Submitted by crinadmin on
On 25 May Ms. Kang, the Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights opened the 51st session of the Committee by welcoming the newly elected members. Ms. Kang briefed the Committee about a few recent developments taken place since the last session of the Committee, including the upcoming celebration of the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the CRC on 20 November 2009, the appointment of Special Representative of the Secretary-General on violence against children, HRC's annual full-day meeting of 11 June 2009, as well as the 5th session of the UPR in May and the Durban Review Conference. The newly elected members of the Committee took a solemn declaration in open meeting pledging their commitment to “perform their duties and exercise their powers as a members of the Committee honorably, faithfully, impartially and conscientiously” . For more information about the CRC elections see breakdown of the results of the elections and UN press release.
The Committee proceeded with the re-election of the Chairperson, as well as the adoption of its agenda and the review of the organization of its work. The election of the Chairperson was made following the proposals of two Committee members supporting the nomination of the current Chairperson.
Furthermore, several issues were raised by the Committee members during the interactive discussion, including the need for a strong and effective Secretariat in view of upcoming two chambers of the Committee in October and throughout next year, the issues of accurate translation of documents into Spanish, the improvement of the computer system in the Office, the difficulties in accessing database of other treaty bodies as well as the methods and exceptional measures granted by the Committee to exercise in relation to States parties that are encountering problems in submitting reports on time. The Deputy High Commissioner addressed most of these issues and expressed her full support in further taking them into consideration in their work.
During the 51st session the Committee will also pursue the elaboration of general comments on article 12 of the Convention on child participation, the one on article 3 on the best interests of the child as well as on article 19 on violence against children. It will continue its discussion on how existing cooperation with various relevant bodies could be further strengthened to enhance the promotion and protection of the rights of the child. The Committee noted that a system of collaboration has been put in place with UNICEF, some other UN agencies, and the NGO Group for the CRC. A workshop in collaboration with UNICEF is expected to take place on 19 June.
The Secretary of the Committee informed that it has received 14 reports since its last session: Cuba, Cambodia, Bahrain, Egypt, Iceland, Italy, Panama, Singapore and Syrian Arab Republic have submitted their reports under the CRC. Under the OPAC, the Secretariat has received the State party report from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and under the OPSC, reports were received from Canada, Sweden and Togo. Six initial reports were overdue as of 22 May 2009 for Afghanistan, the Cook Islands, Nauru, Niue, Tonga and Tuvalu.
Countries scheduled to be examined during the 51st session of the Committee are France, Mauritania, Bangladesh, Niger and Romania under the CRC. Under the OPSC and OPAC, the Committee will consider the State party reports of Slovenia and Oman. The tentative schedule for consideration of States parties reports is available at:http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/crc/crcs51.htm
All country reports will be available at http://www.childrightsnet.org/.