IV.  APPLICATION OF INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS LAW AND INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW BY THE UNITED NATIONS Maintaining peace and preventing armed conflict are vital concerns of the United Nations. As provided in Article 1.3 of the Charter of the United Nations, promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without discrimination is one of the fundamental purposes of the Organization. In this respect, the United Nations has a long history of drawing on both international human rights law and international humanitarian law to protect people during times of armed conflict. It takes into account that the adoption of important international instruments on human rights, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international human rights treaties, has contributed to affirm the idea that everyone is entitled to enjoy human rights, whether in peacetime or in wartime. In the past two decades United Nations Member States have increasingly called on the United Nations Secretariat and specialized agencies to use both bodies of law as the basis for their objectives and activities, leading to the development of considerable expertise, methodology and practice in the field. Both regimes of law are applied in the context of the General Assembly, the Security Council and the Human Rights Council. They are also used in the context of resolutions, monitoring, investigations, analysis, and reporting by the United Nations Secretariat and specialized agencies, including the Secretary-General and OHCHR. International human rights law and international humanitarian law have been applied, in particular, in the context of the Security Council’s work concerning the protection of categories of persons, including civilians, women, children and IDPs. This chapter provides examples of the application of international human rights and humanitarian law by the United Nations in these various contexts. A.  THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY The General Assembly, as the main norm-creating body of the United Nations, has since the creation of the Organization been actively involved in the development of human rights norms, including the Universal 93