A/HRC/11/25* as well as religious believers, including Falun Gong practitioners, without information about their charges, their location and wellbeing. Canada recommended that China: (a) accelerate legislative and judicial reforms, particularly on death penalty and administrative detention, to be in compliance with the ICCPR; (b) reduce the number of crimes carrying the death penalty and (c) regularly publish detailed statistics on death penalty use; (d) abolish all forms of administrative detention, including “Re-Education Through Labour”; (e) eliminate abuse of psychiatric committal; (f) provide those held on State-security charges with all fundamental legal safeguards, including access to counsel, public trial and sentencing, and eligibility for sentence reduction and parole; (g) take immediate measures to implement the recommendations of November 2008 of the Committee against Torture, particularly on the inadmissibility in court of statements made under torture and the nonrefoulement of refugees from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea; and (h) respond positively to outstanding requests made by several United Nations Special Procedures, including the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, to visit China, and (i) facilitate an early visit by the High Commissioner for Human Rights. 29. Singapore noted China’s priority on realizing the people’s right to development has brought about since 1978 rapid growth averaging 9.8 per cent per annum. It noted that this result could not have been possible without the empowerment of women. It welcomed the elaboration of a National Human Rights Action Plan for 2009–2010 that seeks to balance urban and rural development and to accelerate social development, with an emphasis on people’s welfare and on promoting social equity and justice. Singapore recommended that China finalize and publish the national human rights action plan for 2009–2010 at an early date and then swiftly implement it. It commended China for its efforts at strengthening its human rights legislation. It noted that over the past three decades the National People’s Congress and its Standing Committee have enacted some 250 laws relating to human rights protection, with the Constitution as its core. Singapore appreciated China’s active role in supporting the work of the United Nations in the area of human rights, including hosting in Beijing the 4th World Conference on Women in 1995. 30. The Netherlands noted the Chinese position on the protection of ethnic minority rights, and looked forward to further explanations on the death penalty and on UNHCR’s role with regard to refugees from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. It welcomed progress made in human rights. It recommended that China: (a) continue to advance the rule of law and to deepen the reform of the judicial system; (b) ratify the ICCPR as soon as possible and bring its legislation into line with its provisions; and (c) extend a standing invitation to all United Nations special rapporteurs. It said it looked forward to the publication of the Human Rights Action Plan 2009–2010. 31. Switzerland recognized the rapid economic development in the past years and the efforts made by China to improve the living condition of its population. It welcomed the inclusion of an article on the protection of human rights in the Constitution and the promulgation of a number of laws that protect human rights and recommended that China (a) amend the criminal procedure code in order to ensure the right to a lawyer and put in place a law for the protection of witnesses. It requested more information on the process and timeframe for ratification of the ICCPR, which China signed in 1998. It further welcomed the systematic revision of the death penalty by the People’s Supreme Court effective from January 2007, which resulted in a decrease in executions, and recommended that China (b) publish the statistics of the total number of executions since the introduction of its revision to allow measurement of the decline in numbers; (c) install a moratorium on the death penalty as a first step towards its total abolition. While stressing that the rights and the particularities of minorities should be recognized and protected, and that their economic development should be supported, Switzerland expressed concern over the situation of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang and Tibet, Switzerland recommended that the GE.09-16299 7