Discursul prim-ministrului interimar, Aureliu Ciocoi, în cadrul segmentului de nivel înalt al celei de-a 46-a sesiuni a Consiliului ONU pentru Drepturile Omului, care are loc în format de videoconferință, în perioada 22 – 24 februarie curent

Publicat:Mon, 22/02/2021 - 17:08

Madame President,

First of all, allow me to congratulate you on your election as President of the Human Rights Council. I wish you much success in these challenging times.

Excellences, dear friends,

Only one year has passed since we addressed this body in the magnificent Alliance of Civilizations Room, without realizing how different the year 2020 will turn out for all of us.

The pandemic, which in February, last year, was only starting to unfold, showed us how vulnerable, unprepared and sceptical we all were to the risk of having a virus bring the world to a standstill and change our lives beyond recognition. 

It showed how fragile our health system was and that massive investments were needed if we wanted to be able to effectively ensure the right to health for all.

Access to the right to education has also been severely impacted, affecting students/pupils from low-income families, rural areas and minorities the hardest. It demonstrated how important it is to bridge the digital gap in the education sector in order to efficiently apply alternative methods of learning.

Furthermore, the pandemic has shown, even in the countries with a good gender equality track record, that women are among the groups most heavily impacted by the societal effects of the crisis.

Against this background, another disturbing phenomenon continues to unfold: gender-based/domestic violence has been increasing exponentially as many women have been forced to ‘lockdown’ at home with their abusers.

We fully agree that we cannot have an effective post-COVID-19 recovery without placing human rights at the heart of the response measures.

One year into the pandemic, it is clear that the virus has tested our openness and cooperation and the very concept of solidarity. Nevertheless, I am certain that the pandemic, by its nature, will bring nations even closer together, foster more cooperation, more solidarity and more equity.

Now that the scientific community has delivered the extraordinary feat of developing several vaccines so fast, in a rapid manner, we need more cooperation and more concerted actions in order to ensure access to safe and effective vaccines for ALL. I would like to take this opportunity to express our deepest gratitude to every country that has answered our calls for assistance in fighting the pandemic at the national level.

Excellences,

In the same spirit of fostering cooperation and sharing experiences, allow me to highlight a number of positive steps that we have taken during the past year, in order to advance the human rights agenda through democratic reforms in the Republic of Moldova.

With reference to our international commitments, including on human rights, one major development has been organisation of the first meeting of the National Human Rights Council.

Dear friends,

I would also like to mention our continued fruitful cooperation with the human rights mechanisms.

In this respect, I will mention another significant development was the presentation, in June 2020, of the first Voluntary National Review on the implementation of the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development.

The state institutions have already started the complex task of preparing the next Universal Periodic Review Report (UPR) of the Republic of Moldova for the third cycle. We express our appreciation to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights for providing valuable assistance in this process.

At the national level, in order to streamline a Human Rights approach to democratic governance, we have embarked on an ambitious plan to develop and implement the justice sector reform.

In the same context, the Government drafted and sent to the Parliament a draft Law amending the Constitution with regard to the composition of the Superior Council of Magistracy. These much-needed changes, once approved, will strengthen independence, impartiality, accountability, efficiency and transparency of the court system in my country which is deeply needed.

We have also managed to ensure one of the most sacred elements of a democratic society – the exercise of right to vote, including for our citizens living abroad. The Republic of Moldova held Presidential elections in November last year in the midst of a pandemic and the people chose for the first time a woman as the President of my country.

A large package of socio-economic support measures was approved, benefitting both businesses and individuals during the state of emergency. The wide number of labour migrants who returned to Moldova after losing their jobs abroad have been entitled to social allowance.

On the right to education, while we are still working towards bridging the digital gap in the education sector, lessons have been filmed and broadcasted on television for households without the Internet access.

Madame President,

At same time, I would like to draw the attention of the Council to another issue of utmost importance for my country – the protracted conflict in the Transnistrian region of the Republic of Moldova and the grave human rights situation in that very region.

The situation, which has long been marked by these systematic violations, has deteriorated even more since the pandemic erupted and those who hold de facto control have imposed a so called “state of emergency”. Under the cover of measures to control the spread of Covid-19, fundamental human rights have been severely restricted, practically isolating in a prison-like system the people living in that region. 

Tiraspol has banned the free movement of 95 doctors, dozens of prosecutors and judges, 22 customs officers, hundreds of employees and even students living on the left bank of the Dniester river and working or studying on the other side of the river.

Only after the Government’s unrelenting demands and with the support of the international partners, Transnistrian leaders accepted to allow the abovementioned medical staff to cross the administrative line without any hindrance, starting with the 4 February this year.

I call on the international community to speak out against the human rights violations occurring in the region, this is among the very few instruments to ensure some form of accountability for those violations and give hope to the people living in that very region.

To conclude, I would like to reiterate my country’s firm determination to step up efforts in promoting and protecting human rights for all.

Thank you so much.

***

Intervenția video a oficialului moldovean poate fi accesată pe platforma digitală a Secretariatului ONU.

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