China l Upcoming opportunities to protect human rights at the UN (November 2020 update)

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Special Procedures

The Special Procedures are the independent UN human rights experts (Special Rapporteurs and Working Groups) appointed by the Human Rights Council to cover a specific area of human rights, or country. They can conduct visits to countries when invited, send letters of concern (called ‘communications’) to Governments regarding individual cases or problematic laws and policies, as well as report to the Human Rights Council or the General Assembly on specific topics to advance international human rights standards.

A number of Special Procedures are calling for inputs by civil society – either NGOs, scholars, or activists – ahead of their annual thematic reports:

Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders’ upcoming report on killings of HRDs. You can find more information on this questionnaire here, and submit to [email protected]

Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion’s upcoming report on anti-Muslim hatred and discrimination. You can find more details here, and submit information to [email protected]

Special Rapporteur on minority issues’ upcoming report on hate speech, social media, and minorities. You can find out more about it here, and submit information to [email protected]

Working Group on Discrimination against Women and Girls’s upcoming report on women’s and girls sexual and reproductive health and rights in situations of crisis. You can find more information here, and submit to [email protected]

Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy’s upcoming report on the privacy rights of children under 18 and issues relating to their independence and autonomy (more information here), as well as new Data Privacy Guidelines on AI (more information here). You can submit at [email protected]

Submissions have to sent in English, French or Spanish. If you have any security concern in reaching out to the Special Procedures, or if you need technical support, please contact ISHR.

Treaty Bodies

Make sure to keep an eye on the OHCHR dedicated webpage to monitor China’s reporting status, and check past State reports, civil society reports, List of Issues and Concluding Observations adopted.

Click here to download ISHR’s Guide on the Treaty Bodies!

Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (CESCR) – Review of China, Hong Kong and Macao

The CESCR Committee is an independent expert body mandated to monitor State Parties’ implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). The Committee is scheduled to start its third review of China, Hong Kong and Macao next year.

The Pre-Sessional Working Group is expected to meet on 8-12 March 2021 to prepare its List of Issues that will guide the Committee’s review afterwards: civil society organisations and members can submit information to the Working Group for the List of Issues up to 2 months before (18 December 2020 at the latest). If you are interested it send a report, you can refer to the above three documents as a basis for your assessment:

• Concluding Observations from its last review cycle in 2014
• State’s report prepared for this review cycle
• ICESCR

For any additional information or comments, please contact Sarah M. Brooks (at [email protected] ; or on Twitter at @sarahmcneer)，or Raphaël Viana David (at [email protected] ; or on Twitter at @vdraphael).

Credits: ISHR & UN Photo / Jean-Marc Ferré