TEHRAN -- Iran’s High Council for Human Rights called on the United Nations on Sunday to take immediate steps to protect Lebanese civilians, document Israeli violations, and pursue legal action over crimes committed during Israel’s continued attacks on Lebanon.
In a statement, the rights body said ongoing Israeli military attacks have recently killed and wounded dozens of civilians, including women and children, and criticized the international community’s failure to take effective action.
“The continued attacks on civilians constitute an explicit violation of the right to life, the right to security and human dignity, while contravening fundamental principles of international humanitarian law, including the distinction between military and civilian targets and the principle of proportionality in armed conflict,” the Council said.
The High Council warned that “the recurrence of these crimes, coupled with a lack of effective accountability, signals the emergence of a dangerous cycle of impunity”.
The body warned against “double standards” in the international response to human rights violations, arguing that “human rights are universal and that the value of a Lebanese civilian’s life should not be deemed less than that of victims elsewhere in the world based on nationality, geography or political considerations”.
“Remaining silent in the face of the killing of women and children while simultaneously claiming to uphold the universality of human rights seriously undermines the credibility of international human rights mechanisms,” it said.
The Council further said “the inaction of certain international human rights bodies and the Security Council’s failure to take effective measures to halt these atrocities effectively embolden the Zionist Regime to persist in its gross human rights violations and undermine the concept of international accountability”.
It called upon the Human Rights Council, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and other international mechanisms to “abandon selective and political approaches” and take action toward “the immediate cessation of attacks on civilians, the protection of the right to life of the people of Lebanon, and the documentation and legal pursuit of the crimes committed”.
“The right to life is a universal right, not a privilege contingent upon geography or politics,” it said.