(5)Existing international standards on responsible business conduct specify that companies should protect human rights and set out how they should address the protection of the environment across their operations and value chains. The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UN Guiding Principles) recognise the responsibility of companies to exercise human rights due diligence by identifying, preventing and mitigating the adverse impacts of their operations on human rights and by accounting for how they address those impacts. The UN Guiding Principles state that businesses should avoid infringing human rights and should address adverse human rights impacts that they have caused, contributed to or are linked with in their own operations, those of their subsidiaries and through their direct and indirect business relationships.