A/HRC/41/27 I. Introduction 1. In its resolution 38/8, the Human Rights Council requested the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to organize a consultation, in coordination with the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), to discuss all relevant issues and challenges pertaining to respect for and the protection and fulfilment of human rights in the context of the response to HIV, with a focus on regional and subregional strategies and best practices. The consultation was held, pursuant to that request, on 12 and 13 February 2019. It was attended by a wide range of stakeholders, including representatives of Member States and of United Nations agencies, funds and programmes, special procedure mandate holders, experts and members of civil society, including persons living with, presumed to be living with, at risk of or affected by HIV. During the consultation, participants examined best practices, evidence, lessons learned and the challenges faced when removing human rights barriers and the promotion of human rights in the response to HIV in regional and subregional strategies. They also considered regional human rights mechanisms in monitoring, accountability and empowerment in the field of human rights and health, and addressed current challenges to ending AIDS by 2030, including stigma, discrimination, violence and abuse. II. High-level opening 2. The United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Kate Gilmore, opened proceedings by welcoming Human Rights Council resolution 38/8 as a milestone that recognized – conceptually, legally and practically – the added value brought by the human rights framework to an effective and sustained response to the HIV epidemic. The Deputy High Commissioner invited participants to identify affordable, practical, doable and transformative solutions to the HIV epidemic. She commended the core group, comprising Brazil, Colombia, Mozambique, Portugal and Thailand, for its leadership during negotiations, which resulted in the adoption by the Council of resolution 38/8 by consensus. She also expressed her gratitude to civil society and human rights defenders, without whom little would have happened in the response to HIV. She described HIV as an epidemic of human rights loss, denial, derailment, abuse and violence. She noted with concern that HIV and AIDS attracted the deepest and worst kinds of discrimination and life-threatening exclusion. In particular, she expressed concern that women, young people and key populations continued to be directly and the most affected by the epidemic. She hoped participants in the consultation would consider the situation faced by key populations, children and young people, and develop concrete measures to eliminate stigma, discrimination, violence and abuse. Recalling the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, she stressed that there was no justification for the bigotry, homophobia, discrimination and exclusion affecting people living with HIV. According to the Deputy High Commissioner, human rights should be upheld in order to promote an inclusive and deliberate programme of dismantling toxic attitude and behaviour by governments and non-government actors alike to those living with the cost of the epidemic. Failure to do so would imply risking not meeting the UNAIDS 90-90-90 treatment target for 2020, or Sustainable Development Goal target 3.3. She stressed that monitoring, empowerment and accountability played a critical role in promoting human rights-based solutions. 3. The Executive Director of the Global Network of People Living with HIV (GNP+), Rico Gustav, commended civil society for its crucial work in the response to HIV. He recalled article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and reminded States parties about their obligations to protect and promote the right to health, for all. He also referred to general comment No. 14 (2000) of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on the right to the highest attainable standard of health, in which the Committee called upon States to work together, through international cooperation and assistance, on the realization of the right to health. Mr. Gustav noted the decline in global health aid, including funding reductions to middle-income countries, which had an impact on the well-being of people living with HIV, particularly since many 2