The Human Rights Office of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) was established in 2004, subsequent to the relocation of UN and OHCHR international staff from Iraq in September 2003, with the mandate to ensure the promotion and protection of human rights as foreseen in Security Council resolution 1546 of June 2004. Since then, the UNAMI Human Rights Office has issued fifteen public reports on the human rights situation in Iraq, and implemented a number of capacity development projects in collaboration with its partners: UNDP, UNOPS, international and national NGOs. The 2004 Human Rights Programme marked the beginning of a long-term effort by OHCHR, UNAMI Human Rights Office and partner UN agencies to assist the Iraqi authorities to meet their human rights obligations and help create a credible civil society with a capacity to play an active role in the reconstruction of the country.
From 2006 to 2009, UNAMI Human Rights Office carried out a number of training courses for the staff of the Ministry of Human Rights, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Defense on the relevant human rights standards and the international humanitarian law (IHL), and sponsored several high-level seminars on the protection of human rights within the framework of Iraq’s counter-terrorism measures. UNAMI Human Rights Office and OHCHR was also actively engaged on the development of capacity of the Ministry of Human Rights and the Ministry of Justice by sponsoring workshops and training courses for their staff in Baghdad and governorates on detention standards and human rights monitoring, and it assisted and continues to assist with the establishment of the Iraq’s High Commission of Human Rights, a Center for Missing and Disappeared Persons and a national Center for the Rehabilitation of the Victims of Torture.
In 2008, Iraqi Parliament adopted a law on the High Commission of Human Rights, following which a Committee of Experts in charge of the selection of Commissioners was established. The Government has also set up several inter-ministerial committees tasked with drafting state reports for review by relevant treaty bodies such as the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on the Rights of the Child as well as the Universal Periodic Review of the Human Rights Council. UNAMI and OHCHR continue to assist the Iraqi authorities with the establishment of the High Commission of Human Rights in compliance with the Paris Principles as stipulated in the 2005 Constitution, and provide support for the Iraqi government and civil society participation in the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process of the Human Rights Council. Iraq is scheduled to be reviewed under UPR on 16 February 2010.
OHCHR supports the work of the UNAMI by assisting in the implementation of activities and providing guidance and expert advice on specific human rights questions. As of 2009, UNAMI’s human rights officers are based in Baghdad, Erbil, Kirkuk, Mosul, Basra and Amman, thus enabling the UNAMI Human Rights Office to engage in the protection and promotion of human rights throughout the country, assist in the development of a transitional justice strategy and advocate for judicial and legal reform. Opening up of additional offices across Iraq has enabled both, the Human Rights Office and OHCHR, to have a better access to the Iraqi population, including a wider range of vulnerable populations, such as minorities, and to assist the Iraqi authorities at a local level to provide immediate remedy to human rights violations.