Business & Human Rights

Activists Push Divestment from Gun Companies

December 22, 2015

Echoing calls from environmental activists for large investment funds to divest from fossil fuel-related companies, journalist Suzanne McGee highlights a new movement, led by the organization Campaign to Unload, that seeks increasingly drastic measures for investors to pursue to ensure that their money is not invested with companies that produce firearms.
Philippines Human-Rights Commission Investigates "Carbon Majors"

December 22, 2015

The Philippines Commission on Human Rights has announced that it will cooperate with UN human-rights agencies in investigating a group of multinational energy companies for violating rights through their contributions to the emission of greenhouse gases.
NGO Seeks Prosecution of BHR-Violating Companies

December 22, 2015

A report from the UK nongovernmental organization Traidcraft has called for the British Government to prosecute companies that commit "serious" violations of the global business and human rights ("BHR") agenda in other countries.
Academic Charts Path for Foreign Human-Rights Suits in US

December 22, 2015

In a law review article, Cortelyou Kenney of Stanford Law School argues that there is "hope" for litigants of foreign human-rights lawsuits against corporations in US courts to succeed in obtaining remedies by using novel legal arguments to circumvent US Supreme Court jurisprudence limiting the hearing of such foreign cases.
NGO Criticizes EU for Not Supporting BHR Treaty

December 22, 2015

The nongovernmental organization Friends of the Earth Europe has published a paper deriding the EU and its member states for supporting "corporate rights" through an investor-state dispute mechanism in its trade agreements but taking measures to oppose a wide-ranging, binding UN treaty on business and human rights ("BHR").