World Conference on Racism recommended - includes related articles

UN Chronicle, Summer, 1997

The Commission on Human Rights has recommended that the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly authorize the holding, no later than 2001, of a World Conference on Racism and Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance. In a revised omnibus resolution, it further suggested that the Commission play the role of preparatory committee for the Conference.

The Commission concluded its fiftieth anniversary session on 18 April, bringing to a close six weeks of meetings that saw the adoption of 78 resolutions and 26 decisions, most by consensus.The session had opened on 10 March with a pledge by Secretary-General Kofi Annan to be a "champion of human rights" and to ensure that these were fully integrated into the action of the United Nations in all domains.

Among measures taken was the creation of a post of Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Nigeria.

The Commission also created the post of Independent Expert on the effects on human rights of economic structural adjustment programmes, established a working group on the rights of migrant workers, and asked the Secretary-General to send a mission to Guatemala at the end of 1997 to review the implementation of the peace accords signed there in December 1996.

A Special Rapporteur on Rwanda was replaced with a Special Representative and given the task of advising the country on improving human rights, while the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the situation in neighbouring Burundi was extended for another year.

The Secretary-General was requested by the Commission to follow up a recommendation of the General Assembly to appoint, for a period of three years, a special representative on the impact of armed conflict on children. The Commission also called upon States to end the use of children as soldiers and ensure their demobilization and reintegration into society, and to reintegrate child victims in cases of armed conflict or foreign occupation; reaffirmed that rape in the conduct of armed conflict was a war crime and called upon all States to protect women and children from such violence and sexual exploitation, and to strengthen mechanisms to investigate and prosecute perpetrators; and requested the working group on a draft optional protocol to the Convention on the involvement of children in armed conflict to meet for a period of two weeks or less, if possible, before the next session of the Commission to finalize the draft protocol.

Also under that text, the States parties to the Convention on the Rights of the Child were called on to develop urgently measures to eliminate the sale of children, as well as their sexual exploitation, among other things, through child sex tourism and other forms of child prostitution and child pornography. It also requested the Secretary-General to transmit the report of the working group on the question of a draft optional protocol to the Convention, focusing on the sale of children, to Governments and other relevant recipients for their comments.

The Commission extended the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on traditional practices affecting the health of women and children for another two years and appointed a Special Rapporteur to conduct a comprehensive study on indigenous land rights.

The Commission passed resolutions on human rights situations in Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Nigeria, the former Yugoslavia, Cuba, Iraq, Zaire (now Democratic Republic of the Congo), Sudan, Afghanistan, Rwanda, East Timor and Myanmar. It deplored continued Israeli violations in southern Lebanon and the Western Bekaa. And it once again rejected, on a no-action motion, a resolution on the human rights situation in China.

The Chairman's Statements were approved on the status of human rights in Colombia and Liberia, while resolutions related to advisory services programmes focused on situations of human rights in Cambodia, Haiti, Somalia and Guatemala. Another Chairman's Statement condemned the hostage-taking in Lima, Peru.

The Commission extended the mandates off Special Rapporteurs on the independence and impartiality of the judiciary and on the elimination of violence against women; the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the situation of human rights in Iran; and Special Rapporteurs on human rights situations in the former Yugoslavia, Equatorial Guinea, Zaire, the Sudan, Cuba, Iraq, Myanmar and Afghanistan. The Commission's Expert for the special process on missing persons in the former Yugoslavia resigned, citing lack of cooperation from some Governments involved and a lack of international will to accomplish the task.

In closed meetings on 4 and 7 April, the Commission examined human rights situations in 16 countries: Antigua and Barbuda, Botswana, Chad, Czech Republic, Estonia, Gambia, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Saudi Arabia, Sierra Leone, Syria, United Republic of Tanzania, United States and Uzbekistan. It decided to discontinue consideration of Antigua and Barbuda, Botswana, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Syria, Tanzania, United States and Uzbekistan. Under the advisory-services procedure, the Commission considered situations and programmes to promote human rights in Guatemala, Somalia, Haiti and Cambodia.