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Summary: On 21 July 2011, the Human Rights Committee adopted General Comment 34 on freedom of expression.
{21 July 2011} The Human Rights Committee this afternoon adopted a General Comment on States parties' obligations under Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, setting out the rights to hold an opinion without interference and to freedom of expression. The meeting today concluded the second and final reading of the draft text and it was adopted at the end of the meeting. The adoption of the General Comment comes two years after the Committee began its first reading of the text in March 2009. Over the course of the two years the Committee solicited input from the public including non-governmental organizations, States parties and individuals, whose suggestions were incorporated into the final language of the document. NGO contributions Michael O'Flaherty, the Committee Expert serving as rapporteur for the draft General Comment, noted that a number of submissions had recently come in from non-governmental organizations and while these interventions had been received after the stated deadline, he suggested they be considered nonetheless because they were quite relevant to the draft General Comment and made some good points. The Committee then began reviewing the document on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis, beginning with a paragraph regarding the decriminalization of defamation. Experts commented on and proposed changes to the draft General Comment. Next Steps The General Comment will be translated and when the Committee meet again in October the translations will be compared and then the General Comment for each of the different languages will be adopted. An advanced, unedited version of the General Comment is available in the attached PDF document above. Further Information:pdf: http://www.crin.org/docs/GC34.pdf