Mr. Elmar Brok Parlement européen Bât. Altiero Spinelli 05E240 60, rue Wiertz / Wiertzstraat 60 B-1047 Bruxelles/Brussel

Email: [email protected]

Heidelberg, Germany, 1 6 October 2013

Dear Mr. Brok,

FIAN International is an international human rights organization – in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations – working for the implementation of the human right to adequate food.

I would like to draw your attention as the Chair of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the European Parliament to the on-going negotiation process of a UN Declaration on the Rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas at the United Nations Human Rights Council. While peasants and rural poor have been calling for such a declaration for a long time to address the multiple discriminations and human rights violations they face, the European Union and its member states have opposed the process towards a UN Declaration during the first session of the open-ended Intergovernmental working group (IWG) of the Human Rights Council in July 2013 (for more information see http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/RuralAreas/Pages/FirstSession.aspx ).

In September 2012, the Human Rights Council decided to establish an intergovernmental working group with the mandate of negotiating, finalizing and submitting to the Human Rights Council a draft United Nations Declaration on the Rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas , in response to the multiple discrimination and disproportional suffering from hunger of peasants, other small-scale food producers in rural areas and agricultural workers (resolution A/HRC/RES/21/19). With this resolution, the Human Rights Council followed the recommendation of its Advisory Committee, which had pointed out in its study on the “advancement of the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas” (Document A/HRC/19/75) that peasants and other people in rural areas are disproportionally affected by hunger and discrimination due to five main reasons:

- Expropriation of their lands, forced evictions and displacement; - Gender discrimination of women and girls; - Absence of agrarian reform and rural development policies, including irrigation and seeds; - Lack of minimum wages and social protection; and - Repression and criminalization of movements for the defence of the rights of people living in rural areas.

In order to overcome these serious discriminations and violations of rights, the Advisory Committee recommended, among others, to elaborate a Declaration on the Rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas and to include the affected marginalized and disadvantaged rural groups in the process. While several governments acknowledged the need for such a declaration during the first session of the intergovernmental working group (IWG) in July 2013, the European Union and many of its member states opposed this process and refused to engage in the negotiations.

FIAN is very concerned about the disproportionally high level of human rights violations suffered by peasants and other people working in rural areas. The protection of the most affected and marginalized people should be at the heart of the human rights agenda, and it is key for all states, especially the European Union and its member states to comply with their obligations under international human rights law. Therefore, I kindly urge you to support the needs of these groups and contribute to the advancement of human rights by: - including the issue of the rights of peasants and the process underway at the Human Rights Council into the agenda of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the European Parliament (EP); - asking the European Union and its member states to revise their position and to engage in the negotiations; and - proposing a resolution to the EP in support of the elaboration of a UN declaration on the rights of peasants and other people working in rural areas, based on the draft declaration submitted by the Advisory Committee of the Human Rights Council.

Please be informed that the European sections of FIAN have started an e-mail action aimed towards the Committee Members of their respective country, requesting them to follow the above mentioned proposals.

I greatly appreciate your attention and kindly ask you to keep me informed about the measures you will take in this regard.

Sincerely,

Flavio Luiz Schieck Valente

Secretary General FIAN International