A/HRC/11/13 page 15 a fool’s errand because companies can affect the entire spectrum of rights, as documented in the Special Representative’s mapping of nearly 400 public allegations against companies.40 Therefore, the responsibility to respect must apply to all such rights, although in practice some may be more relevant than others in particular contexts.41 53. For the substantive content of due diligence, then, companies at a minimum should look to the International Bill of Human Rights - the Universal Declaration and the two Covenants - as well as the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work. They should do so for two reasons. First, the principles these instruments embody are the most universally agreed upon by the international community. Second, they are the main benchmarks against which other social actors judge the human rights impacts of companies. 54. Companies might need to consider additional standards depending on the situation. For example, in conflict affected areas they should take into account international humanitarian law and policies; and in projects affecting indigenous peoples, standards specific to those communities will be relevant. 55. The Special Representative is planning consultations to further operationalize the corporate responsibility to respect human rights and related due diligence requirements. He will also continue to seek greater conceptual clarity on two sets of issues that have emerged in stakeholder discussions, addressed briefly below. A. Responsibility to respect 56. A number of issues and dilemmas have been raised regarding the corporate responsibility to respect. Demystifying human rights 57. One issue concerns the conceptual difficulties that even companies committed to internalizing human rights have faced in mastering this subject. Part of the problem is that international human rights instruments were written by States, for States. Their meaning for businesses has not always been understood clearly by human rights experts, let alone the engineers, security managers, and supply chain officers in companies who have to deal with the corporate responsibility to respect on the ground. But considerable advances have been made recently. In particular, an OHCHR publication, “Human Rights Translated”, does what the title promises, by translating State-based text into language and examples that make sense in a 40 41 See A/HRC/8/5/Add.2 and E/CN.4/2006/97, paras. 24-30. Companies may support their baseline human rights responsibilities with collaborative initiatives focused on specific areas of rights particularly relevant to their business, such as the Voluntary Principles on Security and Human Rights and the Fair Labour Association.

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