Amina Bouayach on Business and Human Rights in Morocco

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Amina Bouayach is the President of the National Human Rights Council in Morocco. She has been Morocco's ambassador to Sweden and Latvia and the Secretary General of the International Federation for Human Rights (known by its French acronym FIDH), and an outspoken advocate for human rights in Morocco. She has worked against the death penalty and been on missions to Tunisia and Libya during the Arab Spring.

In a recent conversation in Paris with IHRB's Salil Tripathi, Bouayach spoke of the need for greater corporate accountability for human rights. She spoke of the Moroccan initiative for a National Action Plan (NAP) on business and human rights and the rights of workers. Reacting to the criticism from Western Sahara groups which oppose Morocco's rule in the region, she stressed the need for peaceful ways of dealing with the situation. Morocco asserts Western Sahara is part of Morocco, which many Sahrawi people challenge, and the United Nations has expressed critical comments on the political situation. Violence is not the way forward, she said, and the respect for freedom of opinion must be safeguarded.