A/HRC/2/7
page 24
(e)
A key gap in post-conflict reconstruction activities in the housing, health and
other sectors is consultation with those affected. Mechanisms should be devised to remedy
this situation and ensure appropriate consultation and participation;
(f)
The Government should develop, in cooperation with the international
community, a comprehensive strategy to assist internally displaced persons and returnees
taking into account the most vulnerable groups such as women heads of household and
children or elderly people without family support. Such a strategy should use a
rights-based approach, in line with the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, and
urgently address the following protection challenges: (i) access to basic services (in
particular shelter, water, sanitation, education and health) for returnees and for the poor
and vulnerable among those who continue in displacement; (ii) access to livelihoods, in
particular in farming areas affected by UXO; (iii) protection in cases of domestic violence,
which are likely to increase in situations of stress and cramped housing and living
conditions; and (iv) access to courts and other conflict resolution mechanisms in the context
of property disputes that might occur in South Beirut and parts of southern Lebanon.
105.
The mission makes the following recommendations to Hezbollah:
(a)
Hezbollah should publicly affirm that it is bound by international
humanitarian law and should renounce the targeting of civilians in all circumstances;
(b)
Hezbollah should train its fighters in the requirements of international
humanitarian law, inform its fighters of the possibility of criminal prosecution for serious
violations thereof, and take all other necessary measures to ensure future compliance.
106.
The mission makes the following recommendations to the Human Rights Council:
(a)
Having addressed the conduct of Israel in its resolution S-2/1, the Council
should also ensure that Hezbollah’s attacks are thoroughly investigated because of their
serious consequences for the civilian population in northern Israel;
(b)
Hezbollah’s extensive use of Katyusha rockets loaded with lethal
anti-personnel ball bearings fired towards heavily populated civilian areas constitutes a
clear violation of humanitarian law. Whether it also amounts to a war crime is a
determination to be made upon the basis of more detailed evidence as to intent than the
mission was able to obtain, but the prima facie case is nevertheless a powerful one, and the
matter warrants careful investigation;
(c)
It is clear that Hezbollah made at least some use of houses and other civilian
sites to hide or conceal military activities, although the evidence presented to the mission in
that regard was far from systematic. Any further inquiries undertaken by the Council
should consider whether such practices violated humanitarian law rules and whether any
instances amounted to the use of human shields;
(d)
The Human Rights Council should request the relevant international bodies including the Meetings of States Parties to the Convention on Prohibitions or Restrictions
on the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons Which May Be Deemed to Be Excessively
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