A/70/255 minority communities, large-scale displacement, expulsion and other grave human rights violations. 5. The United Nations has repeatedly emphasized the importance of a culture of prevention and response and is committed to supporting such efforts and exposing gaps. As stated by the Deputy Secretary-General at the opening of the seventh session of the Forum on Minority Issues, held in November 2014, minority rights are a vital component of the three pillars of the United Nations, namely, peace and security, human rights and development. They require the systematic and coordinated engagement of every part of the United Nations system. That interdependence is at the heart of the Secretary-General’s Human Rights Up Front initiative, which calls for a system-wide effort to prevent and respond to serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law. II. Selected activities conducted by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights 6. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has pursued a range of activities aimed at increasing the understanding of stakeholders of how to promote and protect minority rights, including through the identification of good practices. Its continuous advocacy for enhanced respect for minority rights has helped to strengthen the capacity of both State and civil society representatives at the country level, although significant gaps remain. A. Strengthening advocacy and developing capacity 7. In order to advance minority rights generally, including protecting the existence of minorities and combating exclusion, cooperation between international, regional and national actors is crucial. In that regard, the p articipation of minorities at all the stages of implementation of programmes to benefit them is critical. 8. The annual OHCHR Minorities Fellowship Programme seeks to inform persons belonging to minorities about the United Nations human rights system, so that they can use international instruments and mechanisms more effectively to protect the human rights of members of their own communities. At the same time, the Fellowship Programme provides the opportunity for the exchange of ideas and the sharing of experiences among participants in the programme. 9. In 2013, the Minorities Fellowship Programme, which was held from 29 October to 30 November, comprised two linguistic components (Arabic and English), with participants coming from Canada, Colombia, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Iraq, Latvia, Libya, Nepal, Nigeria, the Sudan and the Syrian Arab Republic. 10. The 2014 Fellowship Programme, held from 27 October to 28 November, additionally had a Russian language component and a training module on project design, effective fundraising for human rights and the documenting of human rights violations to make it more operational. Fellows came from Egypt, Estonia, Georgia, Iraq, Kyrgyzstan, Lithuania, Mauritania, Nepal, Nicaragua, Pakistan, the Syrian Arab Republic and Yemen. 15-12580 3/14