UN Authority Figures

UN Commission for Social Development: Egypt

Prison sentence for Egyptian workers' rights activist: Kamal Abbas (photo), General Coordinator of the Center for Trade Unions and Workers Services (CTUWS) and his lawyer, Mohamed Helmy have been sentenced to one year imprisonment by an Egyptian court.
Source: Libcom.org

Mission of the Commission for Social Development: "...the Commission has been the key UN body in charge of the follow-up and implementation of the Copenhagen Declaration and Programme of Action....Each year since 1995, the Commission has taken up key social development themes as part of its follow-up to the outcome of the Copenhagen Summit. These themes are...Promoting full employment and decent work for all...Improving public sector effectiveness....National and international cooperation for social development...Integration of social and economic policy..." (Commission for Social Development web-site)

Egypt's Term of office: 2011-2015 (re-elected April 28, 2010)

Egypt's Record on Social Development:
"Women faced extensive discrimination in the labor force... Authorities arrested or subjected to other legal sanctions an increasing number of labor organizers, often following the dispersal or end of a labor strike. Police, and the military to a lesser extent, were involved in forceful dispersal of labor demonstrations or actions... Some workers, most often migrant workers and children, were subjected to conditions indicative of forced labor. Some female workers in domestic service were held in conditions indicative of forced labor... Overall, authorities did not enforce child labor laws effectively" (US State Department Country Report of Human Rights Practices in Egypt, 2013)