Optional
Protocol to CEDAW Adopted!
In
June 1993, governments met in Vienna for the World Conference on
Human Rights and agreed that "the Commission on the Status
of Women and the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women should quickly examine the possibility of introducing
the right of petition through the preparation of an Optional Protocol
to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women (CEDAW)" (The Vienna Declaration and
Programme of Action, Paragraph 40).
On
March 12, 1999 the 43rd session of the Commission on the Status
of Women adopted an Optional Protocol to the United Nations
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
Women. The Optional Protocol contains two procedures: a communications
procedure allowing individual women, or groups of women, to submit
claims of violations of rights set forth in the Convention
to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women;
and an inquiry procedure enabling the Committee to initiate inquiries
into situations of grave or systematic violations of women's rights.
In either case, the governments involved must be a party to the
Protocol in order for these procedures to be used.
The
Commission on the Status of Women submitted a resolution recommending
the Protocol to the Economic and Social Council for approval and
submission to the General Assembly for adoption later this year.
It is hoped that this adoption will coincide with the 20th Anniversary
of CEDAW on December 19, 1999 and should be open for signature,
ratification and accession in 2000. At this point, women whose governments
have ratified CEDAW can begin to push for adoption of the
Optional Protocol. For more information on advocacy strategies contact
the Women's Caucus for Gender Justice at ph: (1-212)697-7741; fax:
(1-212)973-0332; e-mail: iccwomen@igc.org.
The
text of the Optional Protocol and the resolution accompanying can
be found at http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/protocol/adopted.htm.
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