COMMITTEE ON THE ELIMINATION OF DISCRIMINATION AGAINST WOMEN CONCLUDES ITS SEVENTY-SECOND SESSION

The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women concluded today its seventy-second session, during which it reviewed the reports of Colombia, Antigua and Barbuda, Ethiopia, United Kingdom, Angola, Serbia, and Botswana on the implementation of the provisions of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. The Committee also considered the report on the situation of Rohingya women and girls in northern Rakhine state submitted by Myanmar under the exceptional reporting procedure.

The Committee’s concluding observations and recommendations on the eight countries considered during the session will be available on the session’s webpage. Press releases on the public meetings in which the reports were considered are available on the webpages of the United Nations Office at Geneva, while webcasts of the Committee’s public meetings can be accessed here.

The Committee opened the session by electing Hilary Gbedemah of Ghana as the Committee Chairperson, and Bandana Rana of Nepal, Gladys Acosta Vargas of Peru, and Nicole Ameline of France as Vice-Chairs.

In her concluding remarks, Hilary Gbedemah, Committee Chair, noted that, in addition to considering the reports of the States parties, the Committee had held informal meetings with non-governmental organizations and national human rights institutions to discuss the situation in the countries whose reports were considered. The Chair thanked civil society organizations, United Nations entities and other inter-governmental bodies which had provided it with detailed information. The Committee had held a half-day general discussion on trafficking in women and girls in the context of global migration, a prelude to the Committee's subsequent elaboration of a general recommendation on this theme, and had adopted, in closed sessions, final decisions on three individual complaints (communications).

During this session, continued the Chair, the Committee had fruitful discussions with Michelle Bachelet, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights; Michel Forst, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders; Maria Soledad Cisternas Reyes, United Nations Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Disability and Accessibility; and Karima Bennoune, United Nations Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights.

The Committee’s seventy-third session will take place in Geneva from 1 to 19 July 2019, during which the Committee will examine the reports of Austria, Bahrain, Cabo Verde, Côte d'Ivoire, Guyana, Mozambique, Qatar, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.



For use of the information media; not an official record

CEDAW/19/13E