Maat holds a meeting of experts to activate the national mechanism to follow up the implementation of Egypt's human rights commitments

Al-Maeda recommends: A unified national committee to follow up Egypt's pledges to the periodic review and treaty committees

Under the title “Towards a permanent national mechanism to follow up the implementation of Egypt's pledges before international mechanisms” Maat Foundation for Peace, Development and Human Rights held a high-level round table of experts on Saturday, October 8, 2016.

The table comes within the framework of implementing the activities of the universal periodic review project as a tool to improve public policies during the transitional phase, which is implemented by Maat Foundation with funding from the European Union, and seeks to help the state fulfill its obligations before the international mechanism, and to strengthen the capacities of various stakeholders to advocate and engage in efforts to reform human rights situations. And related public policies.

The round table aimed to study the performance and results of the work of the permanent national committee for the universal periodic review since January 2015 until now, to discuss the legislative and procedural requirements to activate the role of the permanent national committee in following up the implementation of the UPR recommendations, as well as to develop a unified vision aimed at activating the role of the committee.

A distinguished elite of experts, officials, parliamentarians and civil society leaders participated in the meeting, headed by Dr. Ahmed Al-Burai, former Minister of Social Solidarity and a well-known international expert in human rights treaty committees, Dr. Maysa Shawky, Deputy Minister of Health and Supervisor of the National Councils of Population, Childhood and Motherhood, Counselor Ahmed Osama, the consultant The Legal Council of the National Council for Persons with Disabilities Affairs, Representative Tadros Felts, a member of the Human Rights Committee of the Egyptian Parliament, Dr. Hoda Badran, President of the General Union of Egyptian Women, in addition to a group of national legal experts.

At the beginning, Ayman Aqil, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Maat Foundation, said that we have been trying for some time to communicate with the "permanent national committee concerned with the universal periodic review mechanism" that was formed according to Prime Minister Decree No. 37 of 2015, but we discovered that the committee did not do so and there is no data available about Meetings held by the committee or measures taken to follow up the implementation of Egypt's pledges before the mechanism, which prompted us to hold this table with the aim of reaching a unified vision in this regard, especially with the approaching date for submitting mid-term reports related to the extent of Egypt's commitment to implementing its obligations before the international mechanism in March 2017.

For his part, Dr. Ahmed Al-Burai pointed out that the lack of a permanent national mechanism for communicating with international mechanisms and following up on recommendations leads to clear contradictions between the Egyptian reports submitted to these mechanisms, and added that the non-involvement of civil society in preparing the reports, in addition to the temporary nature of the committees that do not make them dependent on the owners Experience in preparing reports leads to major problems in communicating with international mechanisms, which was confirmed by most of the participants.

The participants agreed on the necessity of inviting the government to activate the committee's work and expand its membership to include civil society organizations as well as relevant government bodies and relevant national councils, provided that the committee's task is not limited to following up the implementation of the recommendations of the periodic review, but rather that it should be a committee concerned with following up all the commitments of the Egyptian government Whether before the periodic review or before the human rights treaty committees, in addition to an appeal to the Egyptian parliament to use its monitoring tools to hold the Egyptian government accountable for what has been done in the implementation of the UPR recommendations and the role the committee plays in this regard.

The participants also agreed that the Civil Society Organizations Coalition for the Universal Periodic Review emanating from the project would form a parallel non-governmental expert committee to follow up the implementation of the pledges, and to communicate about them with the relevant national and international mechanisms in order to help the Egyptian government to fulfill its obligations and work in a participatory framework to improve the human rights situation. Human .

Also, the participants recommended the necessity to participate in the meetings of the 34th session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, which will be held during the month of March 2017, which coincides with the date of submitting mid-term reports to follow up the progress in implementing Egypt's pledges before the universal periodic review mechanism, and to work to hold parallel activities at the headquarters of the Rights Council. Human rights and meeting with members of the Council and officials of the Commission, and the Maat Foundation has been assigned to follow up and coordinate this matter.