The United Nations Human Rights Council was first established in 2006 to help protect universal human rights and individual freedoms. The committee is given the power to launch investigations and fact-finding missions on alleged human rights violations, pass resolutions that represent international consensus and periodically review UN members own human rights records through the Universal Periodic Review (UPR). In recent years, the UNHRC has expanded in scope to even include digital rights, the impact of climate change on humans and emerging conflicts. As Human Rights issues have become a more debated topic globally in recent years, the UNHRC's importance has only increased.