Human rights are universal and apply equally at sea as they do on land. The ocean — the world’s largest biome as it covers 70% of the Earth – has an estimated regular population of 30 million people at any given moment, an equivalent to the population of a medium-sized state.

However, “there is significant and growing evidence of widespread, deliberate, and often systematic abuse of human rights at sea”:

– Estimates by the Food and Agricultural Office (FAO) of the UN also show that at least 32,000 fishers lose their lives when doing their job every year, with most fishing activities often taking place on remote bodies of water.
– Over 9 million seafarers ensuring the movement of around 90% of global trade. Though indispensable to the global economy, they are often treated as challenging working and living conditions at sea pose significant threats to their human rights.
– Other abuses include issues as diverse as forced labour and slavery on fishing vessels and other ships, the abandonment of seafarers in ports far from home, the victimization of seafarers by pirates and other maritime criminals, instances of physical and sexual abuse on ships, the treatment of irregular migrants and the plight of trafficked people at sea.

At the same time, marine environmental stressors equally pose adverse human rights impacts. As highlighted by the report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to a healthy environment to the Human Rights Council (A/HRC/58/59), the interconnected crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution, as well as business activities that often prioritizes corporate profits over environmental protection and human rights, are intensifying pressure on a distressed ocean. These further jeopardize the human rights of people at sea, including Indigenous Peoples, fisher communities, peasants, women, children, people with pre-existing health conditions, older persons, persons with disabilities and those facing marginalization.

Despite having over 600 legal and institutional frameworks addressing the complex interdependence of human rights, economic activities and marine ecosystems, international ocean spaces are still poorly regulated. Their fragmentation, marked by multiple levels of intervention and an absence of coordination, has prevented enforcement and resulted in ineffective ocean governance, which is exacerbated by weak political ambition, corruption and a lack of transparency and extraterritorial enforcement. As vast areas of the sea are beyond the territorial jurisdiction of States, addressing the human rights situation at sea would require tremendous efforts.

As highlighted in the Special Rapporteur’s report, while important initiatives are being agreed internationally, regionally and nationally, such as the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries in the Context of Food Security and Poverty Eradication, and the Agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ), they do not necessarily reflect the interconnectedness of the ocean and human rights.

Initiatives such as the Geneva Declaration on Human Rights at Sea initiated and conceived in February 2019, as a response to the ongoing systematic abuse of human rights at sea globally, brings together existing international law into one document, and provides practical guidance to states on how to ensure that human rights abuses at sea are detected, remedied, and ultimately ended.

Considering the too often dramatic human rights situation at sea, the Geneva Rights and Environment Talk will discuss the obligations of Member States to respect, protect and full human rights related to the ocean, including the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. The talk will tackle possible ways forward in ensuring that human rights are applied equally at sea as they do on land.

About the Geneva Rights and Environment Talks

More information: https://www.genevaenvironmentnetwork.org/events/human-rights-at-sea-geneva-rights-and-environment-talks/