COMMITTEE ON ELIMINATION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION CONTINUES ADOPTING CONCLUSIONS ON REPORT OF LITHUANIA

CERD
60th session
12 March 2002
Morning



Concludes Public Consideration of Reports of Moldova



The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination this morning continued its adoption of concluding observations and recommendations on the initial report of Lithuania, expressing concern that members of the Roma minority experienced difficulties in enjoying their fundamental rights.
In the paragraphs it continued to adopt, the Committee noted with concern that despite the adoption of a programme for the integration of the Roma in Lithuanian society for 2000-2004, the Roma experienced difficulties in enjoying their fundamental rights in the fields of housing, health, employment and education, and were the subject of prejudicial attitudes. The Committee recommended that the State party, in its next periodic report, include detailed information on the measures aimed at protecting Roma as well as the results of their implementation.
Also this morning the Committee concluded its public consideration of the initial to fourth reports of Moldova after hearing the Government delegation say that Moldova had inherited from the former USSR a certain socio-political reality, particularly concerning the status of the Russian language, which, after holding a privileged role for several decades, had damaged languages of the national minorities.
Raghavan Vasudevan Pillai, the Committee Expert who served as country rapporteur to the reports of Moldova, said the State also had full responsibility to see that the laws on ethnic minorities were effectively put in practice so that those entities enjoyed their rights.
Also participating in the discussion were Committee Experts Mahmoud Aboul-Nasr, Nourredine Amir, Regis de Gouttes, Yuri A. Reshetov, Linos Alexander Sicilianos, Kurt Herndl and Patrick Thornberry.
The Committee will issue its concluding observations and recommendations on the reports of Moldova during its current three-week session, which will conclude on 22 March.
Moldova is among the 161 States parties to the Convention and as such it must submit periodic reports to the Committee explaining how it was giving effect to the provisions of the treaty. A five-member Moldovan Government delegation was on hand during the two meetings to introduce the report and answer questions raised by the 18-member Committee.
Also this morning, the Committee heard a briefing from representatives of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) on the application of human rights to reproductive and sexual health.
When the Committee reconvenes at 3 p.m., it will take up the fifteenth periodic report of Denmark (document CERD/C/408/Add.1).
Concluding Observations and Recommendations on Report of Lithuania
The Committee said it wished to receive more information concerning the right to education and the linguistic rights of persons belonging to national minorities. It wanted to know whether programmes of education on minority cultures were elaborated with the participation of the minorities. The Committee recommended that the next periodic report of the State party contain more information relating to the participation of national minorities in political and economic life.
The Committee noted with concern that despite the adoption of a programme for the integration of the Roma in Lithuanian society for 2000-2004, the Roma experienced difficulties in enjoying their fundamental rights in the fields of housing, health, employment and education, and were the subject of prejudicial attitudes. It recommended that the State party, in its next periodic report, include detailed information on the measures aimed at protecting Roma as well as the results of their implementation.
The Committee recommended that Lithuania consider ratifying the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
In relation to information regarding alleged discrimination against Afghan asylum-seekers, the Committee expressed concern about the disregard of basic procedural guarantees; it recommended that educational rights and assistance in administrative matters be granted to children of asylum-seekers, including those of Afghan nationality.

Response of Moldova
In response to the questions raised by the Committee Experts yesterday afternoon, the members of the Moldovan delegation said that several Experts had made reference to the status of the Roma population, whom they said were treated inhumanely by the police, and about their participation in the privatization of land. The delegation said that most Roma people were leading sedentary lives and they were integrated in the Moldovan society. The Roma people had no problems in using the Russian and Moldovan languages. However, it was difficult to teach them in their mother tongue due to the lack of funds and teachers.
The delegation also said that Moldova had inherited from the former USSR a certain socio-political reality, particularly concerning the status of the Russian language, which, after holding a privileged role for several decades, had damaged languages of the national minorities. The Russian language had been the only official language, and there had not been teaching programmes in minority languages. Since the country's independence, Moldovan and other minority languages were made official and teaching was being conducted in those languages.
The Centre for Human Rights of Moldova had contributed to the preparation of the present report to the Committee and other initial reports to United Nations bodies in compliance with conventions to which Moldova was a party, the delegation said. The Centre had also contributed to the process of making sure that national legislation was compatible with international instruments.
The prevention of acts of torture in the territory of Moldova was ensured by the application of constitutional provisions and legislation, including the penal code of the State, the delegation said. According to article 24 of the Constitution, the State guaranteed to each person the right to life and to physical integration; and no one could be subjected to torture, cruel or inhuman treatment or degrading punishment.
The delegation said that in 1999, 48 petitions on the violation of personal security, which were signed by 94 persons, were dealt with; as well as 63 petitions on the violation of personal dignity, signed by 352 persons; and 315 petitions against the violation of free access to justice, signed by 1,201 persons. Between 1994 and 2000, the Attorney-General had received 20,126 complaints against police actions and investigators of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
The delegation said that immigration for labour was regulated on the basis of the Republic's policy on the need of an additional labour force. Article 4 of the Law on Immigration stipulated that the immigration law was decided upon on the basis of a quota system. The actual figure of migrant workers was 0.05 per cent of the total working force of the country.
Responding to follow-up questions raised by Committee Experts, the delegation said that there were no Muslims in the Moldovan territory, and that the Gagaouze minority had taken up the Orthodox Christian religion.
The delegation said that human rights issues were complex; further information on the issues would be provided to the Committee in the next report.
The Commission for Human Rights of Moldova had been established to deal with human rights. It was composed of Government officials and individuals from different professions, including from non-governmental organizations working on human rights protection and promotion.
The delegation said it would bring to the attention of the Government the need to make a declaration on article 14 of the Convention, which stipulated that a State party might at any time declare that it recognized the competence of the Committee to receive and consider communications from individuals or groups of individuals within its jurisdiction claiming to be victims of a violation by that State party of any of the rights set forth in the Convention.
RAGHAVAN VASUDEVAN PILLAI, the Committee Expert who served as country rapporteur to the report of Moldova, said that the responses of the delegation were based on constitutional and other legislative provisions. The Committee hoped that the State party will provide statistics on the demographic characteristics of the population in the next report. Effective implementation of new legislative acts should take place in order to achieve the desired objectives. The State also had full responsibility to see that the laws on ethnic minorities were effectively put in practice so that those entities enjoyed the rights enshrined in those legal acts. He hoped to receive information in the next report on how the Government had taken measures to make a declaration on article 14 of the Convention on the Committee's competence to receive and consider individual complaints from that State party.

United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Briefing
ALPHONSE MACDONALD, Director, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Geneva, said the Fund would collaborate with the Committee against racial discrimination. UNFPA was established 13 years ago and had accomplished measures concerning reproductive health.
He said that the Fund had incorporated in its activities the application of human rights to reproductive and sexual health. The organization had also concentrated on the real issues of reproductive health in all countries. Racial discrimination was recognized as detrimental to reproductive health. Minorities in many countries were denied access to education and health contrary to the majority population.
Mr. MacDonald said that UNFPA had been working in collaboration with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. If the Committee were to decide to draft a general recommendation on reproductive health, UNFPA was willing to contribute to this work.
ANA ANGARITA, Technical Officer, Gender and Reproductive Rights Technical Support Division, UNFPA, lauded the efforts of the Committee to monitor the impact of racial discrimination on the enjoyment of the rights to reproductive health. She said that the issue of reproductive health had been reflected in the areas of maternal mortality, forced pregnancy, coercive sterility against certain minority women and female genital mutilation.
She said that General Recommendation No. 25 on gender-related dimensions of racial discrimination had affirmed that certain forms of racial discrimination might be directed towards women specifically because of their gender. The Recommendation had also indicated that racial discrimination might have consequences that affect women, such as pregnancy resulting from racially biased motivated rape; in some societies women victims of such rapes might also be ostracized. She said that the Fund could provide information from the field to help the Committee during its consideration of a country report.


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