United Nations General Assembly A/HRC/WG.7/2/3 Distr.: General 13 October 2010 Original: English Human Rights Council Working Group on an optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child Second session Geneva, 6–10 December 2010 and 14–18 February 2011 Comments by the Committee on the Rights of the Child on the proposal for a draft optional protocol prepared by the Chairperson-Rapporteur of the Open-ended Working Group on an optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child to provide a communications procedure* I. Background 1. In its resolution 13/3, the Human Rights Council decided to mandate the Openended Working Group on an optional protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child to provide a communication procedure to elaborate an optional protocol. In this regard, it requested the Chairperson of the Working Group to prepare a proposal for a draft optional protocol, taking into account the views expressed and inputs provided during the first session of the Working Group in December 2009 and giving due regard to, inter alia, the views of the Committee on the Rights of the Child. 2. In accordance with resolution 13/3, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the International Commission of Jurists organized an expert consultation in Geneva on 21 and 22 June 2010, under the chairmanship of Yanghee Lee and Jan Zermatten, respectively the Chairperson and the Vice-Chairperson of the Committee on the Rights of the Child. Participants were drawn from different regions and legal systems and had experience in litigating on children’s issues at the national or international levels. The Chairperson-Rapporteur of the Open-ended Working Group, Drahoslav Stefanek, also participated in the consultation. The purpose of the consultation was to discuss the possible contents of the optional protocol and to facilitate the preparation of the contribution by the Committee to the Open-ended Working Group. 3. The ideas listed below were among those expressed by a majority of experts who participated in the consultation: * Late submission. GE.10-16956 (E) 191010