International law, Sixth edition
Download 7.77 Mb. Pdf ko'rish
|
International Law MALCOLM N. SHAW
tional Human Rights Law, chapter 13; Steiner, Alston and Goodman, International Human
Rights, pp. 175 and 541; J. Morsink, ‘Women’s Rights in the Universal Declaration’, 13 HRQ, 1991, p. 229; H. Charlesworth and C. Chinkin, The Boundaries of International Law: A Feminist Analysis, Manchester, 2000, and M. Bustelo, ‘The Committee on the Elimina- tion of Discrimination against Women at the Crossroads’ in Alston and Crawford, Future, p. 79. 318 See articles 17–21 of the Convention and the first Report of the Committee, A/38/45, and UN Chronicle, November 1983, pp. 65–86. 319 See CEDAW/C/7Rev.3 and with regard to reports submitted from 1 January 2003, www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/guidelines.PDF. 320 Article 21. 324 i n t e r nat i o na l l aw and a discussion of a draft prepared by a Committee member. General Recommendation No. 5 called upon states parties to make more use of ‘temporary special measures such as positive action, preferential treat- ment or quota systems to advance women’s integration into education, the economy, politics and employment’, while General Recommenda- tion No. 8 provided that states parties should take further measures to ensure to women, on equal terms with men and without discrimina- tion, the opportunity to represent their government at the international level. 321 General Recommendation No. 12 called upon states parties to include in their reports information on measures taken to deal with vio- lence against women, while General Recommendation No. 14 called for measures to be taken to eradicate the practice of female circumcision. General Recommendation No. 19 (1992) dealt at some length with the problem of violence against women in general and specific terms, and General Recommendation No. 21 is concerned with equality in mar- riage and family relations. 322 In 1999, the Committee adopted a General Recommendation No. 24 on women and health. General Recommen- dation No. 25 was adopted in 2004 and concerned temporary special measures. 323 The Committee, however, met only for one session of two weeks a year, which was clearly inadequate. This was increased to two sessions a year from 1997. 324 An Optional Protocol adopted in 1999 and in force as from December 2000 allows for the right of individual petition pro- vided a number of conditions are met, including the requirement for the exhaustion of domestic remedies. In addition, the Protocol creates an inquiry procedure enabling the Committee to initiate inquiries into situations of grave or systematic violations of women’s rights where it has received reliable information of grave or systematic violations by a state party of rights established in the Convention. 325 In recent years, the importance of women’s rights has received greater recognition. The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action adopted in 1993 em- phasised that the human rights of women should be brought into the 321 A/43/38 (1988). 322 HRI/GEN/1/Rev.1, 1994, pp. 72 ff. 323 HRI/GEN/1/Rev.7, 2004, p. 282. 324 Although the Committee met exceptionally for three sessions during 2002 to deal with backlog reports. However, see General Assembly resolution 60/230 concering the exten- sion of meeting time in 2005 and 2006. 325 See, for example, for an earlier view, R. Cook, ‘The Elimination of Sexual Apartheid: Prospects for the Fourth World Conference on Women’, ASIL Issue Papers on World Conferences, Washington, 1995, pp. 48 ff. t h e p r o t e c t i o n o f h u m a n r i g h t s 325 mainstream of UN system-wide activity and that women’s rights should be regularly and systematically addressed throughout the UN bodies and mechanisms. 326 In the light of this, the fifth meeting of Chairpersons of Human Rights Treaty Bodies in 1994 agreed that the enjoyment of the human rights of women by each treaty body within the competence of its mandate should be closely monitored. Each of the treaty bodies took steps to examine its guidelines with this in mind. 327 It should also be noted, for example, that the Special Rapporteur on Torture was called upon by the Commission on Human Rights in 1994 to examine ques- tions concerning torture directed disproportionately or primarily against women. 328 In addition, the General Assembly adopted a Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women in February 1994, 329 and a Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, its Causes and Conse- quences was appointed in 1994. 330 The International Labour Organisation established the promotion of equality of opportunity and treatment of men and women in employment as a priority item in its programme and budget for 1994/5. 331 The Committee on the Rights of the Child has also discussed the issue of the ‘girl-child’ and the question of child prostitution. 332 326 See Part II, Section 3, 32 ILM, 1993, p. 1678. See also the Beijing Conference 1995, Cook, ‘Elimination of Sexual Apartheid’; the Beijing plus 5 process, see General Assembly resolution 55/71. In 2000, the General Assembly adopted resolution S-23/3 containing a Political Declaration and a statement on further actions and initiatives to implement the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. 327 See HRI/MC/1995/2. See also the Report of the Expert Group Meeting on the Devel- opment of Guidelines for the Integration of Gender Perspectives into Human Rights Activities and Programmes, E/CN.4/1996/105, 1995. This called inter alia for the use of gender-inclusive language in human rights instruments and standards, the identification, collection and use of gender-disaggregated data, gender-sensitive interpretation of human rights mechanisms and education and the promotion of a system-wide co-ordination and collaboration on the human rights of women within the UN. 328 See resolution 1994/37. See also the Report of the Special Rapporteur of January 1995, E/CN.4/1995/34, p. 8. 329 Resolution 48/104, see 33 ILM, 1994, p. 1049. Note also the adoption of the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence Against Women in June 1994, ibid., p. 1534 and the March 2002 Joint Declaration by the Special Rappor- teur on women’s rights of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, its Causes and its Consequences of the UN Com- mission on Human Rights, and the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Women in Africa of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights which called for the elimination of violence and discrimination against women: see www.cidh.org/declaration.women.htm. 330 See E/CN.4/2003/75. 331 E/CN.4/Sub.2/1994/5, p. 6. 332 See further below, p. 331. 326 i n t e r nat i o na l l aw The Committee Against Torture 333 The prohibition of torture is contained in a wide variety of human rights 334 and humanitarian law treaties, 335 and has become part of customary in- ternational law. Indeed it is now established as a norm of jus cogens. 336 Issues concerning torture have come before a number of human rights organs, such as the Human Rights Committee, 337 the European Court of Human Rights 338 and the International Criminal Tribunal on the Former Yugoslavia. 339 The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment was signed on 10 December 1984 and entered into force in 1987. It built particularly upon the 333 See e.g. M. Nowak and E. McArther, The UN Convention Against Torture: A Commentary, Oxford, 2008; A. Byrnes, ‘The Committee Against Torture’ in Alston, United Nations Download 7.77 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
Ma'lumotlar bazasi mualliflik huquqi bilan himoyalangan ©fayllar.org 2024
ma'muriyatiga murojaat qiling
ma'muriyatiga murojaat qiling