Mini UN

There are 27 of us from 19 countries. Impressive. Next week we will go to the UN at Geneva to do a moot court. We've already got that geographic diversity thing down.

This is from yesterday's tour. The hands on the clock span 7 metres.

Hallway outside our classroom.

Today we covered a lot of material I wrote about over the past year, UN Guiding Principles, UN treaty bodies, and the ILO. In the afternoon we debated a binding treaty wherein states have the power to compel transnational companies to meet human rights standards. Such a treaty was debated at the UN last week. There are mountains of soft flaw and corporate codes spelling out obligations for corporations to comply with human rights standards, however they can be flaunted with impunity.

We saw a short documentary about Rhana Plaza, in which more than 1,100 people died making clothes for Westerners who want cheap fashion. Under the current system, the Big Brand can subcontract to an approved company, which then subcontracts to an unapproved company, and no one is held accountable when it all comes crumbling down. International law is weak on extraterritorial claims and domestic law in Bangladesh--a notoriously corrupt system--is unlikely to provide legal remedies. I read last semester that there were 27 fires in Bangla factories during the month before Rhana. A few hundred died. Rhana was just on a larger scale.

Another random photo from yesterday's tour. I'm randomly backfilling photos.

I have lots of photos but I'm late in uploading because the internet connection at the pension isn't very good. Like the university, the pension isn't air conditioned, so at night I face the choice of windows open (cool air but lots of noise from the street) or windows closed (hot but silent). Four females sharing one bathroom, all trying to get showers in the hour before our 8 a.m. breakfast. I have an advantage because I don't go out at night, unlike the tireless young people, so I'm up first.
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