A/HRC/30/50 44. The media can shed light on human rights violations and has an important role in fairly covering all violations of the rights of athletes or the local population affected by sporting events. Its broadcast programmes also educate people. Campaigns to promote human rights, sometimes with the assistance of star athletes, are intended to raise awareness of society at large. The media can also contribute to the promotion of human rights by encouraging greater inclusion of disadvantaged groups. A powerful instrument of awareness-raising is when personalities publicly condemn cases of racial discrimination or intolerance. The collaboration with non-governmental organizations is also important to raise awareness about the positive and negative impact of sporting events. The “Don’t Look Away” campaign and the “Children Win” project, of the organizations ECPAT and Terre des Hommes, which highlight the positive and negative effects that major sporting events have on children, are a good example of such collaboration with traditional and digital media. 45. Broad media coverage has made sport attractive to business, thereby turning it into a huge industry and contributing to launch new mass sport trends. The modern media promotes outstanding athletes, provides funding and fulfils humanitarian, educational and other support objectives. 46. The media can therefore play a key role in upholding human rights and, for this purpose, an independent media and freedom of expression are essential. Access to information that is objective and balanced can only be guaranteed through a free and competitive media. When censored, the media becomes a tool for propaganda, which goes against the very idea of promotion of human rights in sport. Misleading and wrong information can trigger violence among athletes and fans and lead to infringement of the rights of sporting adversaries and/or local populations. 47. Racist comments and slander during sporting games, the Olympics and other mega sporting events, and their wide dissemination through the media, may contribute to the erosion of the rights of others during sporting events. To avoid such negative outbursts, it is not enough to provide for legal remedies, which may be long-winded, but it is also important to adopt and implement rigorous and effective disciplinary measures to preserve the rights of athletes and promote human rights in sport. I. Sport and development 48. Sport can promote sustainable development if there is awareness about the potential negative economic and environmental impact of international sporting events and effective measures to address them. Sporting events such as the Olympics may generate indirect economic benefits and boost economic development in the host country. Development in a country is promoted in a variety of ways. For example, the building of urban and rural public sporting and exercise facilities in different regions contributes to economic dynamism. The United Nations has incorporated sport as a tool for development and peace in its work, notably through the Office on Sport for Development and Peace. 49. Sport also has unique attributes through which it can contribute to development processes. Its capacity as a communication platform, its ability to connect people, its popularity and its convening power make it a development tool that can be used to meet high standards. It is noteworthy that the International Olympic Committee adopted the Olympic Movement’s Agenda 21 for the twenty-first century, as a result of which the London and Sochi Olympic Games were managed on a sustainable development basis. 50. Furthermore, sport is a catalyst for economic development whereby all elements of the sporting economy are interconnected and simultaneously contribute to and benefit from its development, at the local level in particular, as a result of economies of scale. Sporting 12