HUMAN RIGHTS COMMITTEE OPENS NINETY-THIRD SESSION

Human Rights Committee

7 July 2008



The Human Rights Committee this morning opened its ninety-third session, adopting its agenda and programme of work and hearing an address by the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Kyung-wha Kang on the recent developments in the human rights arena.

Ms. Kang said among important developments of interest to the Committee was the yearlong human rights campaign that had recently been launched by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) leading up to the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In that context, a Dignity and Justice for Detainees week had been established with the aim of improving the rights of detainees worldwide. It was hoped the Committee could find ways it could contribute to that initiative and others.

Recalling that the Human Rights Council had held two sessions since the Committee last met, and that the first 32 countries had now undergone the Universal Periodic Review process, Ms. Kang noted that the review process had drawn heavily on the work of the Special Procedures and the United Nations treaty bodies. Ms. Chanet and Ms. Wedgwood of the Human Rights Committee had been designated to represent the Committee before the Human Rights Council.

Turning to the seventh Inter-Committee Meeting held in June 2008, Ms. Kang the said among the key issues discussed had been the Universal Periodic Review and the need for complementarity between it and the work of the treaty bodies. Also discussed was the need for the improvement and harmonization of working methods of the treaty bodies, and the establishment of a working group on harmonization, as well as the consideration of country situations in the absence of country reports. In terms of harmonizing treaty guidelines, it was important to note that the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, and the Committee on the Rights of Migrants had already adopted treaty-specific guidelines. The Committee on the Rights of Child and the Committee against Torture had also made significant progress as well in that vein.

Since the Committee's last session, Pakistan had signed the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and Honduras had signed the second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Ms. Kang observed. There had also been welcome developments within human rights instruments: the text of an Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights had been adopted by the Human Rights Council on 18 June 2008, and transmitted to General Assembly; and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities had entered into to force. The Optional Protocol to the Covenant was important because it allowed for complaints to be lodged on behalf of individuals claiming their rights under that Covenant had been violated by States parties to the protocol.

Turning to the work of the Committee at its present session, the Committee would examine four country reports – United Kingdom, France, San Marino and Ireland – and country task forces would adopt a list of issues on the situations in Demark, Spain, and Sweden. The Committee would also a revised draft of its General Comment 33, on the question of States parties' obligations under the Optional Protocol to the Covenant, and would consider the progress report of the Special Rapporteurs for Follow-up to Concluding Observations and for Follow-up to Views, Ms. Kang concluded.

Introducing the report the Working Group on Communications, Committee Expert Christine Chanet said they had held a total of nine meetings and had considered 26 communications or requests, of which only three recommendations were finally submitted. The Working Group had also considered the issue of criteria for the receivability of communications and provisional measures.

When the Committee resumes its work in public at 3 p.m. this afternoon it will begin consideration of the sixth periodic report of the United Kingdom (CCPR/C/GBR/6).


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