CYIL 2014

THE UN HUMAN RIGHTS TREATY BODY SYSTEM… the growth of the system and many of the deficiencies described above, the discussion about how to reform the treaty bodies started as early as in the 1990s. 13 3.1 Proposal to Create a Unified Standing Treaty Body Following the discussion on the need for treaty body reform, an Action Plan was attached to the 2005 Secretary-General report In Larger Freedom. 14 In this addendum the High Commissioner called for consolidating the work of the (then seven) treaty bodies and creating a unified committee. In 2006 the High Commissioner released a concept paper elaborating on the possibility of creating a Unified Standing Treaty Body. 15 In general, her reform proposal aimed at merging the current part-time committees into one full-time body of experts that would take over the responsibilities of the different committees. The fragmented system would thus be integrated into one committee consisting of 25 human rights experts which could work not only in plenary but also in chambers. Such a Unified Standing Treaty Body could, on the one hand, stop the continuous increase of the system’s need for further resources, and, on the other hand, this simplification and integration would have a positive impact on the consistency of the human rights interpretation. Furthermore, the states would be submitting a single report encompassing all the treaties. This means that the burden that the system creates on states with regard to the obligation for multiple reporting would be significantly reduced, which should result in a higher rate of cooperation with the unified committee. Nevertheless, the proposal triggered a discussion in which the idea started to be viewed predominantly in a negative way. Even if we do not take into account the question of legally-technical feasibility, i.e. whether it would be possible to achieve it without amending the current treaties, there were mainly two reasons for rejection of the idea. First, the solution seemed to be radical and was presented without proper consultations with the representatives of states, civil society and the treaty body members. Second, many feared that the current focus on different areas of human rights protection would be lost, and some treaty body members understood the proposal as dissolution of their specific treaty bodies. 16 Mainly due to the need 13 It is interesting that today’s major challenges started to clearly show up already at that time. See e.g. Crawford, James. The UN Human Rights Treaty System: A System in Crisis? In The Future of UN Human Rights Treaty Monitoring . (Philip Alston and James Crawford eds., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2000), p. 4-11. 14 In Larger Freedom: towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All , A/59/2005/Add.3 of May 2005, para. 99. 15 Concept Paper on the High Commissioner’s Proposal for a Unified Standing Treaty Body , HRI/MC/2006/2 of March 2006. 16 Johnstone, Rachael Lorna. Streamlining the Constructive Dialogue: Efficiency from States’ Perspectives. In New Challenges for the UN Human Rights Machinery (M. Cherif Bassiouni and William A. Schabas eds., Intersentia, Cambridge, 2011), p. 71. For an overview of reactions to the proposal, see O’Flaherty, Michael. Reform of the UN Human Rights Treaty Body System: Locating the Dublin Statement. Human Rights Law Review (vol. 10, no. 2, 2010), p. 324-325.

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