Guidance on Respecting the Rights of Human Rights Defenders

This guidance aims to sharpen the focus of the Voluntary Principles on Security and Human Rights on human rights defenders and the wider civic space in which they work. It offers an analytical and operational framework to identify and address risks to human rights defenders across key elements of VPs implementation: risk assessment and due diligence; stakeholder and community engagement; and relationships with security forces and host country governments.

Although focused on the extractives and agribusiness sectors, this guidance is also relevant to the renewable energy and timber sectors among others. It is addressed to VPI corporate implementers, Government and Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) Pillars but can also serve as a resource for all actors, VPI and non-VPI members alike.

This guidance has benefited significantly from the work by LITE-Africa included in the report “Understanding the Unique Situation of Human Rights Defenders in Africa”.