Summary:

The Committee on the Rights of the Child opened its 39th session in Geneva today by adopting its agenda and programme of work, electing its bureau and hearing an address by the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights.

COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD OPENS THIRTY-NINTH SESSION

Hears Address by Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights; Begins Considering Report of Saint Lucia

17 May 2005

The Committee on the Rights of the Child opened its thirty-ninth session in Geneva today by adopting its agenda and programme of work, electing its bureau and hearing an address by the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights. The Committee also began its consideration of the initial report of Saint Lucia on how that country has been implementing the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

After having adopted its agenda and programme of work for the session, the 18-member Committee, at the opening of the meeting, swore in four new members and elected its bureau. The new members are David Brent Parfit (Canada), Awich Pollar (Uganda), Kamal Siddiqui (Bangladesh) and Jean Zermatten (Switzerland). Committee Expert Jacob Egbert Doek (the Netherlands) was re-elected as Chairperson. The elected Vice Chairpersons are Joyce Alouch (Kenya), Moushira Khattab (Egypt), Yanghee Lee (China) and Norberto Liwski (Argentina). Nevena Vuckovic- Sahovic (Serbia and Montenegro) was elected as Rapporteur.

Statement by Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights

MEHR KAHN WILIAMS, United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, while referring to the report of the Secretary-General "In Larger Freedom: towards development, security and human rights for all", noted that in the report the Secretary-General stressed that the international community must advance the causes of security, development and human rights together, otherwise none would succeed. He set out proposals to reform the three central pillars of the United Nations human rights system – the treaty bodies, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Commission on Human Rights. The Secretary-General also reaffirmed the ideas put forward in his report of 2002, "Strengthening the United Nations: an agenda for further change", in which the modernisation of the treaty system was identified as a key element in the United Nations goal of promoting and protecting human rights. In his new report, the Secretary-General requested that the "harmonised guidelines on reporting to all treaty bodies should be finalised and implemented so that these bodies can function as a unified system". Draft guidelines on the expanded core document would be considered next month by the fourth inter- Committee meeting and the seventh Committee of Chairpersons from 20 to 24 June 2005. The Secretary-General had also requested the High Commissioner to submit a plan of action by 20 May with concrete recommendations as to how the Office may become more effective for the promotion and protection of human rights. In that regard, considerable efforts were under way.

The Deputy High Commissioner also drew attention to the recommendation by the Secretary-General to replace the Commission on Human Rights with a smaller standing Human Rights Council. This proposal was discussed during the sixty-first session of the Commission on Human Rights and would be considered during the High-level Summit in New York in September. Regarding child rights, the Commission discussed the request of the Committee on the Rights of the Child to draft United Nations guidelines for the protection of alternative care of children without parental care and recognised the need for such guidelines.

Following the successful Committee on the Rights of the Child sub-regional workshop in Bangkok last year, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights decided to organise similar follow-up workshops this year in Qatar from 19 to 21 June and in Argentina from 28 to 30 November, she said. Another activity of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in this area was the one related to the project, funded by the European Union, which sought to raise awareness of the human rights treaty body system among non-governmental organisations, national human rights institutions and the media. One national workshop was just organised in Sri Lanka where representatives of the Government and the civil society examined treaty bodies systems focusing on the concluding observations on Sri Lanka.

Last week, Ms. Khan Williams added, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights convened in Geneva the fourth in a series of workshops on the implementation of treaty body recommendations, which included participants from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mauritius, Thailand, Uganda and Zambia. These countries were going to be reviewed soon by the Committee. Moreover, the United Nations Study on Violence Against Children was now entering a crucial phase with the nine regional consultations that were organised worldwide. The first one took place in Trinidad and Tobago in March this year and was attended by the Chairperson of the Committee and another member. Paolo Sergio Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, the Independent Expert on the Study, would report to the General Assembly at its next session in the fall and submit his final report to the Commission on Human Rights during the spring of 2006, she added.

When the Committee reconvenes in public at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 18 May, it will begin its consideration of the second periodic report of the Philippines (CRC/C/65/Add.31).

CRC05015E

Previous CRC News items

• 01/04/2005: Treaty Body Database
• 09/03/2005: An Introduction to the Members of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (March 2005)

Organisation Contact Details:

UN OHCHR - Committee on the Rights of the Child
8-14 Avenue de la Paix
CH 1211 Geneva 10
Tel: +41 22 917 9000
Website: http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/index.htm

Last updated 16/06/2005 09:42:34

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