State-Owned Enterprises & Public Private Partners
| CHAPTER THREE: POLICY ACTIONS
3.1. Pillar 1: The State Duty to Protect [Page 16] Under international law, States have the primary obligation to protect against human rights abuses within their jurisdiction and territory. Pillar 1 of the UNGPs clarifies that this obligation includes protecting against human rights abuses by third parties such as businesses. In this regard, states should take appropriate steps to prevent, investigate, punish and redress such abuses by having in place effective policy, legal, regulatory and adjudicative measures. States are therefore expected to explicitly set out expectations that all businesses in their jurisdictions, including state-owned businesses and those businesses with which they engage in commercial transactions, respect human rights through policies, laws and guidance.
3.2. Pillar 2: Corporate Responsibility to Respect Human Rights [Page 18] The current voluntary initiatives established and adopted by business associations on different human rights issues do not have strict compliance and reporting mechanisms. They therefore fail to offer businesses that have ascribed to them the required guidance and supervision to ensure that their operations respect human rights. There is no mandatory requirement for human rights due diligence. Businesses, including state-owned enterprises, have not embraced the practice of engaging those whose rights are most likely to be impacted by their operations in any human rights due diligence.
b) Human Rights Policy commitments [Page 19] iii. Enforce compliance with human rights standards by State owned enterprises and other businesses that receive export credit and state support, including by providing access to remedy for human rights violations;
CHAPTER FOUR: IMPLEMENTATION AND MONITORING ANNEX 1: SUMMARY OF POLICY ACTIONS [Page 25]
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