A/HRC/59/49 II. Activities of the Special Rapporteur Country visits 11. The Special Rapporteur conducted an official back-to-back visit to Colombia and Panama from 6 to 19 February 2025. The Special Rapporteur thanks the Government of Mauritania for agreeing to host his visit in September 2025 and encourages prompt agreement on the exact dates. At present, visits are subject to availability of funds, given the current financial crises at the United Nations owing to the lack of payment of assessed contributions by Member States. Other activities 12. On 12 September, the Special Rapporteur spoke the webinar on the human rights situation of migrants in vulnerable situations in North Africa, organized by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). 13. On 21 and 22 October, the Special Rapporteur presented his report on protecting child rights in migration contexts to the General Assembly and participated in a side event entitled “Children are children first and foremost: Protecting child rights in migration contexts”. 14. Also in October, the Special Rapporteur participated as a panellist on a hybrid side-event co-organized by the Quaker United Nations Office in Geneva on “Human rights of migrants in transit: the need for independent monitoring”. 15. In November, the Special Rapporteur participated in two panels at the 2024 conference of the Africa Chapter of the International Association of Refugee and Migration Judges, held in Sharm el Sheik, Egypt, on: (a) strengthening protection and solutions in the context of mixed movements of refugees and migrants and (b) legal and physical barriers to refugee protection. III. Applicable legal framework A. Right to life, prohibition of arbitrary detention and of torture and ill-treatment 16. The universal human rights and fundamental freedoms of migrants must be respected, protected and fulfilled at all times. 17 These rights are guided by the principle of non-discrimination, which is regarded as a jus cogens norm. 18 Everyone has the non-derogable right to life and the right not to be arbitrarily deprived of their life.19 This right entails the duty of States to exercise due diligence to protect individuals from threats to their lives from non-State actors.20 These threats may include dangerous geographical conditions, in circumstances where life-threatening situations may be foreseeable, even when those threats and situations are not caused directly by the State. 21 The right to life further encompasses the dignity and protection of the dead and the right of families to the remains 17 18 19 20 21 4 Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, para. 4. Committee on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, general comment No. 5 (2021), para. 32. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art 6 (1); Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 6; Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, art. 10; and International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, art. 9. Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 36 (2018), paras. 7 and 21; and Inter-American Court of Human Rights, Hacienda Brasil Verde workers v. Brazil (20 October 2016), para. 323. Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 36 (2018), paras. 7 and 62; European Court of Human Rights, Öneryildiz v. Turkey, Application No. 48939/99, Judgment, 30 November 2004, para. 98; and Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), “‘Lethal disregard’: search and rescue and the protection of migrants in the central Mediterranean Sea” (United Nations, 2021), p. 7.