Protecting and promoting human rights in Italy : what has become of the proposal of a national and independent commission for human rights?

Abstract

On 20 December 1993, the General Assembly of the United Nations reaffirmed the importance of developing effective national institutions for the promotion and protection of human rights. The resolution is merely exhortative. However, in view of the Italian candidature to the Human Rights Council for the term 2007-2010, the Permanent Representative of Italy in the UN referred to the commitment to establish an independent national Agency. On 20 July 2011, the Senate approved a draft law in accordance with the resolution 48/134. The text grants the Agency not only advisory and initiative powers, but also monitoring tasks and quasi-judicial powers. At the moment, the establishment of this Agency is only contained in a draft law although it seemed as if 2015 brought positive signals of recovery. For instance, a conference promoted by the interdepartmental Committee for Human Rights relaunched the project in July 2015, in a period when Europe was, as it still is, divided on the topic of priorities concerning human rights, especially for issues concerning immigration and asylum.