TEHRAN –The Secretary-General of Iran’s National Commission for UNESCO has elaborated on the deliberate destruction of development by the US through adopting coercive sanctions and launching military aggressions against the country.
“Forty years after the adoption of the Declaration on the Right to Development, its promise remains unfulfilled for millions. The question is no longer whether development is a human right, but why some states are still allowed to systematically deprive other people of that right,” IRNA quoted Hassan Fartousi as saying while addressing the 63rd session of the Human Rights Council, being held from September 7 to October 7.
Recognizing the right to development becomes meaningful only when the international community can offer effective and actionable solutions to the obstacles that practically prevent nations from accessing the resources, opportunities, and infrastructure necessary for development, the official added.
“For decades, the United States has subjected the Iranian people to extensive unilateral coercive measures, obstructing access to financial resources, technology, medicine, and essential goods, and deliberately constraining our development. Today, the same United States has added military aggression to the economic coercion.
The impact of these illegal measures is not limited to economic indicators; it also affects health, education, infrastructure, and human capital, he added.
“When hospitals are attacked, when schools are destroyed, when children are killed in their classrooms, we are not merely witnessing casualties of war. We are witnessing the deliberate destruction of development itself. A school destroyed in seconds represents years of trauma for the students and challenges in education. A hospital struck means not only a damaged building, but the destruction of health, human capital, and future generations,” Fartousi further noted.
The official went on to say that “Forty years after the declaration, commemoration is not enough. Those who destroy development through unlawful coercion and military aggression must be held accountable. Hereby, as the Secretary General of the Iranian National Commission for UNESCO in Iran, the right to development must be a right for all people, especially the people who are living in the developing countries.”
The 63rd session of the Human Rights Council biennial panel discussion on the right to development was held under the theme ‘Commemoration of the fortieth anniversary of the Declaration on the Right to Development’.
The panel aimed to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Right to Development (DRTD), and to reaffirm the commitment of the international community to the effective realization of the right to development as an inalienable human right for all; take stock of the achievements, obstacles and challenges encountered over the past four decades in the implementation of the Declaration on the Right to Development at the national, regional and international levels, including lessons learned; and identify elements towards a road map for the concrete operationalization of the right to development including through adoption of the draft International Covenant on the Right to Development.
It also aimed to explore the contribution of the right to development framework to the implementation of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development and beyond, including by proposing principles, policy recommendations and institutional pathways; and to catalyse a forward-looking dialogue on the future of the right to development as it enters its fifth decade.
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