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COMMITTEE ON ELIMINATION OF DISCRIMINATION AGAINST WOMEN OPENS FORTY-THIRD SESSION
20 January 2009
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Committee on Elimination of Discrimination
Against Women
19 January 2009
Committee Adopts Agenda, Holds Informal Meeting with Non-Governmental Organizations from Armenia and Dominica
The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women today opened its forty-third session, adopted its agenda and methods of work, and held an informal meeting with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from Armenia and Dominica whose reports will be considered during the session.
Bacre Ndaiye, Director of the Human Rights Council and Treaties Division of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, addressing the Committee, spoke of the progress made on the international level in the field of the elimination of discrimination against women, such as the adoption of the Optional Protocol relating to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights by the General Assembly in December 2008. The General Assembly, at its sixty-third session, had also adopted a resolution related to the intensification of action undertaken to eliminate all forms of violence against women. In April this year, the review of the Durban Conference would take place in Geneva, with the main goal of evaluating the progress achieved in the fight against racism since the World Conference against Racism in 2001. The High Commissioner for Human Rights would continue to support the Committee in its work, and wished it a fruitful session.
Having adopted the agenda and methods of work, the Committee heard the following eight new members take a solemn declaration: Nicole Ameline, Violet Awori, Barbara Bailey, Niklas Bruun, Indira Jaising, Soledad Murillo de la Vega, Victoria Popescu and Zohra Rasekh. The Committee will elect its new bureau at a later stage.
The Committee then heard the report of the Chairperson, Dubravka Simonovic, on activities undertaken between sessions. Ms. Simonovic said this was her last statement as Chairperson. In the two years during which she was Chairperson, 66 reports had been examined, and a backlog had been cleared. A long-term solution of three meetings per year starting from 2010 had also been achieved, but this should be matched with timely reporting from States Parties that should clear their reporting delays. The Committee had also adopted a General Recommendation on Women Migrant Workers, but they were still lagging behind in work on a draft general recommendation on Article 2. It had started work on two new general recommendations, on older women and on economic consequences of divorce. In spite of progress, more needed to be done and more efforts were needed from all stakeholders on the implementation of the Convention and concluding observations if there were to be results on the ground and in the lives of individual women.
During the session, the Committee is scheduled to consider periodic reports from Armenia, Cameroon, Dominica, Germany, Guatemala, Haiti, Libya and Rwanda.
The Committee held an informal meeting with non-governmental organizations, hearing statements from three Armenian NGOs, namely All Armenian Women's Union, "Democracy Today" NGO, and Armenian Association of University Educated Women, and two Dominican NGOs - Dominican National Coalition of Women, and Dominica Association of Disabled People.
On Armenia, speakers said there were critical obstacles faced by women in enjoying their human rights in Armenia. There was still much to be done to achieve the universally accepted standards of gender equality and human rights principles. There was particular concern that the Government had not yet taken any steps to incorporate the Covenant into the national legislation system. The existing institutional mechanisms did not meet the criteria for national machinery as none of these entities formulated or identified anti-discriminatory policies and a gender equality policy or coordinated the activities of Government bodies in this area.
On Dominica, speakers said the Constitution of Dominica provided for equal and inalienable rights to all persons. The efforts of the Government especially towards the enactment of the Protection Against Domestic Violence Act of 2001 were to be commended. Despite these efforts and others, there were still a number of difficulties in the furtherance of justice for women. The Committee should direct the State to address the serious obstacles that prevented Carib women from enjoying their human rights with respect to housing, employment, access to credit, education and health. Persons with disabilities, especially women, continued to be marginalised, and faced discrimination in the State.
The next open meeting of the Committee will be at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 21 January, when it is scheduled to take up the seventh periodic report of Dominica (CEDAW/C/DMA/7).
Opening Statements
BACRE NDAIYE, Director of the Human Rights Council and Treaties Division of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, said the Optional Protocol relating to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights had been adopted by the General Assembly in December 2008, whilst the international community was celebrating the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This Protocol gave the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights the ability to receive and examine individual requests and hold investigations on violations of the principles contained within the Convention. The Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities would be holding its inaugural session in February 2009. The eighth inter-Committee meeting, held in December 2008 was totally given over to the harmonisation of methods of work.
The General Assembly, at its sixty-third session, had adopted a resolution related to the intensification of action undertaken to eliminate all forms of violence against women. This invited all States to put an end to the impunity enjoyed by those who committed violence against women, by, among other things, ensuring that women enjoyed equal protection before the law and equality in access to justice and by eliminating attitudes which encouraged, justified or tolerated all forms of violence against women and girls including crimes of sexual violence. It underlined that murder and mutilation of girls and women should be excluded from amnesties.
In December 2008, the Women's Rights and Gender Unit had organised a panel on the importance of economic and social rights in post-conflict situations, as well as on effective judicial procedures in cases of sexual violence. The goal of the panel was to show the tight link between access to justice and that of economic and social rights, and their direct application. In April this year, the review of the Durban Conference would take place in Geneva, with the main goal of evaluating the progress achieved in the fight against racism since the World Conference against Racism in 2001.
During the current session, the Committee would examine the reports of seven States Parties, and one in the absence of a report. It would also continue its work under the Optional Protocol relating to the Convention. It would examine the recommendations of the eighth inter-committee meeting, and would also hold an informal meeting with representatives of NGOs, and a private meeting with United Nations bodies. The High Commissioner for Human Rights would continue to support the Committee in its work, and wished it a fruitful session.
In response to a question from a Committee member, Mr. Ndiaye said that with regards to the budget, programme 19 had not been adopted by a vote, and the High Commissioner was now in the process of considering the issue. The prospect of additional resources was not as positive as could have been hoped - the news from the budget was not very good, but the High Commissioner was striving to provide services at the same level as it was now.
Responding to a further question, Mr. Ndiaye said that the Human Rights Council had had a Special Session on the situation in Gaza that had finished last week and had adopted a resolution by a majority vote. The idea was to condemn the violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that had been committed and to ask the President of the Human Rights Council to appoint a Commission of Inquiry composed of eminent individuals to investigate what had happened during the three weeks of the dramatic crisis. The President should be meeting today to appoint the members of the Commission, and thus the implementation of the resolution was underway. As in the past the problem would no doubt be that of access to Gaza, and it was hoped that this time the Israeli authorities would cooperate with the Commission.
DUBRAVKA SIMONOVIC, Chairperson of the Committee, said it was only a few months since the forty-second session had ended. Since that time, she had participated in the Third World Congress on Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents. She had addressed a workshop on trafficking in children and highlighted the gender dimension of trafficking and the work of the Committee under article 6 of the Convention. She had also participated in a colloquium on the Impact of Violence against Women on the Family in Doha, Qatar. The colloquium addressed violence against women, international and regional instruments, as well as laws and policy reform and the importance of data collection and the use of indicators on violence against women. Ms. Simonovic also attended the eighth inter-committee meeting, which was dedicated exclusively to the issue of harmonisation of working methods.
In December, Ms. Simonovic said she had attended the first inaugural session of the Forum on Minority Issues, which focused on minorities and the right to education. At this meeting, she had described the Committee's recommendations on minority women and girls and stressed importance of the inclusion of a gender perspective in the outcome document. This was an area that could be further discussed with the Independent Expert on minorities.
This was her last statement as Chairperson, Ms. Simonovic said. In the two years during which she had been chairperson, 66 reports had been examined, and a backlog had been cleared. A long-term solution of three meetings per year starting from 2010 had also been achieved, but this should be matched with timely reporting from States Parties that should clear their reporting delays. The Committee had also adopted a General Recommendation on Women Migrant Workers, but were still lagging behind in its work on a draft general recommendation on Article 2. It had started work on two new general recommendations, on older women and on economic consequences of divorce. In spite of progress, more needed to be done, more efforts were needed from all stakeholders on implementation of the Convention and concluding observations if there were to be results on the ground and in lives of individual women. To achieve further progress, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights should continue and increase its support to the Committee by allocating additional human and financial resources for its work, as well as providing technical assistance for reporting or implementation of concluding observations to State Parties that had such needs. This year, all should use the thirtieth anniversary of the Convention to raise their visibility and their impact on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.
Dialogue with Non-Governmental Organizations
Armenia
ANAHIT AVANESYAN, of All Armenian Women Union, said there were critical obstacles faced by women in enjoying their human rights in Armenia. There was still much to be done to achieve the universally accepted standards of gender equality and human rights principles. Lack of awareness among women on the existing mechanisms protecting their rights as well as on how to use those mechanisms increased their vulnerability to violence and impaired their access to justice. Despite legislation, there were no institutions responsible for gender equality issues. The implementation of the Plan of Action on Advancement of Women was severely hampered by lack of institutional capacities, funding, and comprehensive analysis and understanding of its importance. Also the special areas to which the Committee should pay attention were the political participation of women, trafficking, employment and rural women.
VIKTORIA AVAKOVA, of "Democracy Today" NGO, said there was particular concern that the Government of Armenia had not yet taken any steps to incorporate the Covenant into the national legislation system. The State was not taking proactive steps to ensure substantive equality for women to be elected to public office. The State had not taken any steps to ensure gender balance in public administration. Irrespective of numerous steps taken by the Government during recent years, it was clear that the concern with regards to trafficking continued to be State security rather than the security and protection of Armenian women. Special mechanisms were needed to respond to the needs of victims of trafficking. Women in rural areas were much more vulnerable, given the poverty, unemployment, and limited opportunities of livelihood; further, gender stereotypes ran much deeper, constraining women's participation in most areas of rural life.
JEMMA HASRATYAN, of Armenian Association of Women with University Education, said it had a goal to undertake an independent assessment of the implementation of the CEDAW Covenant with regards to a number of key areas and commitments, to identify problems that faced implementation of the Covenant in the country, and to outline possible ways to solve these through recommendations to the Government and other relevant entities. National machinery had not been established yet in Armenia. The existing institutional mechanisms did not meet the criteria for national machinery as none of these entities formulated or identified anti-discriminatory policies and a gender equality policy or coordinated the activities of Government bodies in this area. As a result of this absence of national machinery, the fulfilment of the obligations under the Covenant and other Conventions or Covenants was held back. The strategy of mainstreaming gender into legislation and into political practices was not carried out in full; gender discrimination persisted in power and decision-making, as well as in women's representation in the legislative and executive branches of Government. In reality, despite the fact that quite extensive rights of women were guaranteed by the national legislation, there still existed discrimination, which, not infrequently, was not perceived as such owing to the deep-rooted stereotypical views of the role of women in society.
Dominica
JOSEPHINE DUBLIN-PRINCE, of Dominica National Coalition of Women, said the Constitution of Dominica provided for equal and inalienable rights to all persons. The efforts of the Government, especially towards the enactment of the Protection Against Domestic Violence Act of 2001, were to be commended. Despite these efforts and others, there were still a number of difficulties in the furtherance of justice for women. Victims of domestic abuse and those claiming rights in marriage and family also faced constraints. The State had not been able to provide adequate resources to ensure that key institutions were able to provide effective response to violence against women and girls. The Committee should direct the State to build a clear view of the survivors and victims of violence against women, and put in place corrective policies and institutions that would ensure protection of women from violence and access to justice.
ELIZA LOLLEL WILLIAMS, of Dominica National Coalition of Women, said the indigenous, the Caribs, of Dominica, lived in poverty. Carib women suffered from seriously inadequate housing conditions, including lack of basic needs such as safe drinking water. Although the Constitution of Dominica provided for the rights to education, health and other social services, accessing these services was very difficult. Carib women faced difficulties in earning sufficient money to survive. They also faced serious problems accessing health services. The Committee should direct the State to address the serious obstacles that prevented Carib women from enjoying their human rights with respect to housing, employment, access to credit, education and health.
IRMA JOSEPH, of Dominica Association of Disabled People, said Dominica was one of the first countries to sign the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, however, persons with disabilities, especially women, continued to be marginalised and faced discrimination in the State. Women with disabilities continued to be denied the right to continuous employment, even when they were employed prior to their disability. Refusal of employment based on disability was compounded by lack of accessibility and conveniences in the workplace and other public places. The present education system was in no way prepared to respond to the needs of the girl child with special abilities. The State's lack of sensitivity and understanding of issues critical to persons with disabilities was such that it could not even perceive the hindrances to the right to mobility. The Committee should direct the State to look into the education and skills-building of girls and women with special abilities.
Questions by Committee Experts
On Armenia, Committee Experts then asked a range of questions, including, among others, a request for a clarification on the situation with regards to the national mechanism and whether it had done anything during its existence as claimed by the Government; what from the Governmental point of view was the role of NGOs and whether they were being aided by the Government in respect of their provision of human rights education; whether there was a difference on the laws of majority; whether the mechanism of human rights defenders functioned and whether it was relevant and well-known; whether the NGOs had been involved in the drafting of the report; and what was the relevance of the Committee's general recommendation in the work of the NGOs.
On Dominica, Committee Experts asked, among other things, what had impeded the submission of the very-overdue report; what the NGOs had done to support implementation of the Covenant; a request for precise information on the nature of discrimination undergone by women and girls and whether this took mainly the form of sexual discrimination; whether there was a political framework for the improvement of the situation with regards to the indigenous in Dominica; and a request for more information as to what exactly the Committee could do in order to improve the situation in Dominica with regards to precise targeting of its concluding observations to the State Party.
Responses by NGOs
Responding, NGO speakers from Armenia said that the Constitution banned explicitly all forms of discrimination based on gender. At the same time, it did not define precisely what was discrimination. NGOs had been working to ban gender discrimination, including work on a definition of discrimination. NGOs had urged the Government to institute a special gender unit, and to establish a national council on gender issues, and thought that this would help to solve many problems. The NGOs were also working to incorporate gender and human rights teaching in schools. The Foreign Ministry had invited a number of NGOs to be involved in the drafting of the report, but NGOs had only been able to read the final version once it was published, and not before. The report was not really publicised particularly, and public organizations and the Education Ministry were lagging in terms of making this information publicly presented. The Parliament had adopted quotas with regards to the participation of women, but these had resulted in nothing. There were problems with meeting the quotas. The priority of the Government was gender equality, equal rights for men and women, and as a result of the setting of this priority, two groups of Experts had been established, and they could submit proposals to the Parliament. On trafficking, the State prioritised its security as it was more interested in investigating the crime of trafficking and prosecuting the traffickers - but the victims were totally neglected in this process and were not protected by law, as well as being victimised by judges and other persons involved in the judicial process. There was no help for rehabilitation.
With regards to Dominica, NGO speakers said with regards to disability, one of the greatest challenges was unemployment, one of the reasons for which was lack of finance, as the women did not have formal education, and this made it difficult for them to be employed, making them liabilities to the State. The Government had been called on a number of times to recognise this problem and to make efforts with regards to legislation on accessibility. Nothing much could be done other than to press on the Government to ratify the Convention. On education for Carib women, the latter were suffering from the lack of secondary schools in their region. There was no access to credit due to communal land holding, lack of land titles, and the dependence on the craft industry for survival, which latter was being exploited. The Government had a housing policy for the whole country, and only a very few Carib women could benefit from it, which was insufficient as they lived generally in very poor conditions. The Carib women required immediate attention and more to be done to improve their situation. With regards to the issue as to whether the definition of discrimination was part of the Constitution, this was the case. On unemployment, this was a major issue, as the banana issue had had a serious impact on the women of the country. NGOs were very much embarrassed by the lack of effort by the Government to engage with the Committee over many long years.
________
For use of the information media; not an official record
Against Women
19 January 2009
Committee Adopts Agenda, Holds Informal Meeting with Non-Governmental Organizations from Armenia and Dominica
The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women today opened its forty-third session, adopted its agenda and methods of work, and held an informal meeting with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from Armenia and Dominica whose reports will be considered during the session.
Bacre Ndaiye, Director of the Human Rights Council and Treaties Division of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, addressing the Committee, spoke of the progress made on the international level in the field of the elimination of discrimination against women, such as the adoption of the Optional Protocol relating to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights by the General Assembly in December 2008. The General Assembly, at its sixty-third session, had also adopted a resolution related to the intensification of action undertaken to eliminate all forms of violence against women. In April this year, the review of the Durban Conference would take place in Geneva, with the main goal of evaluating the progress achieved in the fight against racism since the World Conference against Racism in 2001. The High Commissioner for Human Rights would continue to support the Committee in its work, and wished it a fruitful session.
Having adopted the agenda and methods of work, the Committee heard the following eight new members take a solemn declaration: Nicole Ameline, Violet Awori, Barbara Bailey, Niklas Bruun, Indira Jaising, Soledad Murillo de la Vega, Victoria Popescu and Zohra Rasekh. The Committee will elect its new bureau at a later stage.
The Committee then heard the report of the Chairperson, Dubravka Simonovic, on activities undertaken between sessions. Ms. Simonovic said this was her last statement as Chairperson. In the two years during which she was Chairperson, 66 reports had been examined, and a backlog had been cleared. A long-term solution of three meetings per year starting from 2010 had also been achieved, but this should be matched with timely reporting from States Parties that should clear their reporting delays. The Committee had also adopted a General Recommendation on Women Migrant Workers, but they were still lagging behind in work on a draft general recommendation on Article 2. It had started work on two new general recommendations, on older women and on economic consequences of divorce. In spite of progress, more needed to be done and more efforts were needed from all stakeholders on the implementation of the Convention and concluding observations if there were to be results on the ground and in the lives of individual women.
During the session, the Committee is scheduled to consider periodic reports from Armenia, Cameroon, Dominica, Germany, Guatemala, Haiti, Libya and Rwanda.
The Committee held an informal meeting with non-governmental organizations, hearing statements from three Armenian NGOs, namely All Armenian Women's Union, "Democracy Today" NGO, and Armenian Association of University Educated Women, and two Dominican NGOs - Dominican National Coalition of Women, and Dominica Association of Disabled People.
On Armenia, speakers said there were critical obstacles faced by women in enjoying their human rights in Armenia. There was still much to be done to achieve the universally accepted standards of gender equality and human rights principles. There was particular concern that the Government had not yet taken any steps to incorporate the Covenant into the national legislation system. The existing institutional mechanisms did not meet the criteria for national machinery as none of these entities formulated or identified anti-discriminatory policies and a gender equality policy or coordinated the activities of Government bodies in this area.
On Dominica, speakers said the Constitution of Dominica provided for equal and inalienable rights to all persons. The efforts of the Government especially towards the enactment of the Protection Against Domestic Violence Act of 2001 were to be commended. Despite these efforts and others, there were still a number of difficulties in the furtherance of justice for women. The Committee should direct the State to address the serious obstacles that prevented Carib women from enjoying their human rights with respect to housing, employment, access to credit, education and health. Persons with disabilities, especially women, continued to be marginalised, and faced discrimination in the State.
The next open meeting of the Committee will be at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 21 January, when it is scheduled to take up the seventh periodic report of Dominica (CEDAW/C/DMA/7).
Opening Statements
BACRE NDAIYE, Director of the Human Rights Council and Treaties Division of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, said the Optional Protocol relating to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights had been adopted by the General Assembly in December 2008, whilst the international community was celebrating the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This Protocol gave the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights the ability to receive and examine individual requests and hold investigations on violations of the principles contained within the Convention. The Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities would be holding its inaugural session in February 2009. The eighth inter-Committee meeting, held in December 2008 was totally given over to the harmonisation of methods of work.
The General Assembly, at its sixty-third session, had adopted a resolution related to the intensification of action undertaken to eliminate all forms of violence against women. This invited all States to put an end to the impunity enjoyed by those who committed violence against women, by, among other things, ensuring that women enjoyed equal protection before the law and equality in access to justice and by eliminating attitudes which encouraged, justified or tolerated all forms of violence against women and girls including crimes of sexual violence. It underlined that murder and mutilation of girls and women should be excluded from amnesties.
In December 2008, the Women's Rights and Gender Unit had organised a panel on the importance of economic and social rights in post-conflict situations, as well as on effective judicial procedures in cases of sexual violence. The goal of the panel was to show the tight link between access to justice and that of economic and social rights, and their direct application. In April this year, the review of the Durban Conference would take place in Geneva, with the main goal of evaluating the progress achieved in the fight against racism since the World Conference against Racism in 2001.
During the current session, the Committee would examine the reports of seven States Parties, and one in the absence of a report. It would also continue its work under the Optional Protocol relating to the Convention. It would examine the recommendations of the eighth inter-committee meeting, and would also hold an informal meeting with representatives of NGOs, and a private meeting with United Nations bodies. The High Commissioner for Human Rights would continue to support the Committee in its work, and wished it a fruitful session.
In response to a question from a Committee member, Mr. Ndiaye said that with regards to the budget, programme 19 had not been adopted by a vote, and the High Commissioner was now in the process of considering the issue. The prospect of additional resources was not as positive as could have been hoped - the news from the budget was not very good, but the High Commissioner was striving to provide services at the same level as it was now.
Responding to a further question, Mr. Ndiaye said that the Human Rights Council had had a Special Session on the situation in Gaza that had finished last week and had adopted a resolution by a majority vote. The idea was to condemn the violations of human rights and international humanitarian law that had been committed and to ask the President of the Human Rights Council to appoint a Commission of Inquiry composed of eminent individuals to investigate what had happened during the three weeks of the dramatic crisis. The President should be meeting today to appoint the members of the Commission, and thus the implementation of the resolution was underway. As in the past the problem would no doubt be that of access to Gaza, and it was hoped that this time the Israeli authorities would cooperate with the Commission.
DUBRAVKA SIMONOVIC, Chairperson of the Committee, said it was only a few months since the forty-second session had ended. Since that time, she had participated in the Third World Congress on Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents. She had addressed a workshop on trafficking in children and highlighted the gender dimension of trafficking and the work of the Committee under article 6 of the Convention. She had also participated in a colloquium on the Impact of Violence against Women on the Family in Doha, Qatar. The colloquium addressed violence against women, international and regional instruments, as well as laws and policy reform and the importance of data collection and the use of indicators on violence against women. Ms. Simonovic also attended the eighth inter-committee meeting, which was dedicated exclusively to the issue of harmonisation of working methods.
In December, Ms. Simonovic said she had attended the first inaugural session of the Forum on Minority Issues, which focused on minorities and the right to education. At this meeting, she had described the Committee's recommendations on minority women and girls and stressed importance of the inclusion of a gender perspective in the outcome document. This was an area that could be further discussed with the Independent Expert on minorities.
This was her last statement as Chairperson, Ms. Simonovic said. In the two years during which she had been chairperson, 66 reports had been examined, and a backlog had been cleared. A long-term solution of three meetings per year starting from 2010 had also been achieved, but this should be matched with timely reporting from States Parties that should clear their reporting delays. The Committee had also adopted a General Recommendation on Women Migrant Workers, but were still lagging behind in its work on a draft general recommendation on Article 2. It had started work on two new general recommendations, on older women and on economic consequences of divorce. In spite of progress, more needed to be done, more efforts were needed from all stakeholders on implementation of the Convention and concluding observations if there were to be results on the ground and in lives of individual women. To achieve further progress, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights should continue and increase its support to the Committee by allocating additional human and financial resources for its work, as well as providing technical assistance for reporting or implementation of concluding observations to State Parties that had such needs. This year, all should use the thirtieth anniversary of the Convention to raise their visibility and their impact on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.
Dialogue with Non-Governmental Organizations
Armenia
ANAHIT AVANESYAN, of All Armenian Women Union, said there were critical obstacles faced by women in enjoying their human rights in Armenia. There was still much to be done to achieve the universally accepted standards of gender equality and human rights principles. Lack of awareness among women on the existing mechanisms protecting their rights as well as on how to use those mechanisms increased their vulnerability to violence and impaired their access to justice. Despite legislation, there were no institutions responsible for gender equality issues. The implementation of the Plan of Action on Advancement of Women was severely hampered by lack of institutional capacities, funding, and comprehensive analysis and understanding of its importance. Also the special areas to which the Committee should pay attention were the political participation of women, trafficking, employment and rural women.
VIKTORIA AVAKOVA, of "Democracy Today" NGO, said there was particular concern that the Government of Armenia had not yet taken any steps to incorporate the Covenant into the national legislation system. The State was not taking proactive steps to ensure substantive equality for women to be elected to public office. The State had not taken any steps to ensure gender balance in public administration. Irrespective of numerous steps taken by the Government during recent years, it was clear that the concern with regards to trafficking continued to be State security rather than the security and protection of Armenian women. Special mechanisms were needed to respond to the needs of victims of trafficking. Women in rural areas were much more vulnerable, given the poverty, unemployment, and limited opportunities of livelihood; further, gender stereotypes ran much deeper, constraining women's participation in most areas of rural life.
JEMMA HASRATYAN, of Armenian Association of Women with University Education, said it had a goal to undertake an independent assessment of the implementation of the CEDAW Covenant with regards to a number of key areas and commitments, to identify problems that faced implementation of the Covenant in the country, and to outline possible ways to solve these through recommendations to the Government and other relevant entities. National machinery had not been established yet in Armenia. The existing institutional mechanisms did not meet the criteria for national machinery as none of these entities formulated or identified anti-discriminatory policies and a gender equality policy or coordinated the activities of Government bodies in this area. As a result of this absence of national machinery, the fulfilment of the obligations under the Covenant and other Conventions or Covenants was held back. The strategy of mainstreaming gender into legislation and into political practices was not carried out in full; gender discrimination persisted in power and decision-making, as well as in women's representation in the legislative and executive branches of Government. In reality, despite the fact that quite extensive rights of women were guaranteed by the national legislation, there still existed discrimination, which, not infrequently, was not perceived as such owing to the deep-rooted stereotypical views of the role of women in society.
Dominica
JOSEPHINE DUBLIN-PRINCE, of Dominica National Coalition of Women, said the Constitution of Dominica provided for equal and inalienable rights to all persons. The efforts of the Government, especially towards the enactment of the Protection Against Domestic Violence Act of 2001, were to be commended. Despite these efforts and others, there were still a number of difficulties in the furtherance of justice for women. Victims of domestic abuse and those claiming rights in marriage and family also faced constraints. The State had not been able to provide adequate resources to ensure that key institutions were able to provide effective response to violence against women and girls. The Committee should direct the State to build a clear view of the survivors and victims of violence against women, and put in place corrective policies and institutions that would ensure protection of women from violence and access to justice.
ELIZA LOLLEL WILLIAMS, of Dominica National Coalition of Women, said the indigenous, the Caribs, of Dominica, lived in poverty. Carib women suffered from seriously inadequate housing conditions, including lack of basic needs such as safe drinking water. Although the Constitution of Dominica provided for the rights to education, health and other social services, accessing these services was very difficult. Carib women faced difficulties in earning sufficient money to survive. They also faced serious problems accessing health services. The Committee should direct the State to address the serious obstacles that prevented Carib women from enjoying their human rights with respect to housing, employment, access to credit, education and health.
IRMA JOSEPH, of Dominica Association of Disabled People, said Dominica was one of the first countries to sign the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, however, persons with disabilities, especially women, continued to be marginalised and faced discrimination in the State. Women with disabilities continued to be denied the right to continuous employment, even when they were employed prior to their disability. Refusal of employment based on disability was compounded by lack of accessibility and conveniences in the workplace and other public places. The present education system was in no way prepared to respond to the needs of the girl child with special abilities. The State's lack of sensitivity and understanding of issues critical to persons with disabilities was such that it could not even perceive the hindrances to the right to mobility. The Committee should direct the State to look into the education and skills-building of girls and women with special abilities.
Questions by Committee Experts
On Armenia, Committee Experts then asked a range of questions, including, among others, a request for a clarification on the situation with regards to the national mechanism and whether it had done anything during its existence as claimed by the Government; what from the Governmental point of view was the role of NGOs and whether they were being aided by the Government in respect of their provision of human rights education; whether there was a difference on the laws of majority; whether the mechanism of human rights defenders functioned and whether it was relevant and well-known; whether the NGOs had been involved in the drafting of the report; and what was the relevance of the Committee's general recommendation in the work of the NGOs.
On Dominica, Committee Experts asked, among other things, what had impeded the submission of the very-overdue report; what the NGOs had done to support implementation of the Covenant; a request for precise information on the nature of discrimination undergone by women and girls and whether this took mainly the form of sexual discrimination; whether there was a political framework for the improvement of the situation with regards to the indigenous in Dominica; and a request for more information as to what exactly the Committee could do in order to improve the situation in Dominica with regards to precise targeting of its concluding observations to the State Party.
Responses by NGOs
Responding, NGO speakers from Armenia said that the Constitution banned explicitly all forms of discrimination based on gender. At the same time, it did not define precisely what was discrimination. NGOs had been working to ban gender discrimination, including work on a definition of discrimination. NGOs had urged the Government to institute a special gender unit, and to establish a national council on gender issues, and thought that this would help to solve many problems. The NGOs were also working to incorporate gender and human rights teaching in schools. The Foreign Ministry had invited a number of NGOs to be involved in the drafting of the report, but NGOs had only been able to read the final version once it was published, and not before. The report was not really publicised particularly, and public organizations and the Education Ministry were lagging in terms of making this information publicly presented. The Parliament had adopted quotas with regards to the participation of women, but these had resulted in nothing. There were problems with meeting the quotas. The priority of the Government was gender equality, equal rights for men and women, and as a result of the setting of this priority, two groups of Experts had been established, and they could submit proposals to the Parliament. On trafficking, the State prioritised its security as it was more interested in investigating the crime of trafficking and prosecuting the traffickers - but the victims were totally neglected in this process and were not protected by law, as well as being victimised by judges and other persons involved in the judicial process. There was no help for rehabilitation.
With regards to Dominica, NGO speakers said with regards to disability, one of the greatest challenges was unemployment, one of the reasons for which was lack of finance, as the women did not have formal education, and this made it difficult for them to be employed, making them liabilities to the State. The Government had been called on a number of times to recognise this problem and to make efforts with regards to legislation on accessibility. Nothing much could be done other than to press on the Government to ratify the Convention. On education for Carib women, the latter were suffering from the lack of secondary schools in their region. There was no access to credit due to communal land holding, lack of land titles, and the dependence on the craft industry for survival, which latter was being exploited. The Government had a housing policy for the whole country, and only a very few Carib women could benefit from it, which was insufficient as they lived generally in very poor conditions. The Carib women required immediate attention and more to be done to improve their situation. With regards to the issue as to whether the definition of discrimination was part of the Constitution, this was the case. On unemployment, this was a major issue, as the banana issue had had a serious impact on the women of the country. NGOs were very much embarrassed by the lack of effort by the Government to engage with the Committee over many long years.
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