PRESS BRIEFING BY CHAIRMAN OF AD HOC COMMITTEE ON DISABILITIES CONVENTION

PRESS BRIEFING BY CHAIRMAN OF AD HOC COMMITTEE ON DISABILITIES CONVENTION

Integrating disability concerns into a holistic convention on the rights of persons with disabilities would require a new approach that would include traditional human rights concerns, as well as incorporating new realms of concerns of human rights and development, Luis Gallegos (Ecuador), Chairman of the General Assembly Ad Hoc Committee drafting the convention said this afternoon.

Briefing correspondents at a Headquarters press conference, he said those concerns would range from the technological change in communications and biotechnology and genetics to war and conflicts, epidemics or poverty in a globalized world.  In the twenty-first century, such new agendas would have a major impact on the lives of people with disabilities and on whole societies.

In that context, he said, the role of civil society, transparency and participatory government would also constitute a major part of a successful effort to advance the convention process.  The Ad Hoc Committee’s efforts towards an international convention would also require the strengthening of a dynamic web of interrelationships between international, national, regional and civil society institutions to work closely together to achieve the universal of human rights for all persons, with or without disabilities.

He said the Ad Hoc Committee’s fourth session was expected to work from
23 August to 3 September 2004.  The Committee was engaged in translating the universality of human rights into reality and making a concrete step towards a just and equitable society.

Asked for figures regarding disabled people in the world, he said the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that there were 600 million people, 400 to 450 million of whom lived in the developing world.  They had either been born with a disability, or had acquired it through illness, accident or war.  Certainly as the world aged, there would be more disabled people.

Responding to a question on where resources to deal with disabilities worldwide would come from, he replied that it was not simply a governmental issue, but a societal one.  It was necessary to change the customs and mores of society to make it more integrated and holistic.  Therefore, resources were not the only requirements, but also attitudinal changes, as well.

Resources would have to be obtained in cooperation with the developed world, he said.  They included technology and the transposition of medical and clinical technologies that would be available.

Asked about discrimination against people with disabilities, he said disability complicated that issue even more.  If someone faced discrimination because of race, gender and disability, they faced three types of discrimination.  It was necessary to foster non-discrimination in a worldwide context.

Regarding action by the General Assembly, he said that the Ad Hoc Committee would have to present a resolution to the Assembly on the status of the negotiations.  The Committee was currently negotiating a text that had been the product of two meetings and the working group.  Hopefully, the Ad Hoc Committee would have two more meetings next year and a text would then be ready for signature by governments.

Asked whether the text focused on physical or mental disability, he replied that it focused on both.

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