Meeting at UN, States parties to anti-racism treaty elect nine committee members

The 170 States which have signed the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination today elected nine members of their 18-member monitoring committee to replace those stepping down this month.

At the beginning of their 21st meeting, those elected to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) included Ambassador Jose Augusto Lindgren Alves of Brazil, law professor Linos-Alexander Sicilianos of Greece, law professor Nourredine Amir of Algeria, Danish Institute for Human Rights executive director Morten Kjaerum, former Deputy Foreign Minister Mahmoud Aboul-Nasr of Egypt.

The others were former Foreign Minister Agha Shahi of Pakistan, Senior Advocate General Régis de Gouttes of the French Court of Cassaton, law professor Patrick Thornberry of the United Kingdom and Human Rights Director in the Government of Togo Kokou Mawuena Ika Kana Dieudonné Ewomsan.

The other nine committee members will serve until 19 January 2008.

The members also elected Paulette Bethel of the Bahamas as the meeting’s chairperson, as well as Paul Badji of Senegal, Muhammad Anshur of Indonesia and Marija Antonijevic of Serbia and Montenegro as vice-chairpersons.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s representative, Bacre Waly Ndiaye, Director of the New York Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), told the delegates that since their previous meeting in January 2004, the number of States parties to the Convention had increased from 169 to 170, with the ratification by Comoros.

Among its many activities in the past two years, the Committee had issued four opinions and decisions in connection with communications received from individuals or groups alleging violations of their rights under the Convention, he said.