A/HRC/32/19 abuses, with a particular emphasis on cases of severe abuses. 18 The project focused on six areas: (a) domestic law tests for corporate legal liability; (b) the roles and responsibilities of interested States in cross-border cases; (c) overcoming financial obstacles to legal claims; (d) criminal law sanctions; (e) civil law remedies; and (f) domestic prosecution bodies. Those six themes were selected as areas that require urgent attention and where developments were capable of delivering improvements to accountability and remedy in the short to medium term. 12. While it was necessary to limit the scope to these six priority areas due to time and resource constraints, it is recognized that there are other important aspects of access to remedy which the project has not covered. These include strengthening State-based nonjudicial grievance mechanisms and non-State-based grievance mechanisms as important complements to judicial remedies; individual liability of corporate officers and directors; reforms to rules of court procedure; measures to ensure protection of victims and their representatives from intimidation and threats of reprisals; and wider political, social and economic challenges to the rule of law, including corruption, lack of judicial independence and lack of capacity in many domestic legal systems. 19 C. Methodology 13. To better understand the challenges that exist at the domestic level and the initiatives likely to be most effective given the diversity of legal structures, traditions and approaches around the world,20 OHCHR gathered empirical information from a wide range of jurisdictions on the functioning of domestic legal systems and relevant regimes. This was done through a global online consultation, country-specific reports, reviews of existing research, research projects relating to cross-border and international cooperation, interviews with prosecutors, multi-stakeholder consultations, two workshops with State representatives, engagements with business, civil society and national human rights institutions and online consultative processes at key milestones in the project. 21 Through its collaboration with the Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises, OHCHR also held consultations during the Forum on Business and Human Rights and the Africa and Asia regional forums on business and human rights. All key documents and milestones of the project were communicated directly to States and made available to other stakeholders through relevant platforms and information-sharing channels.22 Regular briefings on the project were held for delegates of the Human Rights Council. 18 19 20 21 22 The emphasis on severe abuses was determined following practical and strategic considerations, including the need for comparability of data on existing State practices, but does not suggest that other categories of harm do not also require a domestic legal response. Business enterprises can have an impact upon virtually the entire spectrum of internationally recognized human rights, and that impact can range in type, nature and severity. The guidance is not limited to “severe” human rights abuses. However, where business involvement in severe human rights abuses may demand a particular response, for example, in the case of specially targeted legal regimes, this has been highlighted in the guidance. For more information about the choice of scope, see www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Business/Pages/OHCHRstudyondomesticlawremedies.aspx. See principle 26 and commentary of the Guiding Principles, and para. 15 below. See A/HRC/32/19/Add.1, para. 5. See note 16 above. See business-humanrights.org/en/ohchr-accountability-and-remedy-project. 5