Seminar Background
The UN ESCAP/CDPF Regional Seminar on an International Convention on Disability is to
be held in Beijing, China from 4 to 7 November 2003 in the following context.
At the international level, draft texts of the convention on the rights of persons with
disabilities were submitted for consideration at the forty-second (1987) and forty-fourth
(1989) Sessions of the General Assembly. Although the summary records of the time indicate
that the actual elaboration process did not materialize, the Commission for Social Development
subsequently started to elaborate on non-binding rules on equalization of opportunities
for persons with disabilities.
This effort resulted in the decision of the General Assembly to adopt the "Standard Rules on the Equalization
of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities" through resolution 48/96 of 20
December 1993. Though the document is non-binding, its monitoring mechanism and the
Special Rapporteur to review the progress of its implementation were innovative.
The Rappoteur recommended a "twin track" approach to further develop human
rights of persons with disabilities. This means that it is important to develop the
disability dimension within the existing United Nations human rights monitoring systems as
well as to elaborate on an international convention on the rights of persons with
disabilities.
In 2001, at the fifty-sixth Session of the General Assembly, Mexico proposed that the
General Assembly consider initiating a process of elaborating a comprehensive and integral
convention on the rights of persons with disabilities. The proposal was endorsed by
General Assembly resolution 56/168 of 19 December 2001. This resolution established an Ad Hoc Committee on a
Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on Protection and Promotion of the
Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities to consider proposals for such a
convention and called for inputs from Governments and other stakeholders to the work of
the Ad Hoc Committee through, inter alia, organizing regional meetings and workshops.
The First Session of
the Ad Hoc Committee was held in 2002, and the subsequent General Assembly
resolution 57/229 of 18 December 2002, further encouraged to make available to the Ad
Hoc Committee, suggestions and possible elements to be considered in proposals for a
convention, as well as, to ensure NGO participation in the committee.
At the regional level, the Governments, UNESCAP and NGOs worked together to implement
the Agenda for Action for the Asian and
Pacific Decade of Disabled Persons from 1993 to 2002. In 2001, the Commission, through
its resolution 58/4 of 22 May 2002, titled "Promoting an inclusive, barrier-free and
rights-based society for people with disabilities in the Asian and Pacific region in the
twenty-first century" renewed the Asian and Pacific Decade from 2003 to 2012. The
Decade's action-oriented guidelines for Governments, "The Biwako Millennium Framework
for Action towards Inclusive, Barrier-free and Rights-based Society for Persons with
Disabilities in Asia and the Pacific (BMF)" urged Governments to support and
contribute to the work of the Ad Hoc Committee.
In pursuance of the above-mentioned resolutions and the regional mandate, UNESCAP
organized the Expert Group Meeting and
Seminar on an International Convention to Protect and Promote the Rights and Dignity of
Persons with Disabilities from 2 to 4 June 2003. The Meeting's outcome is the Bangkok
Recommendations, a comprehensive set of recommendations on the proposed
convention. The Bangkok Recommendations were presented at the Second Session of the Ad
Hoc Committee, which was held at New York from 16 to 27 June 2003.
The Ad Hoc Committee unanimously agreed to elaborate a thematic convention on
disability and decided on formulating a Working Group to prepare a draft text of the
convention for negotiations at the next session of the Ad Hoc Committee in 2004.
The Bangkok Recommendations were submitted to the Second Session of the Ad
Hoc Committee, held from 16 to 27 June 2003 in New York, where Member States
unanimously agreed to start elaborating a proposed convention. At this Committee, Working
Group was established to develop a consolidated draft convention text for the Third
Session of the Ad Hoc Committee to be held next year. This Working Group is
composed of twenty-seven governmental representatives (Asia 7, Africa 7, America 5,
Western Europe 5, and Eastern Europe 3), twelve representatives of disability NGO and one
representative from National Human Rights Institute. The Working Group is scheduled to be
held from 5 to 16 January 2003 in New York.
Prior to the Workshop, two phases of Workshop on Women and Disability:
Promoting Full Participation of Women with Disabilities in the Process of Elaboration on
an International Convention to Promote and Protect the Rights and Dignity of Persons with
Disabilities were held 18 to 22 August 2003 and 13 October 2003. This Workshop
produced a Statement
of Recommendations, which express unified support for a proposed convention with
specific recommendations from disabled women's perspectives.
The Regional Workshop towards a
Comprehensive and Integral International Convention on Protection and Promotion of the
Rights and Dignity of Persons with Disabilities was held to contribute to the global
elaboration process on a proposed convention, by sufficiently incorporating concerns of
women and men with disabilities in Asia and the Pacific region. The region has the largest
number of persons with disabilities (approximately 400 million) in the world. As the
outcome of the Workshop, it intended to adopt a draft of a proposed convention, entitled
"Bangkok Draft."
UNESCAP invited individual experts of disability policies and human rights, and
participants representing the previous Workshop on Women and Disability. All these experts
were expected to contribute their substantive and technical knowledge to the Workshop as
well as empowering themselves with direct involvement in a convention elaborating process.
Experts were from governmental agencies, semi-governmental agencies and civil society
organizations (organizations for persons with disabilities and self-help organizations of
persons with disabilities). Persons with disabilities include those who have physical,
visual, hearing and psychiatric disabilities.
The Workshop had three major components. The first one (the first day) was to review
the global and regional elaborating processes. The second one (the second day and the
third day) was the working group discussions where participants were divided into four
working groups and worked on the Bangkok Discussion draft. This Discussion draft was
prepared, prior to the Workshop, in light of the Bangkok Recommendations and statement of
recommendations from the Workshop on Women and Disability. The third component (the last
day) was to incorporate and synthesize the discussions into a set of General
Recommendations on elements and principles for the Bangkok Draft as well as developing the
Bangkok Draft.
Immediately after the Workshop, the Bangkok Draft was revised by the UNESCAP
facilitator, based on the last discussion at the Workshop and the "Bangkok Draft (version
2)" then was made available to this Seminar for discussions and for formulation
of a political statement entitled the Declaration of Beijing, in the end. Both this
"Bangkok Draft" and the Declaration of Beijing
(outcome of this Seminar) will be submitted to the Ad Hoc Committee with a copy to a
special rappoteur on Commission on Social Development, and the Department of Economic and
Social Affairs (DESA).
This Seminar is the last concluding activity of the series of ESCAP efforts towards the
International Convention during this year. Pparticipates in ths Seminar are expected to
review the "Bangkok Draft", "the Bangkok Recommendations" and other
regional documents and to formulate a policy-oriented statement on the question of the
elaboration of a comprehensive and integral convention on the rights of persons with
disabilities to be adopted as a Seminar outcome. After the Seminar, the adopted
Declaration of Beijing together with he the Bangkok Draft will be submitted to the Ad Hoc
Committee, in accordance with General Assembly resolution 57/229, which invited the views
of Governments and the United Nations system on the elaboration of a new international
convention on the rights of persons with disabilities; copies of these materials will be
made available by UNESCAP for the information and comment as appropriate to the Special
Rappoteur on Disability of the Commission for Social Development, Sheika Hissa bint
khalifa bin Hamad Al-Thani as well as to the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of
the United Nations Secretariat.
For this Regional Seminar, each UNESCAP-funded governmental participant is
requested to prepare a brief country paper on his/her views on an international
convention, (including an analysis on how disabled persons' rights are protected and
promoted in his/her country) and the current level of implementation of the Biwako
Millennium Framework for Action: Towards an Inclusive, Barrier-free and Rights-based
Society for Persons with Disabilities in the Asia and Pacific (BMF). Also, he/she is
expected to complete a questionnaire concerning the implementation of BMF and return it to
us, together with the county paper. The detailed guideline for
the country paper and the questionnaire will be forwarded to confirmed participant,
well in advance, upon receipt of confirmation from by the Secretariat.
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