Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women

Seventy-ninth session

Summary record of the 1802nd meeting

Held via videoconference on Monday, 21 June 2021, at 12.30 p.m. Central European Summer Time

Chair:Ms. Acosta Vargas

Contents

Opening of the session

Adoption of the agenda and organization of work

Report of the Chair on activities undertaken between the seventy-eighth and seventy-ninth sessions of the Committee

Consideration of reports submitted by States parties under article 18 of the Convention

Follow-up to the consideration of reports submitted by States parties under article 18 of the Convention

The meeting was called to order at 12.35 p.m.

Opening of the session

The Chair declared open the seventy-ninth session of the Committee.

Opening statement by the representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

Mr. Walker (Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights), speaking also on behalf of the Secretary-General, said that he wished to commend the Committee for the resilience, flexibility and commitment it had shown in continuing to produce high-quality work, including insightful guidance on how to address the human rights implications of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, while working in an online format. Remote working had been challenging on several fronts as Committee members had been forced to cope with time difference constraints, Internet connectivity problems, technical issues associated with interpretation platforms and a lack of full accessibility and reasonable accommodation for persons with disabilities.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) was acutely aware of the need to recommence in-person sessions as soon as possible. He was pleased to note that the full budget allotment for 2021 had been received and that there were therefore no financial impediments to in-person meetings. In-person sessions were important to enable the treaty bodies to process the backlog of State party reports that had been building up since the outbreak of the pandemic; at the end of May 2021, the total backlog of reports pending review by all treaty bodies combined was 315. Of similar concern was the ever-growing backlog of individual communications that were awaiting decisions on admissibility and/or the merits.

At the thirty-third annual meeting of Chairs of the human rights treaty bodies, which had taken place from 7 to 11 June 2021, discussions had focused on: the development of a predictable review cycle calendar that would maximize synergies and complementarities across the treaty bodies and make it easier for States to comply with their reporting obligations, including the possibility of replacing every second review with a focused review; the ongoing harmonization of working methods; and the use of new technological developments to increase the efficiency, transparency and accessibility of the treaty body system.

The forty-seventh session of the Human Rights Council, which had started that day, would feature two online panel discussions on the human rights of women. The first would address violence against women and girls with disabilities and would involve one of the Committee’s Vice-Chairs, Ms. Peláez Narváez, while the second would focus on gender-equal socioeconomic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and would consider how women’s and girls’ participation in recovery plans might be ensured and how macroeconomic policies might serve to advance gender equality and rectify the undervaluation of care work. In addition, on 23 June 2021, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights would open a high-level panel discussion on the multi-sectoral prevention of, and response to, female genital mutilation. Over the session, the Council would consider: draft resolutions on menstrual hygiene management, human rights and gender equality; realizing the equal enjoyment of the right to education by every girl; preventable maternal mortality and morbidity and human rights; accelerating efforts to eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls, particularly women and girls with disabilities; and the elimination of female genital mutilation.

In the week prior to the current meeting, Ms. Gbedemah had participated in a regional workshop on progress, gaps and challenges in eliminating child, early and forced marriage at which delegates had analysed the meaning of accountability in that field, focusing on the relevant legal and policy frameworks and the monitoring mechanisms through which persons in power could be held accountable for wrongdoings or inaction. From 30 June to 2 July 2021, representatives of civil society and governments, inter alia, would be coming together at the Generation Equality Forum in Paris. Alongside States, feminist civil society organizations, philanthropists and the private sector, OHCHR had been designated one of the co-leaders of the Generation Equality Action Coalition on Feminist Movements and Leadership, which had developed a blueprint calling for more funding for feminist movements, more civic space for feminist action, more participation for women and girls and more resources for young feminist leaders and their movements, and, in a high-level event at the Forum, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights would be setting out the individual and collective commitments that OHCHR had made with a view to accelerating action on feminist movements and leadership over the next five years.

Mr. Safarov said that he would welcome further information on the current financial and pandemic-related restrictions facing the treaty bodies and the effects of those restrictions on the committee’s ability to fulfil their mandates.

Mr. Walker said that it was a priority for OHCHR to ensure that the treaty bodies could resume in-person meetings as soon as possible. Although the United Nations had faced a liquidity crisis in 2020, the financial situation was better in 2021 and there were currently no financial impediments to the holding of in-person sessions later in the year. Where pandemic-related restrictions were concerned, the Swiss Federal Council would shortly be making an announcement on the situation in Switzerland and the possible lifting of the restrictions currently in place.

Adoption of the agenda and organization of work

The agenda was adopted (CEDAW/C/79/1).

Report of the Chair on activities undertaken between the seventy-eighth and seventy-ninth sessions of the Committee

The Chair said that, since the previous session, the number of States parties that had ratified or acceded to the Convention had remained at 189. Similarly, the number of States parties having accepted the amendment to article 20 (1) of the Convention concerning the Committee’s meeting time had remained at 80. In accordance with the provisions of the amendment, acceptance by 126 States parties was required in order to bring it into force. The number of States parties to the Optional Protocol had remained at 114. Eight States parties had submitted their periodic reports to the Committee since the beginning of the last session, namely, Costa Rica, France, the Gambia, Malawi, Rwanda, Ukraine, Uruguay and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Also since the last session, Paraguay had informed the Committee of its decision to submit its eighth periodic report under the simplified reporting procedure.

On 25 February 2021, the last day of the seventy-eighth session, she had spoken at the closure of the sixtieth Meeting of the Presiding Officers of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, organized by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. On 8 March 2021, she had participated in a panel discussion on institutional and legislative aspects of the rights of indigenous women in forging a more egalitarian future, while, on 10 March, she had made a presentation on the rights of indigenous women and girls from an international perspective at an international symposium convened by the Plurinational Constitutional Court of Bolivia. On 11 March, she had participated in a panel discussion on the risks faced by indigenous women when seeking to assert their rights, organized by Indigenous Peoples Rights International.

During the sixty-fifth session of the Commission on the Status of Women, held from 15 to 26 March, she had taken part in several events: a high-level panel discussion convened by OHCHR and the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences to mark the launch of a booklet reviewing 25 years of the Beijing Platform for Action published by the Platform of International Expert Mechanisms on Discrimination and Violence against Women; a side event entitled “Walking Together on the Path of Change”; and a panel discussion on the role of women’s rights organizations in the response to and recovery from COVID-19 organized by UN-Women. On 17 March, she had also participated in an event on ethics, dignity and the protection of the rights of vulnerable groups hosted by the Rafael Landívar University in Guatemala and, on 23 March, she had also spoken at an event held to discuss the challenges of fighting gender-based discrimination and violence against women before, during and after the pandemic, hosted by the municipality of Arequipa, Peru.

On 24 March, she had contributed to a dialogue on barriers and challenges to women’s political participation, convened by the United Nations Development Programme and other organizations. On 29 March, she had participated in a thematic dialogue on the crisis of the human rights of women and girls, including in the COVID-19 context, and the issues of migration, social and racial justice held during the Generation Equality Forum in Mexico City. On 26 April, she had spoken at an event examining intercultural models and good practices in the response to violence against indigenous women and girls, convened by the Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean of the United Nations Population Fund. On 27 April, she had spoken at the launch of a new book by Alda Facio, entitled La evolución de los derechos humanos de las mujeres en las Naciones Unidas, and, on 28 May, she had participated, alongside Alda Facio, in a public discussion on the history of the women’s human rights movement at an event hosted by the Latin American Women’s Network. On 31 May, she had been a special guest speaker at a webinar examining positive developments and future challenges for women’s rights organized by the Academy on Human Rights and Humanitarian Law of the American University Washington College of Law.

From 7 to 11 June, she had participated in the thirty-third annual meeting of Chairs of the human rights treaty bodies, at which discussions had been based on the draft conclusions prepared by a drafting group that had included Ms. Gbedemah. On 10 June, she had spoken at a webinar on inequality and discrimination in times of pandemic, hosted by the Ministry for Women and Vulnerable Groups of Peru. On 14 June, she had addressed an event held to consider the issue of State responsibility for the elimination of violence against women and girls, organized by the Women’s Information and Development Centre of Bolivia. Lastly, on 15 June, she had participated in a panel discussion on the situation of indigenous women and girls with disabilities in the recovery efforts from the pandemic of COVID-19, convened by International Disability Alliance.

Ms. Gabr said that she had taken part in a number of awareness-raising and training events, designed for law enforcement and judicial personnel in particular, at which she had drawn attention to the problem of human trafficking and the Committee’s general recommendation on that subject. She had also been involved in activities intended to support those most vulnerable to trafficking, for example, by informing them of the availability of hotlines and other channels of assistance. In addition, she had delivered lectures at the American University in Cairo and had contributed, as an expert on the human rights of women, to discussions of the Women’s Advisory Council of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.

Ms. Rana said that, while the COVID-19 pandemic had posed a major challenge, it had also brought opportunities to reach out to new constituencies through virtual communications. She had thus been able to take part in webinars on women, leadership and equality in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic organized by UN-Women, the Government of Malaysia and various Malaysian human rights organizations, and to serve as a panellist in a number of virtual events, including: a round-table discussion on women’s rights in armed conflict held at the University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom; an event focused on the decolonization of gendered power structures in South Asia; a side event to the sixty-fifth session of the Commission on the Status of Women examining the human rights of widows and organized by Widows for Peace through Democracy; an event devoted to the digitalization of efforts to end early, forced and child marriage and adolescent pregnancy in the Asia Pacific region; a regional webinar on human rights, gender equality and women’s empowerment organized jointly by various United Nations entities; and a multi-stakeholder dialogue on feminist movements and leadership. In addition, she had spoken at a workshop on women and peace and security and bridging implementation gaps in a world marked by COVID-19 that had been organized by the German Government, and had delivered the opening remarks at a webinar on gender-based violence and environmental linkages organized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the keynote address at the closing session of an Asia Pacific summit organized by the Association Concerning Sexual Violence against Women and the University of Hong Kong, the theme of which had been turning laws into action and the elimination of gender-based violence.

Ms. Bethel said that she had spoken about the Convention and its relationship to sexual orientation and gender identity at a conference organized by various academic institutions in the United Kingdom, and about the Committee’s recommendations relating to article 9 of the Convention at a workshop organized by the Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights. In the Bahamas, she had led an in-depth workshop that had focused on the Committee’s capacity-building and awareness-raising work, while also addressing gender-based violence and divorce and matrimonial matters.

Ms. Reddock said that, during the sixty-fifth session of the Commission on the Status of Women, she had taken part in a panel discussion examining feminist approaches to justice and international responses to sexual violence that had been organized by the International Sociological Association and co-sponsored by Criminologists without Borders. She had also taken part, as a resource person, in an event organized by the Office of the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago to raise awareness of the Committee’s work. In May, acting in a personal capacity, she had served as a presenter and panellist at a session organized by the Open Society Foundations to consider the role of activism in an era of authoritarianism, inequality, pandemic and climate change, at which she had spoken about the history of feminist movements in the Caribbean.

Ms. Tisheva said that she had taken part in a special event on the subject of international standards and obligations in respect of gender-based violence during the session of the Commission on the Status of Women. Her other activities had included: giving a briefing on the Convention at an event organized by the University of Bergen, Norway; speaking on the subject of women’s human rights and the importance of maintaining acquired standards at several other events in Europe; sharing highlights of the Committee’s work to uphold the rights of older women with the Independent Expert on the enjoyment of all human rights by older persons; and, at the domestic level, helping to develop labour standards, to draft legislation to combat domestic violence, based on the Convention, and to organize events for the Bulgarian Women’s Human Rights Training Institute to support the introduction of regional and universal standards for young lawyers.

Ms. Narain said that she had participated in two side events during the session of the Commission on the Status of Women: a virtual panel discussion on the theme of women delivering justice and achieving gender parity in the justice sector, organized by the International Development Law Organization, the International Association of Women Judges, the American Bar Association and others; and a high-level event on equality in family law and committing to reform. She had also taken part in a virtual dialogue on human rights in the context of the universal periodic review process for Samoa, organized by the Office of the United Nations Resident Coordinator, the OHCHR Regional Office for the Pacific and the Government of Samoa.

Ms. Ameline said that she had been actively involved in work carried out by the Inter-Parliamentary Union in follow-up to adjustments made to the legislative structure in Nigeria, as part of the country’s constitutional reform, with the aim of increasing the political representation of women. She had also taken part in a number of seminars, including a recent event attended by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and representatives of the Government of Egypt. Because France currently chaired the Generation Equality Action Coalition on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, she had been able to speak on sexual and reproductive health at numerous forums, including before United Nations bodies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). She had been closely involved in discussions concerning digitalization and had represented the Committee in the monthly meetings at which the treaty bodies considered the COVID-19 situation and the possibility of resuming normal activities in the near future. Lastly, she wished to mention that students at the Sciences Po university in France had developed a toolkit for migrant women in Europe that was intended to demystify the Convention and the Committee’s work to defend their rights.

Ms. Akizuki said that her activities had included: in March, speaking about the Convention, the Committee and the United Nations system in a webinar organized by the Japanese staff association of officials of international organizations in Geneva; in April, giving a talk on trends in the work of the Committee in a webinar organized by the Japan NGO Network for CEDAW, Optional Protocol CEDAW Action and the Japanese Association of International Women’s Rights; and, in June, reporting on the work of the Committee during a symposium on the United Nations and gender organized by the Japanese Association of International Women’s Rights.

Ms. Manalo said that she had recently been in contact with a local association that had asked her to provide a briefing on human rights and the activities of the Committee and other treaty bodies. In addition, having learned about a questionnaire circulated by the Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, she had been in contact with the Supreme Court, the Judicial Academy of the Supreme Court and the Ministry of Justice, had briefed them about the Committee’s activities and had passed the questionnaire to the relevant personnel. She expected to receive responses in the near future.

Mr. Safarov said that he had taken part in various events, including: a webinar focused on best practice for the protection of every child’s right to a nationality organized by the Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, among other bodies; a peer-to-peer webinar on mental health held for English-speaking African countries by OHCHR; a peer-to-peer event for the members of the treaty bodies on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the right to mental health in Europe; and numerous training activities, including an event at Baku State University on women’s rights and gender equality.

Ms. Xia Jie said that she had met with women’s groups in Yunnan Province, which had been seriously affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and had taken part in a forum organized to consider how best to protect the health of women and girls who had been infected with the disease. In March, she had participated in discussions concerning the amendment of Chinese legislation on women’s rights; subsequently, she had met with women’s groups in Shanghai to sound out their opinions on the legislation. She had also taken part in numerous international conferences on women’s rights.

Ms. Stott Despoja said that she had had multiple opportunities to raise awareness of the Committee’s work and discuss women’s and girls’ rights during an intersessional period heavily marked by the COVID-19 pandemic. She had continued her usual work on the prevention of violence against women and children, delivering a range of talks for embassies, NGOs, stakeholders, academics and the media, and had been honoured to speak at the launch of a map for implementation of the Convention published by the George Institute for Global Health and the University of New South Wales Australian Human Rights Institute that would provide a unique tool for monitoring action to uphold women’s rights in the Asia Pacific region.

Consideration of reports submitted by States parties under article 18 of the Convention

Ms. Rana, speaking in her capacity as the Chair of the pre-sessional working group for the seventy-ninth session, said that the pre-sessional working group had met remotely from 9 to 13 November 2021. It had prepared lists of issues and questions with regard to the reports of Egypt, Jamaica, Lebanon, Morocco, Portugal and Saint Kitts and Nevis and lists of issues prior to reporting for Brazil, Greece and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. To prepare the lists of issues and questions, the working group had been able to draw on the core documents of the States parties, with the exception of Saint Kitts and Nevis, which had not submitted one, and the periodic reports of the States parties, with the exception of the three States that would use the simplified reporting procedure. The working group had also drawn on the Committee’s general recommendations, draft lists of issues and questions prepared by the secretariat, the concluding observations of the Committee and other treaty bodies, and, in particular, the States parties’ follow-up to the Committee’s concluding observations on their previous reports. In addition, the working group had received information from entities and specialized agencies of the United Nations system, NGOs and national human rights institutions. The lists of issues and questions had been transmitted to the States parties concerned.

The Chair said that, owing to the continuing effect of the COVID-19 pandemic and the connectivity issues that made ensuring participation in remote meetings difficult for certain Committee members, the Committee had decided to postpone the consideration of the reports of the States parties in question.

Ms. Rasidi (International Women’s Rights Action Watch Asia Pacific), speaking on behalf of five international NGOs working to protect the rights of women and marginalized communities across the globe, said that the NGOs on whose behalf she was speaking wished to express their deep concern about the lack of accountability for women’s and girls’ rights resulting from the absence of State Party reviews by the Committee during the COVID-19 pandemic. State party reviews were the main vehicle for ensuring implementation of the Convention and the Committee had a key role in ensuring that the guarantees of substantive equality and non-discrimination for women worldwide were enforced. The NGOs were alarmed by the systematic efforts to undermine the international human rights system, including the chronic underfunding of the United Nations treaty bodies. In the light of recent regressions in the protection of women’s rights, which had included the withdrawal of Turkey from the Istanbul Convention, the Committee’s decision to suspend virtual reviews was extremely discouraging for those working on the frontline to defend the rights of women and marginalized communities. The NGOs were particularly concerned about the women’s rights situation in five States parties, namely, Indonesia, Nicaragua, Peru, South Africa and Yemen, whose reviews have been postponed at least twice since the start of the pandemic.

In Indonesia, the pandemic had reinforced the backlash against human rights. Over 4 million domestic workers remained unrecognized, subject to discrimination and exclusion and, in the context of the pandemic, vulnerable to food, housing and health crises, multiple forms of violence and debt bondage. In addition, there was still no national law to combat the economic exploitation and sexual harassment of female workers; due to a lack of political will, two important bills – the first on the protection of domestic workers and the second on the elimination of sexual violence – had been languishing in parliament for years at a time when urgent action was required. Every 40 minutes a woman or girl became a victim of sexual violence, with one in every five cases occurring in a work environment, while traditional, cultural and religious beliefs continued to support harmful practices such as child marriage and female genital mutilation. As Indonesia had ratified neither the International Labour Organization (ILO) Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189), nor the ILO Violence and Harassment Convention, 2019 (No. 190), in the absence of a review by the Committee, there was no accountability mechanism that was accessible at that time of urgent need.

Ms. Scanella (Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom) said that the continued postponement of the review of Yemen was particularly concerning since the Committee’s last constructive dialogue with the country on a periodic report had taken place 13 years previously, before the civil war. Even at that time, Yemen had ranked last in worldwide gender equality indexes. Discrimination against women and girls was embedded in laws, institutions, traditions and social norms, and the civil war, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic, had accentuated the pre-existing patterns of discrimination and had exposed women and girls to unprecedented levels of human rights violations and abuses. The NGOs urged the Committee to address those patterns of discrimination, which violated the obligations assumed by Yemen under the Convention, without delay. While they appreciated the challenges inherent in holding online sessions, pragmatic solutions must be found.

Ms. Agosti (International Institute on Race, Equality and Human Rights) said that Peru was undergoing a political and health crisis that directly affected the rights of women, girls and members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex community. According to the Ministry for Women and Vulnerable Groups, complaints of gender-based violence had more than doubled since the start of the pandemic, exceeding 7,000 in 2020 alone; there had been 47 femicides in the first four months of 2020; and an average of 16 women disappeared every day. Furthermore, because health services had recently been focused on fighting COVID-19, sexual and reproductive health services had been scaled back and women’s emergency centres had closed, leaving over 100,000 women unattended. A review by the Committee was urgently needed to provide an opportunity to highlight those patterns, to enter into dialogue with the State’s newly elected government and to urge it to implement public policies that protected all women.

In Nicaragua, currently in its third year of sociopolitical crisis, the human rights situation had escalated into an emergency and women’s fundamental rights were under serious threat. The authorities continued to systematically repress human rights defenders, indigenous peoples, Afro-descendent persons, women and any citizens who exercised their right to dissent. A total of 16 prominent opposition figures, of whom 6 were women and 4 were likely presidential candidates, had been detained in recent weeks; 124 political prisoners, including 9 women, remained behind bars; and, in 2020, over 70 women had been murdered, with barely 30 per cent of the related criminal cases resulting in a conviction. Furthermore, the Government had declined to implement the measures recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) and continued to harass medical personnel who criticized its management of the crisis. The Committee had not had an interactive dialogue with Nicaragua for 14 years; a review was therefore vital to highlight the many serious rights violations and to urge the State to adopt urgent institutional reforms to address the discrimination faced by women, which had been exacerbated by the pandemic.

Ms. Mudarikwa (Women’s Legal Centre and Sexual Rights Initiative), noting that the last review of South Africa had taken place in 2011 and that the review of the periodic report submitted in 2019 had already been postponed twice, said that the NGOs were concerned that any further delays would have a cascading effect, given the increase in violations of women’s rights since the start of the pandemic. South Africa had one of the highest levels of inequality in the world and one of the highest recorded levels of incidents of violence against women. Conditions of work for women continued to be dominated by patriarchal behaviour; social protection floors were discriminatory, exclusionary and inadequate; and less than 15 per cent of women owned land, although they accounted for 51 per cent of the country’s population. Reports indicated that black women who were living with HIV, or who were pregnant and about to give birth, had been coerced into undergoing forced sterilizations that deprived them of their rights to bodily autonomy and choice, and that many aspects of service provision continued to operate within a binary and heteronormative framework that perpetually excluded and discriminated against women with diverse gender identities, gender expressions and sexual characteristics. The manner in which the pandemic had been handled had made access to sexual and reproductive health services harder still for the many women and girls already struggling to obtain regular and consistent access. It had become vital for the constructive dialogue to happen, as any improvement in the rights of women in South Africa was critically dependent on the work of the Committee. The NGOs therefore urged the Committee to avoid further postponements and, if necessary, find alternative ways of working that allowed for State party reviews to resume.

The Chair said that the NGOs had raised some very pertinent issues that reaffirmed the Committee’s responsibilities towards women and girls throughout the world. The State party reviews had had to be postponed because the unprecedented circumstances had prevented the Committee from conducting them in a manner that guaranteed the requisite quality and efficiency, but the importance that the Committee attached to reviews had in no way diminished. The Committee was committed to continuing its work provided that at least the minimum prerequisites were met, but in recent times even those minimums had been impossible to achieve. The Committee was doing all that it could to address the backlog and, in October, would be reviewing a total of 12 States parties over four weeks, provided that the health situation allowed for in-person meetings.

Ms. Haidar said that, although the NGO representatives had raised some important points, they had omitted to mention the digital divide, which had had an important bearing on the feasibility of online reviews. Technological constraints – for members as well as for States parties – had dictated that only one State party could be reviewed during each online session and, for reasons of time zones as much as technical capacities, that State party had had to be from the North. Even so, the online sessions had had a high cost for members in terms of time and energy.

Follow-up to the consideration of reports submitted by States parties under article 18 of the Convention

Ms. Chalal (Rapporteur on follow-up), briefing the Committee on follow-up reports received from States parties, said that, at its seventy-seventh session, the Committee had decided to postpone the assessment of follow-up reports due to the prevailing circumstances. It had also decided to increase the number of such assessments from 8 to 12 for the current and the eightieth sessions in order to prevent a backlog.

At the end of the seventy-eighth session, follow-up letters outlining the outcome of assessments had been sent to Burkina Faso, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, North Macedonia, Luxembourg, State of Palestine, Thailand and Saudi Arabia. First reminders regarding overdue follow-up reports had been sent to Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Botswana, the Republic of the Congo, the Cook Islands, Ethiopia, Liechtenstein, Samoa and Serbia

For the current session, follow-up reports had been received from Angola, Australia, the Bahamas, Colombia, Malaysia, the Marshall Islands, Mauritius, Nepal, the Niger, Suriname, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. First reminders regarding the submission of follow-up reports should be sent to Austria, Cabo Verde, Côte d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guyana, Mozambique and Qatar. In addition, meetings regarding overdue follow-up reports should be scheduled with representatives of Botswana, the Republic of the Congo, the Cook Islands, Samoa and Liechtenstein.

The first part (public) of the meeting rose at 2.05 p.m.