Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights - March session

[Priti Darooka]

 

 

 

 

From: Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights [mailto:lucy=globalinitia...@mail94.suw17.mcsv.net] On Behalf Of Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
Sent: 31 March 2016 16:37
To: pdar...@pwescr.org
Subject: Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights - March session

 

Dear Friends and Colleagues, I thought you might be interested in our update on the March session of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. If you are not interested in receiving future updates, please unsubscribe using the link below. CESCR Alert:  57th session, March 2016 The 57th session of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (including its ‘Pre-session’) finished on 18 March 2016, with some significant advances in the normative development of ESCRs and the monitoring of implementation of the ICESCR. State Reporting process The Committee considered 3 State reports: Namibia, Canada, Kenya.  The Concluding Observations are here.  A large number of civil society groups from Canada and Kenya participated in the reviews by briefing the Committee and observing the dialogue with the States. The Committee is also piloting the ‘Simplified Reporting Procedure’ with a limited number of States and this was the first session at which it adopted ‘List of Issues Prior to Reporting’, in respect of New Zealand, Bulgaria and Spain. During the pre-session (7 – 11th March), the Pre-sessional Working Group of the Committee considered and prepared Lists of Issues for: Costa Rica, Cyprus, Dominican Republic, Lebanon, Philippines, Poland and Tunisia.  Whilst Yemen was due to be considered at this pre-session, the Working-Group decided to postpone the consideration of Yemen, given the very serious conflict in the country. General Comments At this session the Committee also adopted two General Comments: General Comment 22 on the right to sexual and reproductive health (Art 12); and General Comment 23 on the right to just and favourable conditions of work (Art 7).  GI-ESCR has written a blog on the new General Comment 23, found here. In addition, in a closed meeting the Committee considered the outline of a proposed General Comment on human rights, the environment and development. OP-ICESCR - Communications The Committee also considered 2 Communications: No. 11/2015 against Spain – Inadmissible This case concerned banking industry employees who had been dismissed or resigned, and claimed they were entitled to funds held by their employer bank in anticipation of the payment of certain employment benefits, provided for in their employment agreements (eg: benefits in the event of illness, permanent disability or death of the worker).  Those contingent events had not occurred. The Committee noted that all events relating to the communication had occurred prior to the entry into force of the OP-ICESCR (for Spain: 5 May 2013) and thus the communication was found inadmissible pursuant to Article 3, paragraph 2(b) of the OP-ICESCR.  See E/C.12/57/D/11/2015 No violation was found in relation to the 2nd case, but the decision has not yet been published.  The Committee should publish the decision in the next few weeks. In summary, the Committee has now considered 5 cases, finding 3 cases inadmissible (all on the grounds that the Optional Protocol had not entered into force for the State involved at the time of the relevant events), finding a violation in 1 case (against Spain and relating to housing rights) and finding no violation in another case (this case has not yet been published).  There are 5 cases pending consideration by the Committee (see Table of Pending Cases). On-going and future work In closed meetings the Committee also considered proposals for new General Comments and discussed the substance of two proposed future public statements: the first on public debt and economic, social and cultural rights; and the second on the refugee crisis and mixed migration flows. The next session will be the 58th, occurring 6 June – 24 June 2016 and the States to be reviewed are: Angola, Burkina Faso, France, Honduras, Sweden, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and the United Kingdom There will be no pre-session at the session in June. Elections – 5 April 2016 On April 5 in New York, the Economic and Social Council will hold elections for membership of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. ECOSOC members will vote in respect of 9 seats that are becoming available on 31 December 2016. Membership of the Committee is allocated regionally, such that for this election, there are 2 seats available for each regional group, except the Latin American group which has 1 seat available. As is common for CESCR elections, there are ‘clean slates’ for every region, except Africa.  Therefore, a true election will only occur in respect of 2 African seats on the Committee, for which there are currently 4 nominees (from: Egypt, South Africa, Mauritania and Mauritius). Currently there are only 3 female members of the 18-member Committee, which is the lowest number of women members for any of the UN treaty bodies.  Last year the Global Initiative for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, together with a large group of NGOs, called on States to nominate more women to the Committee. Pleasingly 2 women have been nominated for election to the Committee (from Romania and South Africa) and the election of the Romanian nominee, Ms Laura-Maria Craciunean, is guaranteed as there are only 2 nominees in respect of 2 seats for Eastern Europe.  We will need to wait for the outcome of the elections before knowing whether the South African nominee, Ms Sandra Liebenberg, will also become a member of the Committee. 31 March 2016 Share Tweet Forward +1   unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences

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[Shreen Saroor]

Establishing the minimum age of marriage for all citizens is foremost

a State responsibility

 

Women Action Network (WAN*) welcomes and appreciates the actions of Member of Parliament (MP) Hirunika Premachandra during a workshop with parliamentarians on the formation of Constitution, held on 29^th March 2016 wherein she raised the concerns that Muslim Marriage and Divorce Act (MMDA) allows for Muslim girls and boys below the age of 18 to be married. MP Hirunika’s comments come in light of the fact that under the Penal Code (Section 363) of Sri Lanka, sexual intercourse with a girl below the age of 16 (with or without her consent) amounts to statutory rape, therefore the provision of early marriages for Muslims is contradictory and requires attention in this regard. As a concerned MP, it demonstrates her apprehension about the practical and potential problems faced by the minority Muslim women and children in the country with regard to lack of minimum age of marriage.  

 

For over two decades, these concerns have been raised at multiple forums including with religious leaders and Muslim MPs, and are usually ignored on the basis that early marriage is not happening in the Muslim community. However, Muslim women’s groups who have been working very closely at the community come across many cases of early marriage on a regular basis. High prevalence of early marriage has also been noted in districts such as Batticaloa, Puttalam and parts of Colombo.  In some areas the number of early marriages have in fact increased from 2014 to 2015, and a look at the data on registration of Muslim marriages will reveal the facts and figures. In most cases of early marriage, young girls are removed from schools in order to be married. Thus, early marriage is also closely associated with a denial of educational opportunities and other social, economic and cultural rights. In addition, girls are more vulnerable as a result of their age, inexperience and lack of awareness to reproductive and health problems, gender-based violence, harassment within marriage, economic challenges in case of divorce, or non-maintenance by husbands.

 

WAN advocates that minimum age of marriage is first and foremost a serious child rights concern, which the State has the principal obligation to protect and NOT one that should be left at the discretion of any particular community.

 

We are therefore highly disappointed at the counterargument of Minister Rauff Hakeem in response to MP Hirunika, when he stated that the issue of age of marriage is a concern that is being dealt with by the Muslim community through reforms of the MMDA. Reforms to the MMDA have been overdue for 64+ years and we are also saddened that little action was taken by Minister Hakeem during his time as Minister of Justice to expedite the process.

While we are aware that there is a Muslim Personal Law Reforms Committee that was established in 2009 by then the Justice Minister Milinda Moragoda tasked with recommending reforms to the MMDA, we are unaware of the progress that has been made by this committee in the past 7 years. The broader Muslim community has very little information on the work of the committee thus far, timeline of when its report will be delivered to the Government and whether or not it recommends the protection of rights of Muslim children on par with the rest of the children of Sri Lanka.

Given these concerns and significant delay to reforms, many Muslim women’s and victims of the injustices faced under the MMDA have gone before the Public Representation Committee on constitutional reforms in district level hearings in Puttalam and the North and East. They have made oral and written submissions demanding immediate reform of the MMDA or to give Muslims the option of choose to marry under Sri Lankan General Marriage Ordinance. It is highly problematic that when it comes to marriage and divorce, Sri Lankan Muslims are governed only by an outdated MMDA with discriminatory provision that especially violates the rights of Muslim women in many ways (such as allowing early marriages). In Sri Lanka fundamental rights should apply to ALL citizens of the country and not be left to the discretion of minority personal laws. This had to be one of the primary concerns addressed in constitutional reforms.

We reiterate that the issue of age of marriage is NOT a ‘Muslim issue’ but rather one of human rights and child rights. Sri Lanka is required to adhere to global benchmarks set for implementing child rights through a number of human rights instruments and international commitments, such as the Child Rights Convention (CRC) and Convention for Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Such rights should apply to ALL citizens of the country. Women of minority communities should not be left out of the protection of their rights. In fact in 2010, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights at the forty-fifth session, reminded Sri Lanka that when it comes to statutory and personal laws which allow early marriage of girls as young as 12 years old are discriminatory against women and, and restricts their economic, social and cultural rights. They went on to say that repealing such laws “…is an immediate obligation of the State parties which cannot be conditioned to willingness of concerned communities to amend their laws”.

 

Thus it is illogical that a different minimum age of marriage applies for a minority community than to the rest of Sri Lankan citizens and this discrimination needs to be questioned and raised as a concern by many more MPs. Action also needs to be taken by relevant government agencies such as the National Child Protection Authority to understand the implication of such a discriminatory provision under State laws.

 

WAN also calls on more political and community leaders to take due effort to understand the situation of minority communities and with this knowledge and awareness raise issues pertaining to the violations of rights. While calling for empathy and understanding, we insist that ‘cultural sensitivity’ should not be used as a cover for not raising concerns and asking important questions. When it comes to human rights issues of any citizen, it is the duty of ALL elected representatives to urge Government to promote laws that treat citizens of this country equally irrespective of their class, religion, ethnicity or gender.

 

*WAN is a collective of 8 women’s organisations that are working in the north and east” 


 

 

[Wasim Wagha]

Shereen

This is a much needed development.  In Pakistan we are also fighting this issue but as a majority community as Muslim. 

We have done and further recommended amendments in Muslim Family Laws. Recently Sindh government has mad a Hindu Marriage Act.

Early marriages must end as it deprives girls of all their basic human rights.

Wasim

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