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B. Enhanced human rights leadership
35. The Strategic Management Plan for 2008-2009 emphasizes the leading role of the
High Commissioner in identifying and analysing human rights problems and proposing solutions
to close implementation gaps. To fulfil this role, the Office has taken on board, as priority areas,
the work on economic, social and cultural rights, with a focus on legal protection and advocacy.
36. The sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the one-year
advocacy campaign launched by the Secretary-General on 10 December 2007 to commemorate
this important milestone has been the occasion for OHCHR to reiterate the universality,
interdependence and interrelatedness of all human rights, and the equal importance of economic,
social and cultural rights with civil and political rights. As part of the commemoration of the
sixtieth anniversary, OHCHR called on all partners to pay special attention to the civil, cultural,
economic, political and social rights of persons deprived of their liberty in prisons and other
places of detention, especially during the week of 6-12 October 2008 designated as “Dignity and
Justice for Detainees Week”. This initiative was intended to stress the importance of economic,
social and cultural rights for detainees, notably in the context of detention of women and girls,
children, disabled persons and migrants. In particular, OHCHR underlined that Governments are
obliged to adopt appropriate measures to ensure that all detainees are able to enjoy their rights to
health, food, water and education.
37. In the course of the year, OHCHR also undertook several other initiatives in the field of
economic, social and cultural rights, notably in relation to the global food security crisis,
counter-terrorism, the human impact of climate change, the Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs), women’s human rights, as well as HIV/AIDS.
38. In the context of the global food security crisis, the High Commissioner advocated for the
integration of human rights into the responses to the crisis. The High Commissioner made a
statement at the seventh special session of the Human Rights Council and at the FAO
High-Level Conference on World Food Security: The Challenges of Climate Change and
Bioenergy, in June 2008. In these statements, the High Commissioner highlighted the negative
impact of the world food crisis on the enjoyment of the right to food and the importance of
integrating the realization of the right to food in the global response to the crisis. OHCHR also
supported the development of a system-wide response to the food crisis, with a view to
integrating a human rights-based approach, and in particular the right to food. While OHCHR is
not a part of the High-Level Task Force on the Global Food Security Crisis convened by the
Secretary-General, the Office has actively contributed, together with the Special Rapporteur on
the right to food, to the Comprehensive Framework for Action (CFA) developed by the Task
Force. Likewise, OHCHR, jointly with UNICEF, convened an expert consultation on a human
rights-based approach to the food crisis in New York in August 2008.
39. As a leading member of the Working Group on “Protecting human rights while countering
terrorism” of the United Nations Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force, OHCHR
organized an expert group meeting on the impact of terrorism and counter-terrorism measures on
the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights on 5-7 November 2008. The expert
meeting aimed at discussing the impacts of terrorism and counter-terrorism measures in the field
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