Rights for Northern Ireland
Rights & Security International was formed in 1990 as the Britain & Ireland Human Rights Project, and was later known as British Irish Rights Watch.
In the early 1990s, our mission statement read: “We are an independent non-governmental organisation that monitors the human rights dimension of the conflict in Northern Ireland. Our services are available free of charge to anyone whose human rights have been affected by the conflict, regardless of religious, political or community affiliations, and we take no position on the eventual constitutional outcome of the Peace Process.”
We are proud to have contributed to the peace process and the development of human rights in Nothern Ireland, reflected in the Belfast / Good Friday Agreement (B/GFA) protections and the landmark Human Rights Act 1998.
Impact
As RSI has evolved to provide a greater scope of advocacy on UK-wide and international human rights issues, we have still maintained our focus on monitoring and improving human rights in Northern Ireland and contributing to transitional justice and the peace process. This work has involved research, campaigning, legal interventions and submissions to, for example, United Nations bodies such as the Human Rights Committee and the Committee Against Torture. We have long helped ensure that the international community does not forget or overlook what happens in Northern Ireland.
Present
Our present focus is on protest rights, migrants’ rights and racial justice in Northern Ireland, as well as the legacy of the conflict and the human rights of victims, survivors and their families.
We raised our concerns about the Northern Ireland ‘Legacy Act’ of 2023 throughout its passage, and together with partners, we continue to campaign for the repeal of the Act. We are also monitoring the compliance of the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR) with human rights.
The right to protest is under pressure throughout the UK and, given the ‘security’-focused treatment of protests in Nothern Ireland during the conflict, we are concerned that elements of this approach are still in operation and discourage protests, contrary to B/GFA human rights protections. Similarly, racial justice and migrants’ rights are key concerns across all of RSI’s workstreams, and we engage in campaigning and other work on this issue in Nothern Ireland — including, for example, submitting evidence to the 2024 UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination about the UK’s failure to address the intimidation of migrants in Northern Ireland.
