A/HRC/44/19 including religious, cultural and social groups, national human rights institutions, international and national experts, members of the Government, including from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Justice and the ministry in charge of gender issues and equality, academia, trade unions and United Nations agencies. The final report of the consultations recommended the implementation of international, regional and national recommendations to address racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance at all levels. The report also recommended that civil society and other relevant stakeholders should work in close consultation during the preparation of a future national action plan against racism. 53. In Afghanistan, the Voluntary Fund was used to further enhance the capacity of senior government officials (members of the universal periodic review technical working group), the Afghan delegation attending the meeting of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review in Geneva, civil society organizations and the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission to implement the recommendations received from the universal periodic review and other human rights mechanisms and to promote the country’s engagement with those mechanisms. 54. With the full involvement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan Human Rights Service and the Universal Periodic Review Branch of OHCHR conducted a number of workshops, in particular for the interministerial committee and its focal points responsible for the implementation of recommendations from the universal periodic review. The workshops focused, among other things, on the role of the national mechanism for reporting and follow-up and the utility of establishing a national recommendations tracking database, a human rights action plan and a recommendations implementation plan linked with Sustainable Development Goals, as well as the assistance that the United Nations system in Afghanistan could provide in that regard. A workshop for civil society addressed the importance of engaging the public in various stages of the review and the participation of civil society and the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission in the universal periodic review process. Opportunities for dialogue with the State and the engagement of relevant organizations in the implementation of recommendations from the universal periodic review were reinforced. 55. Supported by the Voluntary Fund, a regional consultation on the universal periodic review, looking at good practices, follow-up mechanisms and synergies with the 2030 Agenda, was organized by OHCHR in Panama in October 2019, with the consent of the host country and in partnership with the Development Coordination Office, the UNDP regional office and the office of the United Nations Resident Coordinator. The activity gathered 70 representatives from 17 Spanish-speaking countries, including senior government officials from national mechanisms for implementation, reporting and followup and Sustainable Development Goal-related structures, representatives from national human rights institutions, parliaments and civil society, and officials from the United Nations system. A member of the Board of Trustees of the Voluntary Fund, Mr. CorcueraCabezut, participated in the regional consultation. 56. The main objectives of the regional consultation were to facilitate the use of good practices and the articulation of lessons learned at the various stages of the universal periodic review process, especially regarding the implementation of recommendations, and to identify challenges as well as opportunities to align initiatives to achieve human rights and the Sustainable Development Goals at the national level. It included a segment on the use of recommendations from the universal periodic review and other human rights mechanisms in the preparation of voluntary national reports on the Sustainable Development Goals. The consultation also covered the role of parliaments, national human rights institutions and civil society organizations in the implementation of human rights recommendations and the Sustainable Development Goals; strategies to mainstream human rights in the implementation and monitoring of the Sustainable Development Goals at the national level; and the activities of United Nations country teams to assist States in integrating recommendations from the universal periodic review to achieve the 2030 Agenda. 57. At the end of the event, the Regional Director of the Development Coordination Office delivered a joint concluding statement on behalf of UNDP, the Development Coordination Office and OHCHR, highlighting an important number of best practices that 11