BUSINESS AND HUMAN RIGHTS / Šturma, Mozetic (eds)

State party companies, both at home and abroad, can claim reparations through the State party’s judicial and non-judicial mechanisms; 28 to link public procurement with the observance of economic, social and cultural rights; and to strengthen the capacity of national contact points. 29 The CESCR Committee has recommended measures for both developed and developing States. For example, it has urged France to take measures to prevent business enterprises domiciled in its territory or under its jurisdiction from committing human rights violations abroad. In that connection, it has encouraged adoption of a law imposing binding obligation on such enterprises to fulfil their duty of care with respect to human rights. 30 At its last session in June 2018, the Committee examined the negative impact of extractive activities on health and rights of workers, communities, farmers and agro-pastoralist in Niger. The concerns included uranium contamination of a town, consumption and contamination of water and expropriation of land without legal guarantees. The State party has been demanded, inter alia , to ensure strict application of the legal framework concerning exploitation of natural resources, conduct independent investigation into the impact of extractive activities on economic, social and cultural rights prior and during the implementation of projects, and conduct inspections of mining sites. 31 The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD Committee) has focused on protection of human rights of vulnerable groups, such as indigenous people, minority groups and persons of African descent, from adverse impact of business activities. 32 The Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW Committee) has addressed discrimination of women in the private sector, requested adoption of temporary special measures to develop capacity of women entrepreneurs, 33 to promote women access to management positions in the business sector 34 and more generally to adopt measures to ensure substantive equality of women with men in the labour market, promote employment of women, eliminate occupational segregation and close the gender wage gap. 35 The Human Rights Committee has adopted recommendations specifically targeting the business sector less frequently. An example of a recommendation would be a request to State parties to set out clearly the expectations that all business enterprises domiciled 28 Ibid. 29 National contact points are established under the Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in the Member States of OECD. 30 Concluding observations: France (E/C.12/FRA/CO/4). The Concluding observations were issued at 2016 when France considered adoption of the bill on corporate due diligence. The law was approved on 21 February 2017 and upheld by the Constitutional Court on 23 March 2017. 31 Concluding observations: Niger (E/C.12/NER/CO/1). 32 Concluding observations: Norway (CERD/C/NOR/CO/21-22), Netherlands (CERD/C/NLD/CO/19-21). 33 Concluding observations: Andorra (CEDAW/C/AND/CO/2-3). 34 Concluding observations: Denmark (CEDAW/C/DENPCO/7), Sweden (CEDAW/SWE/CO/7), Netherlands (CEDAW/C/NLD/CO/4). 35 Concluding observations: Hungary (CEDAW/C/HUN/CO/7-8) Concluding observations: Italy (CRC/C/ ITA/CO/3-4), see also Finland (CRC/C/FIN/CO/4).

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