Deputy Public Defender Delivers Speech at Conference of Members States to CRPD
On June 12-14, 2011, Ekaterine Skhiladze, Deputy Public Defender of Georgia, and Rusudan Kokhodze, Deputy Head of the Department of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, attended the 11th session of the Conference of States Parties to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (GRPD) in New York.
On June 14, Deputy Public Defender Ekaterine Skhiladze delivered a speech and talked about the challenges in the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in Georgia. She focused on the shortcomings in institutional mechanisms, as well as obstacles faced by persons with disabilities in terms of living independently and realizing their fundamental rights.
"Participation of persons with disabilities in the public and political life remains a problem. Among the challenges are access to physical environment and information. Apart from the implementation of the inclusive education program, the quality and accessibility of education still remain problematic. Significant part of children with disabilities still remain beyond the education system," Ekaterine Skhiladze said.
It should be noted that the theme of this year’s conference was “Leaving no one behind through the full implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities". In addition, a number of round table discussions focused on several priority issues, such as national fiscal space, partnership between public and private sectors, international cooperation to facilitate implementation of the Convention, women and girls with disabilities, political involvement and equality before the law.
In the course of the conference, a meeting of the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions was also held, where national institutions talked about the deepening of cooperation for strengthening the monitoring of the rights of persons with disabilities.
The Conference of States Parties to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is held every year, but the Public Defender's Office of Georgia has been privileged among the national human rights institutions to deliver a speech at the conference for the first time.
