UN Committee to review Haiti’s record on children’s rights

GENEVA (12 January  2016) – Children’s rights in Haiti will be reviewed by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) on 15 January in sessions that will be webcast live. Haiti is one of the 196 states that have ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child and so is required to undergo regular examinations of its record by the Committee of 18 independent experts.

The CRC members will hold discussions with a delegation from the Haitian Government about how the Convention is being implemented. The Committee will base its evaluation on the delegation’s replies, as well as information from civil society groups.

These are among the possible issues to be discussed: Impact of corruption on implementation of programmes for children; measures to encourage universal birth registration; discrimination against girls; sexual abuse of Haitian children by peacekeeping soldiers and international workers, protection and rehabilitation of victims; impact of new legislation on international adoptions; elimination of child labour.

The full list of issues can be found here: http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/treatybodyexternal/SessionDetails1.aspx?SessionID=924&Lang=en

The CRC’s meetings with the Haitian delegation will take place in Room XXIV at the Palais Wilson in Geneva on 15 January from 10:00 – 18:00 (04:00 - 12:00 in Port-au-Prince). The sessions are public and will be webcast here: http://www.treatybodywebcast.org/.

The CRC will hold a news conference to discuss its findings on Haiti and the other countries being reviewed - Senegal, Iran, Oman, Latvia, France, Ireland, Peru, Maldives, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Benin, Brunei and Kenya – at 12:00 on 4 February at the Palais des Nations. The findings, officially called concluding observations, will be published on 4 February here: http://tbinternet.ohchr.org/_layouts/treatybodyexternal/SessionDetails1.aspx?SessionID=924&Lang=en

ENDS

For more information and media requests, please contact Liz Throssell (+41 (0) 22 917 9466/ +41 79 752 0488 ethrossell@ohchr.org

To obtain media accreditation for the Palais des Nations, see:   http://unog.ch/80256EDD006B9C2E/(httpPages)/70991F6887C73B2280256EE700379C58?OpenDocument

To learn more about the Committee on the Rights of the Child, visit: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CRC/Pages/CRCIndex.aspx

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