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Complaints mechanisms within the UN human rights system
There are various mechanisms within the UN human rights system by which individuals can submit complaints of human rights violations. These include procedures to bring complaints directly under international human rights treaties and special procedures for filing complaints with bodies called the Commission on Human Rights and the Commission on the Status of Women.
Complaints under international human rights treaties
Four of the six core UN human rights treaties currently have complaints procedures:
- The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
- The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
- The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination
- The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
These complaint procedures enable individuals or groups to raise allegations when they believe that the rights of individuals have been violated. However, such procedures can only be used to make complaints against states that have both ratified the treaty in question and recognised the competence of the corresponding committee to consider complaints from individuals. Complaints (sometimes called ‘communications’) are examined by quasi-judicial committees.
Complaints under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
At present, there is no formal procedure for the submission of individual complaints under the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which greatly limits the possibility for individuals to obtain international redress in cases of violation of such rights as the right to water.
There have long been discussions about the adoption of an Optional Protocol to the Covenant, granting the right of individuals or groups to submit communications concerning non-compliance with obligations under the Covenant. Such a proposal was supported by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights at its sixth session, in 1991. As the Committee wrote, such a procedure:
“would enhance the practical implementation of the Covenant as well as the dialogue with States Parties and would make it possible to focus the attention of public opinion to a greater extent on economic, social and cultural rights." (E/ 1992/23, para. 362).
It is states that would be the subject of complaints and they have been reluctant to commit such scrutiny and redress. Nevertheless, support for the establishment of a complaints mechanism was given at the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in June 1993.
In 1996, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights prepared a Draft Optional Protocol, which it subsequently submitted to the Commission on Human Rights – the main UN human rights body - but this Draft Protocol has not yet been officially adopted by the relevant United Nations organs.
Some further progress on the development of an Optional Protocol was made in 2002, when the Economic and Social Council of the UN endorsed the proposal by the Commission on Human Rights to establish an open-ended working group of the Commission to consider this proposal further. The Working Group was established by the Commission in 2003, at its 59th Session. It requested that the Working Group meet for a period of 10 working days, prior to the 60th session of the Commission. The mandate of the Working Group is to consider
“options regarding the elaboration of an optional protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, in the light, inter alia, of the report of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to the Commission on a draft optional protocol (E/CN.4/1997/105, annex), comments and views submitted by States, intergovernmental organizations, including United Nations specialized agencies, and non-governmental organizations, and the reports of the independent expert (E/CN.4/2002/57 and E/CN.4/2003/53)”.
A number of human rights advocates consider this mandate to be rather vague and inadequate. Nevertheless, the request to the Working Group to take into account the views of NGOs provides an opportunity for water advocacy groups to contribute to the establishment of an individual complaints mechanism under the Covenant. This is of critical importance in providing an international mechanism of redress for violations of the right to water.
Complaints under the Commission on Human Rights and the Commission on the Status of Women
There are also other bodies within the UN that deal with human rights complaints. These include the Commission on Human Rights and the Commission on the Status of Women.
The Commission on Human Rights is a political body composed of UN member states, which meets each year in March/April for six weeks in Geneva. Over 3000 delegates from member and observer States and from non-governmental organizations participate in these sessions. The Commission can also meet exceptionally between its regular sessions in ‘special sessions’, to deal with urgent and acute human rights situations.
During its regular annual session, the Commission adopts resolutions, decisions and Chairperson's statements on matters of relevance to individuals in all regions and circumstances. It is assisted in this work by the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, a number of working groups and a network of individual experts, representatives and rapporteurs mandated to report to it on specific issues or countries (see below).
The Commission on the Status of Women was established as a functional commission of the Economic and Social Council. It prepares recommendations and reports to the Council on promoting women's rights and makes recommendations to the Council on urgent problems requiring immediate attention in the field of women's rights.
The Commission consists of members appointed by governments and elected by the Economic and Social Council for a period of four years. The Commission meets annually for a period of ten working days.
The complaint procedures before the Commission on Human Rights and the Commission on the Status of Women focus on more systematic patterns and trends of human rights violations, rather than individual cases. Complaints may be brought against any country in the world.
Special Rapporteur on the right to water
The Commission on Human Rights and the Economic and Social Council have established what are known as Special Procedures of the Commission on Human Rights. These are a number of additional procedures and mechanisms, undertaken either by ‘working groups’ composed of experts acting in their individual capacity or by independent individuals known as ‘Special Rapporteurs’, ‘Independent Experts’, or ‘Special Representatives’.
The mandates of the working groups and Special Rapporteurs are to examine, monitor and publicly report on either human rights situations in specific countries or territories (country mandates) or on major phenomena of human rights violations worldwide (thematic mandates).
In 1997, the UN Commission on Human Rights entrusted an individual expert, Mr. El-Hadji Guissé, with the task of drafting a working paper on the question of the promotion of the realization of the right of access of everyone to drinking water supply and sanitation services (UN Doc: E/CN.4/Sub.2/1998/7).
In its decision 2002/105 of 22 April 2002, the Commission approved the appointment of Mr. El-Hadji Guissé as Special Rapporteur to conduct a detailed study on the relationship between the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights and the promotion of the realization of the right to drinking water supply and sanitation.
Mr Guissé submitted a preliminary report in 2002 (E/CN.4/Sub.2/2002/10), and the Commission, in E/CN.4/Sub.2/2003/L.17 (August 2003), welcomed the report, requesting that the UN Secretary-General both provide the Special Rapporteur with any assistance necessary to enable him to fulfil his mandate and also invite governments, United Nations bodies, the specialized agencies and interested non-governmental organizations to provide the Special Rapporteur with information necessary for the preparation of his final report.
This final report, on the promotion of the realisation of the right to drinking water and sanitation, is due for submission in 2004, at the 56th Session of the Commission on Human Rights in March/April.
In addition, the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food has been expanded by the Commission on Human Rights to include monitoring of the right to water, in order to “pay attention to the issue of drinking water, taking into account the interdependence of this issue and the right to food". The express linkages between the rights to water and food have been dealt with in some detail in the reports of the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food.
The work and reports of Special Rapporteurs provide an ideal opportunity for advocacy groups concerned with water issues to make their views known.
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