On Tuesday, the United Nations Human Rights Committee in Geneva held a session to examine the human rights situation in Egypt and discuss the country’s compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Egypt ratified the covenant in 1982.
According to the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, the Minister of Justice, Omar Marawan, and representatives from the Public Prosecution Office, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the National Council for Women represented the government in the closed discussion. The human rights group added that it submitted to the UN committee a report last January that dealt with the situation of freedom of expression, organization, peaceful assembly, privacy, and movement in the country, in addition to issues of torture, arbitrary detention, and the right to a fair trial. Despite 375 UN recommendations to improve conditions, the human rights situation in Egypt has not witnessed a tangible improvement. On the contrary, human rights violations and abuses are escalating, according to the rights group.
The International Committee comprises 18 independent experts elected by the United Nations General Assembly to monitor the situation of civil and political rights among the 173 signatories to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The committee is scheduled to issue concluding observations and recommendations to the Egyptian government at the end of its session, which runs until March 24.
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