The United Nations lacks the funds to annually update its data base of companies doing business with Israeli entities over the Green Line, including in east Jerusalem, the Golan Heights and in West Bank settlements, the High Commissioner for Human Rights Michele Bachelet said on Thursday.
Her office published the data base, dubbed the “blacklist,” in 2020 after a three-year delay. It identified 130 business entities, of which 112 were local Israeli companies and 18 were foreign-based companies, who were engaged in such activities.
The list is designed to highlight corporate activity linked to alleged violations of international law, such as settlement activity. Bachelet’s office has not created a similar database for any other county over alleged violations of international law.
The United Nations Human Rights Council has mandated that Bachelet update the data base on a yearly basis. Speaking to the UNHRC on Thursday, Bachelet said that it was not financially feasible to annually update the data base.
“It is not possible for the [Human Rights] office to absorb, on an open-ended recurring basis into the future, the substantial resources that updating the database and reporting to the council would annually imply,” Bachelet said.
“Any further work in this area can only be discharged consistent with the organization’s budgetary process applicable to funding mandates of the Council.”