an end to "the binary view that if you are not for us, and against our enemies, then you too must be an enemy".

He warned that the "us versus them illogic" was creating increasingly dangerous and combustible divisions, especially in pre-electoral periods, of which there are many this year".

"All this is a politics of distraction, of warmongering, which slowly numbs our deepest sense of compassion. Especially at a time of deep division and fear, seeing the humanity in the other is the lifeline that can tug us away from disaster."