OSCE meeting focuses on monitoring and reporting on women's rights in Kazakhstan
ALMATY, 11 December 2008 - Ways to improve the monitoring and reporting on the rights of women in Kazakhstan are the focus of an OSCE roundtable discussion which began in Almaty today.
The two-day event was organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), the OSCE Centre in Astana, in co-operation with the NGO Equitas - International Centre for Human Rights Education.
Representatives of the Kazakhstani authorities and civil society will discuss how to address the under-representation of women in public and political life, violence against women and trafficking in women and girls. The meeting will also address the scarcity of information on the situation of rural and elderly women and limited access to adequate health care for rural women.
The issues to be discussed at the meeting were highlighted as concerns by the United Nations Committee that monitors implementation of the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).
"As Kazakhstan is due to submit its next report to the CEDAW Committee in 2011, this meeting is an excellent opportunity to develop strategies to improve co-operation in monitoring women's rights," said Kirsten Mlacak, the head of ODIHR's human rights department.
Ambassador Alexandre Keltchewsky, the Head of the OSCE Centre in Astana, said: "It is important to continue to strengthen partnerships between the authorities and civil society and support avenues for increased information sharing. Monitoring, which is crucial in assessing the level of implementation of human rights, is improved by broader participation."
The meeting follows two workshops organized in February, during which the OSCE brought together state institutions and non-governmental organizations from Kazakhstani regions to strengthen their skills on how to investigate, document and report on the implementation of the government's international commitments on women's rights.
The meeting is part of a broader OSCE project on strengthening human rights in Central Asia, which is co-funded by the European Commission and the Canadian International Development Agency.