Side-event during the 59th session of the UN Human Rights Council
Wednesday, 25 June 2025, 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm CET
Room XXV, Palais des Nations
SRI Side-event at HRC 59 organised in collaboration with the Global Network of Sex Work Projects (NSWP), the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women (GAATW) and the European Sex Workers Rights Alliance (ESWA), FIZ Fachstelle Frauenhandel und Frauenmigration, Tiyane Vavasate, and the Caribbean Alliance of Sex Workers. It was co-sponsored by Urgent Action Fund, SWAN, APC, CREA, ICJ, AWID, ILGA, IPPF, La Strada International, GATE, Women Deliver, Akahata, Just Futures Collaborative, Amnesty International, Wo=Men, Our Voices Our Future, and Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights.
This side event will address the harms caused by conflating sex work with trafficking, deriving from a paternalistic approach to sex work and denying sex workers their right to bodily autonomy & capacity to consent. The side event will emphasise the urgent need to recognise sex work as work – a human rights and practical imperative to prevent and eliminate all forms of discrimination.