Human Rights Council Draft Resolution on Houla / Syria

The U.N. Human Rights Council will hold an emergency session Friday, 1 June 2012, on the deteriorating situation in Syria and  to address the massacre in Houla. Diplomats say this draft resolution is likely to be adopted at the end of the meeting. 

This draft resolution was posted by UN Watch. 

Draft Resolution on the human rights situation in Syria and the recent killings in El-Houleh

30 May 2012

Recalling General Assembly resolutions 66/176 of 19 December 2011 and 66/253 of 16 February 2012, as well as Human Rights Council resolutions S-16/1 of 29 April 2011, S-17/1 of 22 August 2011, S-18/1 of 2 December 2011, 19/1 of 1 March 2012 and 19/22 of … and Security Council resolutions 2042 (2012) and 2043 (2012),

Deploring the killings, confirmed by United Nations observers, of dozens of men, women and children and the wounding of hundreds more in the village of El-Houleh, near Homs, in attacks that involved a series of Government artillery and tank shellings of a residential neighborhood,

1. Condemns in the strongest possible terms such an outrageous use of force against the civilian population which constitutes a violation of applicable international law and of the commitment of the Syrian Government under the United Nations Security Council Resolutions 2042 (2012)  and 2043 (2012) to cease violence in all its forms, including the cessation of use of heavy weapons in population centres;

2. Calls upon the Syrian authorities to put an immediate end to all violence and all human rights violations;

3. Reaffirms that those responsible for acts of violence must be held accountable;

4. Decides for the Council President to establish and urgently dispatch an independent fact-finding mission to conduct an immediate and unfettered investigation of the killings in the village of El-Houleh and to report its initial findings to the Human Rights Council at its twentieth session with a full report and interactive dialogue at its twenty-first session; and requests that the fact-finding mission coordinate, as appropriate, with relevant UN mechanisms;

5. Invites the United Nations – Arab League Joint Special Envoy for Syria Mr. Kofi Annan to provide a briefing to the Human Rights Council at its twentieth session.

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