Jamaica, Antigua and Barbuda Sign UN Disabilities Convention

Mar 31, 12:48 PM

Current Headlines: Text of report by Caribbean Media Corporation news agency website

UNITED NATIONS, CMC - The United Nations said Friday that Jamaica and Antigua and Barbuda were among over 80 countries that signed the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

The UN said in a statement that 81 member states signed the landmark new treaty that aims to improve the lives of the world's estimated 650 million people with disabilities.

The UN said it was "a record for the first day of signature of any convention."

It said Jamaica also ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

By doing so, Jamaica became "the first country to go beyond endorsement and adopt it as law," the statement said.

The pact, the fastest negotiated international human rights instrument in history, needs 19 more states parties to enter into force.

The UN said some 44 countries, including Jamaica and Antigua, also signed the Optional Protocol to the Convention, which gives individuals recourse to an expert committee on the rights of persons with disabilities when all national options have been exhausted.

The convention outlaws discrimination against persons with disabilities in all areas of life, including employment, education, health services, transportation and access to justice.

It requires that public spaces and buildings be accessible to persons with disabilities, and calls for improvements to information and communications infrastructure.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour told reporters that the drive and commitment of the disability community was the greatest impetus behind the treaty's content and relatively rapid adoption.

"It is very appropriate [that] it targets a community that has been marginalised for so long," she said.

"The most important thing is to recognise that where we are today is already a testimony to the empowerment of a community which has a long history of disempowerment," she added.

Yannis Vardakastanis of the International Disability Caucus called the Convention "a very drastic paradigm shift in the way the international community looks at disability."

He said the pact should bring real changes in the daily lives of people living with disabilities, "helping to take away the discrimination, exclusion and obstacles they routinely face."

Representatives of more than 350 disability organizations from around the world attended Friday's ceremony.

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