What’s New on the C-Fam Human Rights Database?

By | July 10, 2024

For decades, C-Fam has been following the story of how UN human rights experts, including treaty monitoring bodies, have been exceeding their mandates to promote concepts that do not enjoy consensus as human rights, including abortion and issues of sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI).  Meanwhile, countries take part in a cyclical review of each others’ human rights records called the Universal Periodic Review, where the same issues come up, although mostly because of a few particularly aggressive member states.

For almost a year and a half, our database has been keeping track of all the instances where pressure on these issues is being asserted against individual countries, both from the treaty bodies and the UPR.  We quote the relevant excerpts and provide links to the official UN documents.

In a calendar year, there are typically three UPR sessions in which fourteen countries are reviewed in each session.  The nine core treaty bodies meet to review countries two or three times a year as well.  Since the start of 2024, our database has been updated to include:

  • The January session of the Committee on the Rights of the Child
  • The February session of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women
  • The February session of the Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
  • The February session of the Committee Against Enforced Disappearance
  • The March session of the Human Rights Committee
  • The March session of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
  • The April session of the Committee Against Torture
  • The May session of the Committee on the Rights of the Child
  • The May session of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women
  • The results of the 44th session of the UPR, which was conducted in November 2023
  • The results of the 45th session of the UPR, which was conducted in January 2024
  • Ten new treaty ratifications

Among the information contained in recent database updates, we see:

  • The United States using the UPR to pressure Japan and the Republic of Korea to recognize same-sex marriage
  • Iceland remains by far the most aggressive proponent of abortion and SOGI in the UPR, with 41 and 155 instances, respectively, in the fourth cycle so far.
  • The treaty body that monitors the treaty on eliminating discrimination against women (CEDAW) continues to pressure countries on abortion. In its most recent two sessions, the committee pressured thirteen out of sixteen countries to liberalize their laws or increase access.  The Central African Republic was told to “decriminalize abortion and legalize it in all cases,” while Italy was chastised for “the high rate of conscientious objection to performing abortions by medical practitioners.”
  • The CEDAW Committee told Singapore to “[r]ecognize the equal right of all women, including those in same-sex relationships and non-married women, to parenthood through assisted reproductive technology.”
  • The Human Rights Committee, which monitors the treaty on civil and political rights, pressured seven out of seven countries on SOGI during its most recent session. The United Kingdom was told to “eliminate intrusive requirements for legal gender recognition, including psychiatric diagnosis, and provide for and effectively implement a quick, transparent and accessible procedure for legal gender recognition that is compatible with the provisions of the Covenant.”
  • In the UPR, Senegal received fifteen recommendations on SOGI. Malaysia received eighteen, and Nigeria received nineteen. All three countries marked them all as “noted” rather than “supported.”
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