The UN Committee on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families (Migrant Workers Committee) has posted the list of questions for the second periodic report of Tajikistan on the implementation of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.
In its document, the Committee pays attention to a number of important issues related to the labor migration from Tajikistan.
The Committee, in particular, asks the government of the country to provide additional information about the elaboration of the migration law. The Committee asks whether the legislation provides for mechanisms for protection of rights of migrants, including those who are being recruited through the private agencies, and to what an extent the government took into consideration the Committee’s recommendations of 2012 while elaborating the migration law.
The Committee also asks to provide additional information on the amount and nature of legal aid provided to Tajik labor migrants in the Russian Federation.
The UN Migrant Workers Committee is also concerned over the increasing number of Tajik labor migrants contracting infectious diseases (HIV, tuberculosis, hepatitis) and the Committee asks the country to provide additional information about measures taken to prevent the spread of these infections.
Besides, the Committee touches upon the problems of access of foreign citizens to effective means of legal protection, prevention of corruption risks, and social protection of migrants.
The Committee also raises the issues related to migration of women and asks to provide practical information about the work of the national referral mechanism for victims of human trafficking.
Tajikistan ratified the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families in 2002. In December 2010, the country submitted its initial report on the implementation of the convention to the Migrant Workers Committee.
The International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families is a United Nations multilateral treaty governing the protection of migrant workers and families. Signed on December 18, 1990, it entered into force on July 1, 2003 after the threshold of 20 ratifying States was reached in March 2003. The Migrant Workers Committee monitors implementation of the convention, and is one of the seven UN-linked human rights treaty bodies.
The Committee on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families (CMW) is the body of independent experts that monitors implementation of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families by its State parties. It held its first session in March 2004.
All States parties are obliged to submit regular reports to the Committee on how the rights are being implemented. States must report initially one year after acceding to the Convention and then every five years. The Committee will examine each report and address its concerns and recommendations to the State party in the form of "concluding observations."
The Committee will also, under certain circumstances, be able to consider individual complaints or communications from individuals claiming that their rights under the Convention have been violated once 10 States parties have accepted this procedure in accordance with article 77 of the Convention.
The Committee meets in Geneva and normally holds two sessions per year.
The Committee also organizes days of general discussion and can publish statements on themes related to its work and interpretations of the content of the provisions in the Convention (general comments).
