BY: Hana Saada
ALGIERS- Mary Lawlor, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, praised her visit to Algeria as “fruitful” on Tuesday.
Lawlor noted that by accepting her visit, the Algerian government “clearly demonstrated its willingness to engage appropriately on issues related to human rights defenders.”
During a press conference providing an overview of the report she will submit to the Human Rights Council in March 2025, the UN representative emphasized that “it would have been much easier not to respond to the request, as other states have done.”
The UN Special Rapporteur specified that during her 10-day visit to Algeria, she met with government officials, representatives of civil society, and visited several provinces in the country.
Mary Lawlor highlighted that the number of high-level meetings granted to her “attests to the commitment of the Algerian government to seriously engage with the United Nations special procedures and work towards better protection of human rights defenders.”
