This March 5 and 6, the Minister of Justice, Luis Cordero, will undergo scrutiny before the UN Human Rights Committee in Geneva, where the country’s compliance with the obligations contained in the Covenant on Civil Rights and Politicians.
From Switzerland, Minister Cordero stressed that in the exam, the first of its kind in a decade, since the last one taken in 2014, “what is the object of evaluation is the State and not a government“.
The topics to be analyzed, derived from a list of previous issues presented by the committee in August 2019, range from anti-terrorist measures to the situation of children’s rights, including gender equality, violence against women, and children’s rights. indigenous peoples, among others.
“The aspects are very varied, in which Chile has to take an examination, ranging from the measures it has implemented to fight terrorism, aspects linked to equality between men and women, voluntary interruption of pregnancy, violence against women, the situation of children’s rights, as well as matters linked to torture and cruel and inhuman treatment,” explained the Minister of Justice.
The situation of people deprived of liberty and the circumstances in which the regulations regarding migration and refuge have evolved will also be examined.
Social outbreak and Covid-19
Cordero highlighted that Chile has prepared update reports to address aspects that have arisen recently, such as the social outbreak, the management of the pandemic and its impacts on the guarantee regime.
“It is evident that as time has passed there are aspects that were not part of the list of previous issues, nor the original 2021 report, but that are important to address how they have to do with the outbreak, institutional violence, the effects of the and how the country addressed Covid and the system and whether or not that affected the guarantee regime, so that the State can show the progress of a decade, but above all through the questions and answers it formed the State of Chile, the Committee is going to make follow-up observations for the country,” said the head of the Justice and Human Rights portfolio.
Minister Cordero stressed the importance of the review as an opportunity to show the country’s institutional advances during the last decade and to identify new gaps and challenges. Likewise, he stressed that the exam evaluates the State as a whole, not just the Government, and that representation before the Committee includes the Executive, Legislative, Judicial and autonomous organizations such as the Public Ministry.
“It is reasonable and appropriate for the country to show its progress during the decade,” said Luis Cordero.