Find Human Rights Documents

UN sites

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Best source for 1) full text of UN human rights instruments; 2) documents from UN human rights treaty bodies; and 3) documents from UN human rights charter-based bodies.

United Nations Human Rights Research Guide
Explanatory guide to various UN human rights bodies with links to related sites.

UN Treaties – Notre Dame Law School only
Scanned text of UN Treaty Series. Also includes separate database listing status of all treaties.

International Criminal Court
Describes court, lists state parties, and reports cases, investigations, and news.

International Criminal Court for the Former Yugoslavia
Includes texts of judgements, documents, press releases, etc.

International Criminal Court for Rwanda
Includes texts of judgments, documents, press releases, etc.

International Court of Justice
Includes decisions (some older cases only available as summaries), current docket, Statute of the Court, and Rules of Court.

CEDAW
Site for Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Country-specific info and statistics on refugees.

United Nations
Starting point for all UN-related information.

Regional human rights bodies

European Court of Human Rights
General information, basic texts, and list of judgments and pending cases. Includes HUDOC , a searchable database of Court and Commission judgments and decisions.

Inter-American Court on Human Rights
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
Includes instruments, documents and decisions.

African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights
Includes texts and documents.

Other useful sites

University of Minnesota Human Rights Library
Contains over 6500 human rights documents and features search engine for simultaneous searching of multiple human rights web sites.

Human Rights Organizations Database
Very extensive, searchable database of human rights organizations from around the globe. Includes descriptions, directory info, and links to web sites.

International Committee of the Red Cross
Provides text of and commentaries on the Geneva Conventions; a database of some 100 international humanitarian law treaties; and documentation about the implementation of international humanitarian law at the national level.

Amnesty International
Texts of selected country and annual reports, info on current campaigns, and news releases.

Human Rights Watch
Briefings, reports and press releases.

International Network for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
Information about organizations and news on economic, social and cultural rights. Includes invaluable searchable Case Law database collecting jurisprudence from various human rights bodies.