Inaugural meeting of the Committee

Inaugural meeting, Palais Wilson, Geneva, 1-5 March 2004

The week long meeting focused on the introduction of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the present and future UN Treaty Body monitoring system, in particular the way of reporting, the role of ILO and other specialized agencies like IOM, UNHCR and UNICEF and the role of the NGOs regarding promotion and protection of the human rights of migrants and the monitoring of UN Conventions, in particular the Child Rights Convention.

The Committee also met with the Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants and with the Special Rapporteur on the rights of non-citizens. The Committee Members agreed that it would work with these mechanisms on promoting the Convention.

The Members had an informal meeting with States Parties to the Convention on working methods and challenges in reporting to treaty bodies and met with the Chairperson of the Committee of the Rights of the Child in his capacity as Chairperson of the 15th meeting of persons chairing the human rights treaty bodies.

There are no official minutes available on this meeting. We can only refer to the following reports:

• Report on the implementation of the Convention, GA Official Records, Supplement No. 48 (A/59/58) that was submitted by the Committee to the 49th Session of the General Assembly that met from September to December 2004.
• Report of the 16th meeting of the chairpersons of the human rights treaty bodies, held in Geneva from 23 to 25 June 2004 (A/95/254). The Chairperson of the MW Committee outlined the result of the first Committee meeting as follows: «The International CPRMW entered into force on 1 July 2003, and had 25 States parties, most of which could be classified as “sending countries”. Twenty-three State Parties were required to submit their initial reports by July 2004 but, in light of the efforts to streamline working methods and harmonize the reporting guidelines of the treaty bodies, the Committee has deferred adoption of reporting until the third inter-committee meeting (21-22 June 2004) while at the same time stressing that States were not released from their reporting obligations. The members should adopt, informally, an advocacy role to promote ratification of the Convention. The Chairperson requested the support and assistance of the other treaty bodies in this respect».

The special Committee session with the NGOs was scheduled on 4 March 2004. It gave the NGOs the opportunity to introduce their organisation, their work on the protection of the rights of migrant workers and the promotion of the Convention and migrant workers' rights. A summary of their presentations can be viewed on this page.