A/HRC/38/19 I. Introduction 1. Pursuant to its resolution 35/1, on 28 February 2018, at its thirty-seventh session, the Human Rights Council held a high-level panel discussion to commemorate the seventieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the twenty-fifth anniversary of the adoption of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, with a particular focus on the implementation of the provisions thereof, including the benefits of enhanced international cooperation in that regard. In resolution 35/1, the Council also requested the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to liaise with States, relevant United Nations bodies and agencies, treaty bodies, special procedures and regional human rights mechanisms, and with civil society, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and national human rights institutions, with a view to ensuring their participation in the panel discussion. The present summary report of the panel discussion was prepared pursuant to the Council’s request to that effect contained in resolution 35/1. 2. The panel discussion offered a valuable opportunity to raise awareness and to reflect on achievements, best practices and challenges with regard to the full realization of human rights and fundamental freedoms, and the benefits of enhanced international cooperation to that end. 3. The panel was chaired and moderated by the President of the Human Rights Council, Vojislav Šuc. The discussion was opened by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, and the Director of the Department for Humanitarian Cooperation and Human Rights of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation and Commissioner for Human Rights, Democracy and Rule of Law, Anatoly Victorov. The panel was composed of: the Special Representative for the Austrian Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Chairmanship 2017 and former Special Representative and Ambassador for the World Conference on Human Rights (1992–1993), Christian Strohal; the Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living, and on the right to nondiscrimination in this context, Leilani Farha; member of the Human Rights Committee and former Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Christof Heyns; and senior advisor at Women Political Leaders Global Forum and former member of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Şafak Pavey. 4. The panel discussion was made accessible to persons with disabilities, in order to promote their participation in the work of the Council on an equal basis with others. International sign language interpretation and real-time captioning were provided in the room and on the webcast. II. Opening statements 5. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said that both his and the Human Rights Council’s mandates were rooted in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action. The panel, therefore, represented an occasion to reaffirm the commitment to those fundamental texts. The Universal Declaration enshrined a promise made by States to uphold the equality and inherent rights of every human being. At the time of the negotiations of the Universal Declaration, uniform practice had not been a goal, as the drafters had sought to show that the coexistence of States with differing economic conceptions and differing regimes was possible. Therefore, the Universal Declaration was not a projection of partisan politics, or a project for world domination. 6. The original push to draw up the Universal Declaration had come from antiimperialist, anti-racist movements in countries of the global South. Indeed, while Western countries, including France, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America, had initially been reluctant, Latin American States, with their experiences of slavery, colonialism and foreign domination, had pushed for international human rights measures even before the Second World War. Furthermore, once discussions 2