24/09/2012

UPR Info denounces the practice of back-room negotiations of recommendations during UPR debate at the HRC

On 21st September, in a joint statement with Conectas Direitos Humanos and the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies at the Human Rights Council (HRC), UPR Info denounced the practice of States negotiating the wording of recommendations made during the UPR.

Speaking for the first time at a HRC General Debate since the granting of its Special Consultative Status with ECOSOC, UPR Info criticised both States under Review and Recommending States which engage in trade-off concerning the wording of recommendations after they have been made during the review. This practice, though used since the Working Group reports of Afghanistan and Yemen in 2009, still lacks transparency and accountability. Moreover, it undermines the participation of stakeholders within the UPR process by erasing their effort to ensure specific recommendations are made. The three NGOs called on all states to stop this practice.

Other issues of concern raised in the statement were the possibility for States under Review to draft the summary section of their own statement within the report of the UPR Working Group, and the requirement that when factual mistakes and mistranslation of language occur within that report, only the delegation which made the statement may request that corrections be made to that text. The three NGOs argued that this practise is unnecessary and could potentially increase the chance of inaccuracies being included in the final outcome document.