The UN Guiding Principles firmly establish corporate responsibility to respect
human rights. Corporations are expected to take proactive steps to ensure that
they do not cause, or contribute to, human rights abuses within their global
operations, and respond to human rights abuses when they occur.
For example, Human Rights Watch has investigated several instances where
companies have been responsible for human rights abuses. We have
documented how illegal logging in Indonesia jeopardized the sustainability of
forest use and global efforts to combat climate change. We have also reported
how the Porgera mine of Canada’s Barrick Gold mining company in Papua
New Guinea dumped 14,000 tons of liquid mining waste daily into a nearby river.
Earlier this year we exposed human rights abuses and forced labor in Thailand’s
fishing industry. These and many other cases of abuse highlight the importance
of the corporate responsibility to respect rights.
The key tool in the UN Guiding Principles to operationalize the responsibilities of
businesses with respect to human rights is due diligence. Human rights due
diligence is a process to identify, prevent, mitigate, and account for companies’
impacts on human rights. Companies are thus expected to establish and
implement effective screening, monitoring, and response mechanisms that
permit continual analysis of human rights risks. Specific steps that corporations
should take to fulfill their human rights due diligence responsibility is to conduct a
risk assessment, prevent or mitigate that risk, and ensure access to a remedy
when they have caused or contributed to the harm.
Corporate human rights due diligence should address all internationally
recognized rights. This is because companies can and do interfere with the
realization of a wide spectrum of human rights.
That said, some rights will be more relevant than others, depending on the
particular industries and circumstances. In the case at hand, the issue of the
responsibilities of carbon majors for human rights impacts resulting from climate
change, particularly involves the right to a healthy environment, the right to life,
the right to health, the right to property, and the right to food.
The impact of a company’s activities on human rights may relate to its direct
operations, its supply chains, and its products and services. In the case at hand,
carbon majors have conducted activities that result in the concentration of
greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which in turn causes global climate
change.
The corporate responsibility to conduct adequate human rights due diligence
extends beyond corporations’ direct operations to include their global supply
chains. Individual companies’ global supply chains often involve large numbers
of suppliers or subcontractors, including some who are part of the informal
sector. Due diligence does not involve limitations based on nationality or
location of suppliers.
Marcos Orellana – Remarks for Philippines CHR 23 & 24 May Hearing
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