Committee on the Rights of the Child

Ninety-fifth session

Summary record ( p artial )* of the 2786th meeting**

Held at the Palais Wilson, Geneva, on Friday, 2 February 2024, at 3 p.m.

Chair:Ms. Skelton

Contents

Closure of the session

The discussion covered in the summary record began at 5.05 p.m.

Closure of the session

The Chair said that, on 2 February 2024, the date of the closure of the Committee’s ninety-fifth session, there were 196 States parties to the Convention, 173 to the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict, 178 to the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography and 51 to the Optional Protocol on a communications procedure. The Committee had held 30 meetings during the session, which 17 Committee members had been able to attend in person. One member had participated via a videoconferencing service while that service was still being provided by the United Nations. However, the service had been discontinued without warning. The Committee was very concerned about the effect that the discontinuation would have on the future participation of civil society stakeholders in its meetings.

At the session, the Committee had considered periodic reports submitted under the Convention by Bulgaria, the Congo, Lithuania, the Russian Federation, Senegal and South Africa. The Committee had also considered the reports of Senegal under the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict and the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography. If there were no further comments, she would take it that the concluding observations on the reports of those six States parties could be adopted.

It was so decided.

The Committee had adopted decisions on 10 individual communications. It had found violations of the Convention with respect to two of the communications, concerning Paraguay and Spain, had declared two others, concerning Argentina and Bosnia and Herzegovina, inadmissible and had discontinued its consideration of the other six, concerning Argentina, Finland, Türkiye and Switzerland. The Committee had also adopted its follow-up progress report on individual communications.In that report, it had assessed the degree to which the Governments of Belgium, Denmark, Finland and Georgia had implemented the recommendations made by the Committee in the Views it had adopted in cases to which those States were parties; the report alsotouched on the Committee’s revised working methods for handling individual communications. The Committee had decided to adopt ad referendum its report on one inquirybeing conducted under the inquiry procedure set out in article 13 of the Optional Protocol on a communications procedure; when the report was made final, it would be shared with the relevant State party. No decisions to initiate new inquiries had been taken during the session.

The Committee had continued its discussions on the treaty body strengthening process, including on the working paper on options and guiding questions for the development of an implementation plan for the conclusions adopted by the Chairs of the treaty bodies at the thirty-fourth annual meeting and confirmed at the thirty-fifth meeting of the Chairs, and on the cluster headings used in its dialogues with States parties. It had held a meeting with the European Committee of Social Rights on 26 January 2024 and had taken steps to cooperate more closely with the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child. The Committee had announced that its next general comment, its twenty-seventh, would address children’s rights to access to justice and effective remedies. Its ninety-sixth session would be held from 6 to 24 May 2024.

Mr. Chophel (Rapporteur) said that, during the intersessional period, many Committee members, including the Chair, Ms. Aho, Ms. Al Barwani, Ms. Ayoubi Idrissi, Ms. Correa, Mr. Gudbrandsson, Ms. Kiladze, Ms. Marshall-Harris, Mr. Mezmur, Ms. Otani, Mr. Pedernera Reyna, Ms. Todorova, Mr. Van Keirsbilck, Ms. Zara and he himself, had taken part in a number of conferences, seminars and meetings relevant to the mandate of the Committee. According to Mr. Jaffé, the Committee’s X (formerly known as Twitter) account had over 7,000 followers. In addition, the Chair and Ms. Kiladze had visited Cambodia and Thailand from 6 to 10 November 2023 at the invitation of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF); during the visit, they had met with a wide range of stakeholders, including government officials and children. From 13 to 24 November 2023, the Chair, Mr. Pedernera Reyna and Ms. Otani had made follow-up visits to the Cook Islands, Micronesia (Federated States of) and Tuvalu and participated in a regional workshop with representatives of the States parties.

The Chair said she took it that the Committee wished to adopt the report on its ninety‑fifth session.

It was so decided.

After the customary exchange of courtesies, she declared the Committee’s ninety-fifth session closed.

The meeting rose at 5.25 p.m.