The Human Rights Council Special Session is an extraordinary plenary meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) convened outside its regular three-session annual calendar to address urgent or grave human rights situations requiring immediate attention. The legal basis derives from UN General Assembly Resolution 60/251 of 15 March 2006, which established the Council as a subsidiary organ replacing the former Commission on Human Rights, and from the institution-building package contained in HRC Resolution 5/1 of 18 June 2007. Paragraph 10 of Resolution 60/251 expressly authorizes the Council to "hold special sessions, when needed, at the request of a member of the Council with the support of one third of the membership." The procedural framework is further elaborated in the rules of procedure annexed to Resolution 5/1, specifically Rules 6 and 7 governing convening and conduct.
Procedurally, a special session is triggered when any of the 47 elected member states of the Council submits a formal written request to the President of the Council, who is based in Geneva. That request must garner the support of at least 16 members—one-third of the Council's membership—communicated in writing to the secretariat. Upon verification of the threshold, the President, in consultation with the Bureau and through the secretariat of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), convenes the session within two working days of receipt of the qualifying request. The duration is, as a rule, no longer than three days unless the Council decides otherwise, and the session must conclude with the adoption (or rejection) of an outcome document, typically a resolution.
Participation extends beyond the 47 members: observer states, UN specialized agencies, intergovernmental organizations, national human rights institutions accredited with "A" status under the Paris Principles, and accredited non-governmental organizations in consultative status with ECOSOC may take the floor under arrangements analogous to regular sessions. Resolutions are adopted by simple majority of members present and voting, and may establish commissions of inquiry, fact-finding missions, or mandate the High Commissioner to report back at a subsequent regular session. The Council has also developed the practice of holding "urgent debates" within regular sessions as a lighter-touch alternative when the one-third threshold for a full special session is uncertain or when timing aligns with an ongoing session.
Since 2006 the Council has convened more than thirty special sessions. Early sessions concentrated on the Occupied Palestinian Territory (the first, third, sixth, ninth, twelfth, fifteenth, and twenty-first sessions all addressed Israeli military operations or settlement activity), reflecting the diplomatic activism of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. The second special session (November 2006) addressed Lebanon following the 2006 war. Country-specific sessions have covered Myanmar (October 2007, following the Saffron Revolution crackdown), Darfur, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sri Lanka (May 2009, controversially endorsing the Rajapaksa government's narrative), Côte d'Ivoire, Libya (February 2011, which recommended suspension from the Council), Syria (multiple sessions from 2011 onward), the Central African Republic, Iraq, Burundi, South Sudan, and Ukraine. The 34th special session, convened in Geneva on 12 May 2021, addressed the deteriorating situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and East Jerusalem; the session on Ukraine in March 2022 established a Commission of Inquiry headed by Erik Møse. Thematic special sessions have addressed the global food crisis (2008) and the financial crisis's impact on human rights (2009).
A special session must be distinguished from an urgent debate, which is held within the framework of an ongoing regular session and requires only a procedural majority decision rather than the one-third co-sponsorship trigger; from the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), a peer-review mechanism applying to all UN member states on a 4.5-year cycle; and from country-mandated special procedures (special rapporteurs and independent experts) whose mandates are created by ordinary resolutions of regular sessions. It is also distinct from emergency special sessions of the UN General Assembly convened under the "Uniting for Peace" Resolution 377A (V) of 1950, which operate in New York and carry different political weight.
Controversies recur on three axes. First, selectivity: critics argue the trigger has been used disproportionately against certain states while comparable situations elsewhere escape scrutiny; the standing Agenda Item 7 on the Occupied Palestinian Territory remains a particular flashpoint. Second, the politicization of outcomes—the May 2009 session on Sri Lanka adopted a resolution widely criticized as congratulating the government rather than investigating alleged war crimes during the final phase of the conflict against the LTTE. Third, threshold gaming: states sometimes withhold co-sponsorship to deny the one-third trigger while permitting a weaker urgent debate. Recent practice shows increased use of commissions of inquiry as the principal operational output, with mandates of one year renewable, supported by dedicated OHCHR secretariats.
For the practitioner, the special session is the Council's most visible rapid-response instrument and a barometer of diplomatic alignments in Geneva. Desk officers monitoring crisis situations should track co-sponsorship lists in real time through the HRC Extranet, as the identity of the 16 triggering states signals regional bloc cohesion (the African Group, GRULAC, EU, and OIC behave as discernible caucuses). Outcome resolutions create downstream reporting obligations, briefing opportunities at subsequent regular sessions, and political cover for unilateral or coalition measures such as sanctions, visa restrictions, or referrals to the International Criminal Court. Drafting a special-session resolution is among the most time-compressed exercises in multilateral diplomacy and rewards prepared text, pre-cleared capitals, and a clear theory of follow-up action.
Example
On 4 March 2022, the Human Rights Council convened its 34th special session at Ukraine's request and established an Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine chaired by Norwegian judge Erik Møse.