Professor Siobhán Mullally

Established by a group of UN and regional independent human rights experts in December, PIERR aims to better co-ordinate joint advocacy initiatives that will enhance the protection and promotion of human rights of refugees and asylum-seekers.

It is supported by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and UNHCR, the UN refugee agency.

Professor Mullally, director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights at the University of Galway, said: “The Platform is being launched at a time when persecution, conflict, violence, and human rights violations, have resulted in record numbers of people displaced and forced to seek protection.

“At the same time, the rights of refugees and asylum seekers are increasingly threatened by a denial of the right to seek asylum. We are witnessing increasingly punitive measures adopted by states, collective expulsions, deprivation of liberty, limited access to asylum procedures, as well as hostility and xenophobia worldwide.

“Against this background, it is urgent that we work together across international and regional human rights bodies, to mobilise the full potential of international law and the promised universality of human rights protections.

“I hope that this global platform will be an effective advocate for the rights of refugees and asylum seekers, recognising the fundamental right to seek asylum, enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and a foundation of our shared responsibility to provide a place of refuge.”