full version - World Organisation Against Torture

Colombia1. Preliminary ObservationsThe submission of information specifically relating to violence againstwomen to the United Nations Committee against Torture forms part ofOMCT’s Violence against Women programme which focuses on integratinga gender perspective into the work of the five “mainstream” UnitedNations human rights treaty monitoring bodies.1.1 Colombia’s International and Domestic ObligationsColombia has ratified the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel,Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment without reservations (7January 1988). Despite the recommendation of the Committee AgainstTorture in 1999, Colombia has not made a declaration accepting the competenceof the Committee Against Torture to examine communicationsunder Article 21, para.1, relating to State Party claims that another StateParty is in non-compliance with the Convention, or communicationsunder Article 22, para.1, by individual victims of torture.Colombia is also a State party to most of the principal internationalhuman rights treaties including the International Covenant on Civil andPolitical Rights (ICCPR) and its two Optional Protocols, the InternationalCovenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), theInternational Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of RacialDiscrimination (CERD) and the Convention on the Rights of the Child(CRC). Colombia has also ratified without reservation the Convention onthe Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women(CEDAW).OMCT notes that although Colombia signed the Optional Protocol toCEDAW on 10 December 1999, it has not ratified it and as a result,Colombia does not yet recognize the competence of the Committee on theElimination of Discrimination against Women to receive and act uponindividual communications or to undertake investigations in cases whereserious or systematic violations of the Convention are allegedly occurring.Further, considering the extent to which the current armed conflict inColombia is affecting children, OMCT notes with concern that whileColombia has signed the two Optional Protocols to the CRC on theInvolvement of Children in Armed Conflict and on the Sale of Children,157