Virtual global workshop 29-30 June 2021

Office of the
Secretary General
COVID-19 pandemic recovery through a human rights
lens: What contribution from parliaments?
Virtual global workshop for parliamentarians organized by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
Two half-days spread over two days, Tuesday, 29 and
Wednesday 30 June 2021
Geneva, 1 June 2021
Dear Madam President,
Dear Mr. President,
The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) are pleased to invite your Parliament to
take part in the virtual workshop “COVID-19 pandemic recovery through a human
rights lens: What contributions from parliaments?” which will be held on 29 and
30 June 2021 (2 - 5 p.m. CEST – Geneva time).
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a tremendous impact on the enjoyment of human
rights and has accentuated structural inequalities and vulnerabilities in terms of
access to education, health, housing, employment, and information among others.
The response to the pandemic should therefore not only focus on halting the spread of
the virus and on vaccinating the population. Recovery should also tackle the
underlying factors of marginalization which, because they have been so negatively
impacted by the pandemic, have worsened the situation of significant parts of society.
The virtual workshop will offer an opportunity for parliamentarians to learn and
exchange experiences and views regarding the impact of the pandemic on human
rights and good human rights-based national strategies. During the workshop,
parliamentarians will discuss how they can and should contribute to a resilient COVID-
19 recovery by engaging more robustly in the protection of human rights with the
United Nations human rights mechanisms, such as the UN Human Rights Council.
I sincerely hope that a delegation of your Parliament will take part in the workshop.
Ideally, delegations are comprised of up to four members, include both female and
male members, and reflect the political spectrum represented in your Parliament.
I am pleased to attach the provisional programme, which is also available at
https://www.ipu.org/events.
Kindly find below the link to the registration platform:
https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJMpduirpjgvHte8-hT1qDwIaZjd0yRleNAf
I am looking forward to your Parliament’s participation in this important event.
Yours sincerely,
Martin Chungong
Secretary General
Dansk Interparlamentarisk Gruppes bestyrelse 2020-21
IPU Alm.del - Bilag 24
Offentligt
COVID-19 pandemic recovery through a human rights lens:
What contribution from parliaments?
Virtual global workshop for parliamentarians organized by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner
for Human Rights (OHCHR)
Two half-days spread over two days, Tuesday, 29 and Wednesday 30 June 2021
2 - 5 p.m. (CEST - Geneva Time)
BACKGROUND
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a tremendous impact on the enjoyment of human rights and has
accentuated structural inequalities and vulnerabilities in terms of access to education, health, housing,
employment, and information among others.
The response to the pandemic should therefore not only focus on halting the spread of the virus and
on vaccinating the population. Recovery should also tackle the underlying factors of marginalization
which, because they have been so negatively impacted by the pandemic, have worsened the situation
of significant parts of society.
Parliaments play a key role in helping ensure that COVID-19 recovery includes the strengthening of
state institutions and policies so that they truly serve everyone, starting with those most in need, and
are fully grounded in existing human rights standards.
Indeed, as guardians of human rights and platforms of national representation where decisions
affecting the whole of society are taken, parliaments should be at the forefront of developing, based on
lessons learned from the pandemic, a consolidated recovery strategy.
In this regard, parliaments, in particular their human rights committees, have a critical role to play in
the promotion and protection of human rights by turning international human rights obligations into
meaningful action at the national level. Through its powers, parliament has the constitutional means to
transpose international standards into national law and can seek to collaborate with international
bodies, notably the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), entrusted with ensuring respect for these
standards.
The United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) recognized the importance of parliaments’
contribution in its resolution 35/29 (adopted in 2017) in which it encouraged States, in accordance with
their national legal frameworks, to promote the participation of parliaments as stakeholders in all
stages of the Universal Periodic Review. The HRC tasked the Office of the UN High Commissioner for
Human Rights (OHCHR) with producing an analytical report on parliaments’ contribution to the work of
the HRC. This report (A/HRC/38/25) was prepared with the assistance of the IPU and submitted and
discussed by the HRC in June 2018. The report included numerous examples of parliamentary
engagement on human rights, in particular at committee-level.
Against the backdrop of the global mobilization to defeat the pandemic and the different constraints
that may exist in this regard at the national level, the IPU-OHCHR workshop aims at:
- Sharing best national practices in terms of legislation and other parliamentary activities to
promote human rights while fighting the pandemic.
- Identifying appropriate measures, drawn from international human rights principles, to fight the
pandemic.
- Exploring robust human rights-based strategies for post-COVID-19 recovery, including avenues
to strengthen the contribution of parliaments to the work of the UN Human Rights Council
through the implementations of its UPR recommendations.

- 2 -
PROVISIONAL PROGRAMME
Tuesday, 29 June 2021
2 p.m. • Inaugural session
2.15 p.m. Session I: What have the pandemic and government responses to it taught us about
respect for human rights in today’s world?
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries took sweeping steps to stop the spread
of the virus and protect their populations. Most of these steps have had important
consequences for human rights. The question arises as to whether these measures have been
guided by human rights. Moreover, the pandemic itself underscored and appeared to exercabate
existing inequalities and discrimination affecting already marginalized communities. What data
do we have to shed light on these developments? To what extent have States sought to tackle
the adverse new and old human rights dimensions laid bare by the pandemic?
• Panellists (IPU, OHCHR)
• Moderators (TBI)
Discussion
3.30 p.m. Break
3.45 p.m. Session II: The role of dedicated parliamentary human rights committees in helping insert
a human rights-based approach into government responses to the OVID-19 pandemic
A number of parliaments, in particular through their human rights committees, have carried out
dedicated oversight to help ensure that the promotion and protection of human rights is a central
pillar in official policies to tackle the pandemic. How did this oversight come about and what
shape did it take? Is it effective in bringing about better human rights compliance?
• Panellists (to be identified according to the topic to be discussed)
• Moderator (TBC)
Discussion
5 p.m.
End of day one 
Wednesday, 30 June 2021
2 p.m. Session III: Building back better: successful human rights-based COVID-19 recovery
measures to address inequalities and structural discrimination, and to leverage the HRC
UPR in line with the HRC 38/25 report
The pandemic has been as a wake-up call to parliaments to take more forceful action to make
parliamentary policy responses more inclusive and more beneficial to those most in need. As
several countries are slowly starting to turn the page on COVID-19, they have had the
opportunity to seize this moment to address structural underlying obstacles to the full enjoyment
of human rights by everyone, in particular the marginalized communities. What has been done in
this regard thus far? Which States have used the occasion to undertake ambitous human rights
reforms in these areas? And what has been the role therein of parliaments?
3.30 p.m. Break
- 3 -
3.45 p.m. Session IV: Using COVID-19 recovery to better connect parliaments and international
human rights mechanisms, also taking into account tools produced by OHCHR and the
IPU to facilitate engagement with the UN Human Rights Council and its UPR
More robust cooperation and interaction between parliaments and international human rights
mechanisms can go a long way in facilitating stronger human rights implementation at the
national level during this critical recovery phase. What opportunities do parliaments have to
engage with these mechanisms? Which parliaments have best been able to seize these
opportunities and what lessons does this bring to other parliaments?
• Panellists (TBC)
• Moderator (TBC)
Discussion
5 p.m. Conclusion of the virtual workshop