[JURIST] Six human rights organizations, including Amnesty International (AI) and Human Rights Watch (HRW) [advocacy websites], are calling for the next UN Secretary-General to do everything he or she can to protect innocent civilians whose nations face armed conflict. The groups have outlined eight priorities [text, PDF] that they believe the next UN Secretary-General must address to protect human rights in nations such as Syria, Iraq and South Sudan. The priorities outlined include strengthening the UN’s impact on human rights, championing the rights of marginalized people, preventing and ending mass atrocities, combating impunity, defending civil society, ensuring gender equality, delivering a new deal for refugees and migrants, and ending the death penalty. The successor to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be nominated before the end of the year.

In March EU leaders agreed to a deal [JURIST report] with Turkey to stem migrant flows, particularly of Syrian refugees, to Europe in return for financial and political incentive to Ankara. Under the terms of the deal [WP report], all migrants crossing the Aegean into Greece would be sent back to Turkey, effectively turning the country into the region’s “migrant holding center.” Meanwhile, Amnesty International last week a reported record number of executions [JURIST report] in 2015. On the gender equality front, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights stated in September that no country has achieved full equality [JURIST report] between men and women