The Centre for Human Rights has increasingly brought its human rights expertise to bear on various activities dealing with early warning or with information relating to emergency situations. The Centre has participated in the Administrative Committee on Coordination Working Group on Early Warning of New Flows of Refugees and Displaced Persons and its subgroup on indicators. The Centre has also contributed to the development of the set of indicators for the Humanitarian Early Warning System led by the Department of Humanitarian Affairs and to the framework for coordination project for planning and implementation of complex operations in the field. The Centre is also an active participant in the relief net project coordinated by the Department and contributed to the May 1995 meeting on early warning activities related to the CIS region.
During the last year the United Nations faced a major challenge in responding to the increasingly varied demands for action made upon it by Governments and United Nations bodies. Initial difficulties encountered in fielding complex human rights missions have now been overcome and the High Commissioner is seeking the cooperation of countries in building a solid basis for future action in the following areas: (a) logistical assistance capacity on a standby basis to provide material, communications and other support needed to contribute to emergency or preventive field missions; (b) the establishment and maintenance of an international roster of specialized staff to be available at short notice for human rights field missions (investigation teams, human rights field officers, legal experts etc.); and (c) increased contributions to the voluntary fund for technical cooperation in order to cover the financial needs of advisory service field missions and assistance.
Other action must be envisaged to enable the human rights programme to respond to the new demands of the Vienna Declaration, the High Commissioner's mandate and other decisions of policy-making bodies. The structure of the programme and of the supporting secretariat is being carefully reviewed in order to rationalize the work programme and to provide the substantive and technical support needed by the programme.
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