A/HRC/6/8 page 8 35. Liechtenstein, Portugal, Switzerland, Uruguay and Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of) proposed to delete the bracketed text in paragraph 1. Egypt stated that it would be able to accept excluding Part I of the Covenant from the scope of the procedure. India stated that it was open to a limited approach, covering Parts II and III of the Covenant, if clear guidelines on how to assess States’ performance were defined. 36. Australia, Greece, India, Morocco, Russia and the United States favoured excluding Part I of the Covenant from the scope of a communications procedure. The United Kingdom suggested that if a comprehensive approach were ultimately followed it would be more correct to state that the provisions of Part II may only be invoked in conjunction with the substantive rights contained in Part III. The same would apply to an à la carte approach. 37. Australia, China, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, the Republic of Korea, Russia, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States were in favour of an à la carte approach that would allow States to limit the application of the procedure to only certain provisions of the Covenant along the lines of paragraph 2 of the draft. It was pointed out that such a selective approach would enable a larger number of States to become parties to the protocol and allow States to limit the procedure to those rights for which domestic remedies exist. 38. Poland and the United Kingdom preferred an opt-in approach, as opting-out from certain rights might send the signal that these rights were less important. The United Kingdom noted that this approach would allow States parties to add further rights at a later stage while not preventing other States from accepting petitions under all Covenant rights. Poland proposed to establish a minimum number of articles that all States parties would have to accept. 39. The Netherlands proposed to add a third paragraph to article 2, enumerating those provisions that may be excluded from the protocol. China stated that it is not appropriate for States to opt out of article 2, paragraph 1, which sets out guidelines for the whole Covenant. The Republic of Korea suggested adding to paragraph 2: “A State party that has made a declaration under the present paragraph is requested to inform the Committee after 10 years of its ratification of the present Protocol or accession thereto whether or not it will maintain the declaration.” 40. France stated that communications should be considered in the light of the obligations to respect, protect and fulfil. 41. Egypt and India said that an optional protocol should define clear parameters to be applied by the Committee when examining communications. 42. Finland and Norway supported the provision in paragraph 1 that communications may be submitted by or on behalf of individuals and groups of individuals. India preferred to limit standing to individuals or groups of individuals claiming to be the victims of a violation. China suggested referring to “direct victims”. 43. Belarus, Burkina Faso, China, Egypt (on behalf of the African Group), Ethiopia, Morocco and Russia proposed that communications on behalf of individuals or groups of individuals be submitted with their prior “express” consent. Ecuador, Peru, the NGO Coalition and ICJ stated