Tonga’s human rights record to be reviewed by UN

GENEVA – Tonga’s human rights record will be examined by the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group for the third time on Monday, 15 January 2018 in a meeting that will be webcast live.

Tonga is one of the 14 States to be reviewed by the UPR Working Group during its upcoming session taking place from 15 to 26 January. Tonga’s first and second UPR reviews took place in May 2008 and January 2013, respectively.

The documents on which the reviews are based are: 1) national report - information provided by the State under review; 2) information contained in the reports of independent human rights experts and groups, known as the Special Procedures, human rights treaty bodies, and other UN entities; 3) information provided by other stakeholders including national human rights institutions, regional organizations and civil society groups.

The three reports serving as the basis for the review of Tonga on 15 January can be found here: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/TOindex.aspx

Location: Room 20, Palais des Nations, Geneva

Time and date: 14.30 – 18.00, Monday, 15 January (Geneva time, GMT +1 hour)

The UPR is a unique process which involves a periodic review of the human rights records of all 193 UN Member States. Since its first meeting was held in April 2008, all 193 UN member States have been reviewed twice within the first and second UPR cycles. During the third UPR cycle, States are again expected to spell out steps they have taken to implement recommendations posed during their previous reviews which they committed to follow-up on, as well as to highlight recent human rights developments in the country.

The delegation of Tonga will be headed by Mr. Sione Sisifa, Solicitor General.

The three country representatives serving as rapporteurs (“troika”) for the review of Tonga are: Angola, Slovakia and the United Arab Emirates.

The webcast of the session will be at http://webtv.un.org

The list of speakers and all available statements to be delivered during the review of Tonga will be posted on the UPR Extranet at the following link [username: hrc extranet (with space); password: 1session]: https://extranet.ohchr.org/sites/upr/Sessions/29session/Tonga/Pages/default.aspx

The UPR Working Group is scheduled to adopt the recommendations made to Tonga at 15.30 on 19 January. The State under review may wish to express its positions on recommendations posed to it during their review. The recommendations will be shared with the media on this day in advance.

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