COMMITTEE ON ELIMINATION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION EXCHANGES VIEWS WITH STATES PARTIES

Committee on the Elimination
of Racial Discrimination
63rd session
19 August 2003
Afternoon






The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination this afternoon held a meeting with the States parties to the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination to exchange views with them.

The Committee Chairperson, Ion Diaconnu, said that the Committee had felt a need to meet with the States parties even before resolution 572, as adopted by the General Assembly, which encouraged Chairpersons of bodies set up under human rights instruments to continue to invite representatives of States parties to hold a dialogue with the bodies. The meeting was an opportunity to explore the manner in which the Committee could strengthen its work to the mutual advantage of both the Committee and the States parties, he said.

During the meeting, a representative of the Acting High Commissioner for Human Rights, Bertrand Ramcharan, read out a brief statement on behalf of Mr. Ramcharan in which he expressed shock and outrage at this afternoon’s explosion at United Nations Headquarters in Baghdad. He expressed concern for members of the United Nations staff who were there and for their families, as well as for High Commissioner Sergio Vieira de Mello who is presently serving as the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Iraq. Such a despicable act, directed at people whose only aim was to help and assist the people of Iraq to recover from years of oppression, could only be condemned by the entire international community, said Mr. Ramcharan in his statement.

Various topics raised by the Committee included that its meetings should be held periodically at United Nations Headquarters in New York, as stipulated in the Convention, since this would ensure a better dialogue between the Committee and certain countries that did not have missions in Geneva; and the issue of non-reports and single reports. Committee Experts said that a proposed list of issues that would be raised during the consideration of each report by each State party was also contentious, since the preparation of such a list would have to be done during the session, and this would slow down the consideration of other matters. The follow-up to be given to conclusions and recommendations made to States parties was also an important issue, since true dialogue pre-supposed that all parties should keep an eye on the follow-up.

During the meeting, issues raised by representatives of the States parties included the difficulty of many States to honour their reporting burden to all the human rights treaty bodies, since this was wider than just the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination; the need to lengthen the period between due reports and the possibility of making the bi-annual report optional and voluntary; the need to disseminate the conclusions of the Committee more widely including to other bodies of the United Nations; the need for greater continuity, which was also relevant to the issue of follow-up, since there was a need for discipline with regard to this; the possibility of implementing interim focused reports; the forms and content of the periodic reports; the introduction of a unified procedure for reporting to treaty bodies; that a full report be submitted every four years and a progress report submitted every two years; and, in an issue raised by many speakers, the need for written questions to be submitted by the Committee in advance and responded to in writing by the country in advance of the presentation of the report.

Experts themselves raised issues such as the need to provide technical assistance to more disadvantaged countries that had difficulties in, for example, sending a delegation to Geneva to present the country report; the need for a flexible approach with regard to the venue of the sessions of the Committee since both locations had specific advantages; the optional declaration under article 14 of the International Convention and the importance of States parties ratifying it, since it gave importance to the International Convention itself; the need for coordination of work in connection with the different treaty bodies; the growing tendency in reports to be more open, which created the strongest background for a dialogue in which all issues could be discussed in detail; the need for a better gender balance among the members of the Committee and for the States parties to take a more active part in redressing this balance in the election of Experts; the amendment to article 8 of the International Convention, and the need to adopt this amendment.

Representatives of States parties also pointed out that Geneva was the United Nations center for human rights, and that it was important to keep such bodies together. Further, there were budgetary issues linked to the holding of meetings in New York. The reports were one of the most significant ways in which the States parties could communicate with the Committee, and there was a need to strengthen that body so that it could continue further and expand in its efforts to eliminate all forms of racial discrimination. Country representatives also noted the need to create the most effective possible follow-up mechanism among all the treaty bodies. Representatives also commended the way press releases were handled over the last session. Several countries commended the idea of the submission of a list of questions, and urged this upon the Committee as a most effective method of work. The measure of success of the Committee lay in the improvement of human rights standards and in a helpful dialogue with the countries.

Concluding the debate, the Chairman noted the wide participation of State parties in the meeting, and said the discussion would be very useful in refining the working methods of the Committee, which was currently underway and almost reaching completion.

Experts participating in the debate were Mahmoud Aboul-Nasr, Raghavan Vasudevan Pillai, Kurt Herndl, Régis de Gouttes, Morten Kjaerum, Mohamed Aly Thiam, Jose Agusto Lindgren-Alves, Patricia Nozipho January-Bardill, Luis Valencia Rodriguez, Nourredine Amir, Marc Bossuyt, Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos, Mario Jorge Yutzis, Patrick Thornberry, and Chengyuan Tang. Participating in the debate were the representatives of the following States parties: Costa Rica, Greece, Latvia, Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Sweden, New Zealand, Australia, the Czech Republic, Mexico, the United States of America, France, India, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt and Chile.

There are 169 States parties to the International Convention and they all have to present periodic reports on how they are implementing the provisions of the International Convention to the Committee.

When the Committee next convenes at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 20 August, it will meet with Serguei Lazarev of UNESCO, before continuing to adopt concluding observations and recommendations on country reports which it has considered during this session.



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