26 July 2005
[presented by Joseph Rajkumar, Pax Romana]
Several NGOs met this weekend to discuss Mr. Decaux s paper and the organization of work of the Sub-Commission. We would like to offer these brief comments.
1. We support the ideas in Mr. Decaux s paper, particularly efforts to improve the long term perspective of selecting and updating studies, more and better interaction with the treaty bodies, and the opportunities for NGO involvement
2. NGOs would like early and full access to studies and working papers, in order to be in the best possible position to read and comment on them. This includes those cases where an advance copy of a study or working paper is circulated to experts or governments for comments. We would hope that NGOs would also be included in these early distributions.
3. We suggest the historical list of studies that has recently been compiled by the Secretariat be used to hold a joint strategy discussion with experts, NGOs and other interested persons to evaluate the overall body of work of the Sub-Commission studies, as well as any gaps and follow up needs for updating important studies of the past
4. We strongly believe that experts should be invited to complete their studies and working papers, even if their term has ended and even if they are not re-elected for a subsequent term
5. We also support the interactive dialogue mechanism, and the right of NGOs to participate in these dialogues
6. We would encourage comments to studies and working papers be as substantive as possible, with a minimum of time spent on the usual complementary remarks