A/HRC/14/22
gross and systematic violations characterized by large numbers of victims and perpetrators,
weak Governments, fragile economies, scarce governmental resources and huge
reconstruction and development challenges. In such contexts, remedies may have to be
adjusted to achieve goals other than that of compensating each individual victim in
proportion to harm, including prioritizing the recognition of victims and promoting
interpersonal trust and trust in the institutions of the new State order.
19.
It is important to draw a distinction between reparation measures and other
rehabilitation measures. Sometimes, especially when the emphasis is placed on
rehabilitation services as measures of redress, the line that divides reparation measures for
gross violations from social assistance, humanitarian intervention measures and general
development-oriented policies gets blurred.
20.
Reparation measures express the obligation of the State to provide redress to victims
when, by action or omission, it has infringed against their rights. Social policy and
development measures are measures addressed at the entire population to ensure that each
and every person can meaningfully enjoy all rights recognized by the State. They are
inspired by notions of redistributive justice and should primarily target those sectors of the
population which have traditionally been discriminated against and structurally
disadvantaged, including women. Humanitarian intervention measures are measures of
temporal assistance to victims of natural and human-made disasters, aimed at ensuring their
subsistence, alleviating their suffering and protecting their dignity and basic rights during
the crisis. They rest on basic notions of solidarity and the obligation of the State to protect
rights but, unlike reparations, they are not remedial measures that express State
responsibility for the violation of rights.
21.
At the level of State practice, national Governments dealing with a legacy of
systemic violations have been increasingly prone to supplementing the transitional justice
mechanisms they put in place with the adoption of reparation initiatives and comprehensive
reparation programmes for victims of human rights violations. Such programmes try to
simplify a complex reality by selecting, among the violations that took place during the
conflict or the repressive period, those that are considered most serious and distributing a
set of benefits among victims and family members. Although they vary significantly, these
programmes rarely reproduce the five categories of reparations set forth in the Basic
Principles and Guidelines. Instead, they are mainly organized around the distinction
between material and symbolic measures and modalities of distribution, including
individual and collective distribution. Reparation programmes are also being used in
consolidated democracies to try to provide redress for specific and systematic practices
perpetrated and/or condoned by the State targeting certain groups of the population.
2.
Bringing women into the reparations debate
22.
Women are of course addressed in all the human rights and humanitarian law
treaties that contemplate a right to a remedy. Unfortunately, the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women is not particularly explicit
regarding women’s right to remedies, reparation or compensation. Article 2 (c) provides
only that States parties undertake to ensure the effective protection of women against any
act of discrimination through competent national tribunals and other public institutions.
This contrasts with article 6 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Racial Discrimination which refers to the obligation of States to assure “adequate
reparation or satisfaction for any damage suffered as a result of such [racial]
discrimination” and article 14 of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman
or Degrading Treatment or Punishment which requires that States ensure that the victim of
an act of torture obtains redress and has an enforceable right to fair and adequate
compensation, including the means for as full rehabilitation as possible.
8
GE.10-13109
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