BDS activists welcome decision by UNICEF in Jordan to end contract with G4S

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Jordan has ended its contract with British security giant G4S, following a campaign by Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) activists.

UNICEF’s decision comes after a year-long campaign which included meetings, letters, protests and social media actions.

G4S has provided services to various UN agencies in Jordan including UNICEF and UNHCR, both of whom no longer have contracts with the company. Other UN bodies in Jordan including United Nations Development Program (UNDP), World Food Program (WFP), and United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) still have contracts with the firm.

G4S is a long-standing target of BDS activists due to its complicity in Israel’s detention and torture of Palestinian political prisoners and other human rights violations.

Guman Mussa, the Arab World campaigns coordinator with the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), praised the decision: “This is an important decision in accordance with the values of human and children’s rights espoused by UNICEF. We urge the United Nations, its Secretary General Ban Ki Moon and all UN agencies contracting G4S worldwide to follow the lead of UNICEF and UNHCR in Jordan and immediately end their contracts with G4S.”

Yazid Halaseh, member of the Jordan BDS movement, said the group was “delighted” by the news.

We will continue campaigning to demand an end to all UN agency contracts with G4S until the firm stops profiting from occupation and apartheid. The United Nations should simply ban this notorious firm from its procurement process because it is profiting from the Israeli settler-colonial project, ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians and apartheid policies. These are all violations of UN resolutions, basic principles of human rights and international law.