Human Rights Monitoring Associate

Volunteering Crisis & Emergency Response Security Legal

Overview

Contribute to human rights monitoring and support victims effectively.

You have:

• Demonstrated interest and/or experience in protecting or promoting human rights and related areas.
• Experience in research and analytical skills.
• Empathy and sensitivity to work with the families of missing persons.
• Previous experience as a volunteer and/or experience of another culture would be highly regarded.

Contract

This is a UNV International Youth contract. This kind of contract is known as International UN Volunteer. It is normally internationally recruited only. More about UNV International Youth contracts.

The UN Youth Volunteer will be part of the Grave Human Rights Violations Unit, which currently consists of a coordinator and three staff members. The Grave Human Rights Violations Unit personally gives legal orientation to victims, particularly human rights defenders who search for their loved ones who have disappeared. The Grave Human Rights Unit also participates in field missions to follow up on cases of alleged human rights abuses, meeting with victims, family members of victims, local NGOs and government authorities. The Grave Human Rights Unit members collaborate in the activities of the task forces created in the Office around the main issues, such as torture, disappearances and the right of indigenous people to prior consultation, among others. In addition, the Grave Human Rights Unit prepares mission reports and reports for UN Special Procedures, treaty bodies and headquarters in Geneva.

As of January 29, 2025, over 120,000 individuals have been reported missing, marking a significant increase in disappearances between 2006 and 2025, with more than 98% occurring during this period. This surge correlates with a policy involving the deployment of armed forces for public security functions. Unlike disappearances in the second half of the last century, which were primarily politically motivated and executed by government agents and armed forces against opposition social groups, post-2006 cases involve a diverse range of perpetrators, modalities, and victims. Various patterns characterize these disappearances, including instances related to migration and affecting indigenous communities and LGBTIQ+ individuals. Predominantly, men aged 15 to 40 are impacted.

The OHCHR expresses deep concern about the specific victimization of women left to care for their families, searching for loved ones at their own expense while enduring severe social and economic effects. Women are often victims of violence, persecution, stigmatisation, extortion, and reprisals. Those searching, predominantly mothers, are also human rights defenders; some have been attacked for their involvement in searches and combating disappearances. Of the beneficiaries of the Protection Mechanism for Human Rights Defenders, 62% are human rights defenders (1.596). From 1 January 2017 to 31 December 2024, a total of 98 journalists and human rights defenders were disappeared as a possible reprisal for their work: 39 were located dead; 37 were located alive; and 22 are still missing. 19 victims are women.

Under the direct supervision of the Coordinator of Grave Human Rights Violations Unit, the UN Volunteer will undertake the following tasks:

•Contribute to research and collect information pertaining to human rights issues through monitoring human rights situations at the field level and from a variety of data sources (e.g. communications, publications, the press) to keep abreast of issues/events and pro-vide up-to-date information; •Participate in interviews with human rights victims, particularly human rights defenders who search their loved ones, relevant authorities and civil society organizations as part of the documentation of cases; •Assist in the analysis of information regarding substantive matters in the field of human rights, particularly related to journalists and human rights defenders who search for their loved ones, and recommend actions to be taken; •Assist in drafting inputs for reports, communications for UN reports and correspondence relating to human rights matters; •Provide inputs for meetings with relevant authorities to assist in strengthening their capac-ity for protection and promotion of human rights;

Results/Expected Outputs

•Provision of monitoring and analysis of human rights situations and individual cases of hu-man rights violations. •Analytical mission reports for all field missions. •Accurate new and updated cases in the human rights database. •Contribution to communications on cases or human rights situations.

☒ Accountability ☒ Adaptability and Flexibility ☒ Building Trust ☒ Commitment and Motivation ☒ Communication ☒ Ethics and Values ☒ Judgement and Decision-making ☒ Planning and Organizing ☒ Professionalism ☒ Respect for Diversity ☒ Working in Teams

Demonstrated interest and/or experience (ideally one year) in:

•Protecting or promoting human rights and related areas. •Research and analytical skills. •Empathy and sensitivity to work with the families of missing persons. •Previous experience as a volunteer and/or experience of another culture, (i.e. studies, volunteer work, internship) would be highly regarded;

•Family duty station A •Very good infrastructure (health, housing, banking transportation, telecommunications and recreational facilities) •Adequate schools. There is no lack of private schools, although the number of bilingual or bicultural schools is not high. •The current security situation in Mexico is considered as stable, nevertheless common crime activities as robbery, theft and "express kidnapping", among others, represent a serious threat to any citizen living in Mexico. •There is no direct threat to UN Staff or other international organization. •Movements within Mexico City can be done without restrictions; however, staff must adopt basic precautions.

Conditions of Service

The Conditions of Service outline the policies and rules governing UN Volunteer assignments. These, along with other resources, are available on the Unified Volunteer Platform (UVP) at https://app.unv.org/explore. You can also access the entitlement calculator here: https://app.unv.org/calculator.

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Potential interview questions

Added 1 year ago - Updated 11 months ago - Source: unv.org