Sara Hossain appointed to inquiry commission on protests in Palestine

Barrister Sara Hossain, a Supreme Court lawyer, has been named as one of the three members of the "Commission of Inquiry" on the 2018 protests in the occupied Palestinian territory. President of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Ambassador Vojislav Suc (Slovenia) announced the appointment on Wednesday.

The two other members are David Michael Crane (United States) and Kaari Betty Murungi (Kenya). Crane will serve as Chair of the three-member commission, according to the UNHRC.

Sara Hossain is an honorary executive director of Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST). In 2016, she was appointed by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as one of the two experts on accountability to support the work of the Special Rapporteur on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

The council decided to urgently dispatch an independent, international commission of inquiry at its special session of May 18, 2018, “to investigate all alleged violations and abuses of international humanitarian law and international human rights law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, particularly in the occupied Gaza Strip, in the context of the military assaults on the large-scale civilian protests that began on 30 March 2018”.

The commission is scheduled to present an oral update to the UNHRC at its 39th session in September 2018 and a final, written report at its 40th session to be held in March 2019.