International Human Rights Documents

United Nations
The pursuit of human rights was a central reason for creating the UN. States wanted to create a legal framework for considering and acting on complaints about human rights violations. This led to the comprehensive UN human rights protection system.

Council of Europe
The Council of Europe embraces the first  regional human rights protection system created through the European Convention on Human Rights  and its protocols covering 46 countries in Europe.

Other Regional Instruments
Apart from the UN and CoE frameworks, 2 important regional human rights documents pertain to countries in the Euro-Mediterranean region: the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the Arab Charter on Human Rights.