REPRESENTATIVES OF RIGHTS COMMITTEES BACK GUIDELINES TO IMPROVE REPORTING OF RESPECT FOR TREATY OBLIGATIONS

28 June 2004


Representatives of seven international human rights panels have backed a set of guidelines to improve how countries report on what they are doing to abide by their human rights treaty obligations.

The experts said the proposed guidelines will allow States parties to the different rights treaties to submit information common to all or several pacts in one document, along with treaty-specific reports. Presently, a country has to present a separate full report for each treaty. The proposed guidelines on reporting place the emphasis on the mutually-reinforcing nature of the treaties and the importance of the reporting process in national-level assessment of human rights implementation.

The meetings also emphasized a more coordinated approach by the monitoring panels, or treaty bodies, and more effective follow-up to their recommendations to reinforce the role of these bodies in developing national human rights protection systems; and they underlined the importance of universal ratification of treaties, in particular the most recent, the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.

The draft guidelines will now be forwarded to each treaty body for further consideration. It was agreed however, that States parties wishing to use the draft guidelines for their reporting may do so, in consultation with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW) of the United Nations.

The one week of meetings comprised, from 21 to 22 June, working sessions among members of the following treaty bodies: the Committee on the Rights of the Child, the Committee on Migrant Workers, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Human Rights Committee, the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the Committee on the Elimination of Violence against Women and the Committee against Torture (“third inter-committee meeting”). From 23 to 25 June, the chairpersons of the committees met for their sixteenth session. Prasad Kariyawasam (Sri Lanka), Chairperson of the Committee on Migrant Workers, presided over both meetings.