GENEVA (9 November 2017) – Zambia’s human rights record will be examined by the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group for the third time on Monday, 13 November 2017 in a meeting that will be webcast live.

Zambia is one of the 14 States to be reviewed by the UPR Working Group during its upcoming session taking place from 6 to 17 November.  Zambia’s first and second UPR reviews took place in May 2008 and October 2012, respectively.

The documents on which the reviews are based are: 1) national report - information provided by the State under review; 2) information contained in the reports of independent human rights experts and groups, known as the Special Procedures, human rights treaty bodies, and other UN entities; 3) information provided by other stakeholders including national human rights institutions, regional organizations and civil society groups.

Among the issues raised in the above-mentioned documents are: ramping up child protection efforts, including raising the minimum age for criminal liability, ending child marriage and child labour; combatting malnutrition; ending the stigmatization and the killing of people with albinism for their body parts; decriminalizing homosexual conduct;  reducing poverty, and the protection of environmental and human rights in relation to the mining and agricultural industry; addressing political intolerance and violence; the abolition of the death penalty; ending torture and ill-treatment by security forces; halting gender-based violence and the equality of women; guaranteeing the freedom of assembly, expression and information; ensuring accessibility to HIV/AIDS related health care services; improving access to quality education including by improving school facilities and providing adequate training to teachers; and ensuring free birth registration.

The three reports serving as the basis for the review of Zambia on 13 November can be found here.

Location: Room 20, Palais des Nations, Geneva
Time and date: 14.30 – 18.00, Monday, 13 November (Geneva time, GMT +1 hour)

The UPR is a unique process which involves a periodic review of the human rights records of all 193 UN Member States.  Since its first meeting was held in April 2008, all 193 UN member States have been reviewed twice within the first and second UPR cycles.  During the third UPR cycle, States are again expected to spell out steps they have taken to implement recommendations posed during their previous reviews which they committed to follow-up on, as well as to highlight recent human rights developments in the country.

The delegation of the Zambia will be headed by Mr. Given Lubinda, Minister of Justice.

The three country representatives serving as rapporteurs (“troika”) for the review of Zambia are: Switzerland, China and Kenya.

The webcast of the session will be at http://webtv.un.org

The list of speakers and all available statements to be delivered during the review of Zambia will be posted on the UPR Extranet at the following link.

The UPR Working Group is scheduled to adopt the recommendations made to Zambia at 17.00 on 16 November.  The State under review may wish to express its positions on recommendations posed to it during their review.  The recommendations will be shared with the media on this day in advance.   

ENDS

For more information and media requests, please contact Rolando Gómez at +41 (0) 22 917 9711 /  rgomez@ohchr.org , Sarah Lubbersen at +41 (0) 22 917 9689 / slubbersen@ohchr.org or Cédric Sapey at +41 (0) 22 917 9751 / csapey@ohchr.org

To learn more about the Universal Periodic Review, visit: www.ohchr.org/hrc/upr

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