A/HRC/37/25 Committee has pointed out that article 9 (2) (h) of the Convention calls on States parties to promote accessible legal information to persons with disabilities and to society at large by using the full and varied range of formats and modes of communication. It also noted that new technologies could contribute to that end. 20 22. Several good practices illustrate the possibilities of guaranteeing that legal information and communication are accessible to persons with disabilities. The Constitutional Court of Colombia 21 and the Supreme Court of Mexico 22 called for the translation of judgments concerning the rights of persons with disabilities into easy read formats for the benefit of the petitioners and other persons with intellectual disabilities. In Finland, the police have designed their website to provide a range of accessible formats, such as plain language, content and videos in sign language, some of them captioned, and a complaint form in large print. 23. States should implement mechanisms to monitor their legal proceedings and evaluate the success of their policies with regard to access to justice. For example, States could establish markers that allow for the identification of persons with disabilities who access the justice system and the outcomes. Existing systems could also include datacollection tools that allow for disaggregation, such as the Washington Group on Disability Statistics Short Set of Questions.23 2. Procedural and age-appropriate accommodations 24. Equality of arms is a component of the right to a fair trial, guaranteeing that the same procedural rights are provided to all the parties to ensure access to the same information and the same opportunities to adduce and challenge evidence. 24 Persons with disabilities are frequently hindered in enjoying equality of arms due to inaccessible documentation or procedures. Beyond accessibility, States parties must make available the procedural and age-appropriate accommodations that persons with disabilities may require in accessing justice. The list of measures that States parties should take to ensure effective and equal access to justice enumerated in article 13 (1) of the Convention is not exhaustive, and States parties are obliged to provide procedural and age-appropriate accommodations to facilitate the role of persons with disabilities as direct and indirect participants in all legal proceedings, including the investigative and other preliminary stages. Hence, procedural accommodations serve as a means to effectively realize the right to a fair trial and the right to participate in the administration of justice, and are an intrinsic component of the right to access to justice. The Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has provided a number of examples of how procedural accommodations for persons with disabilities can look in practice, for example, through the provision of sign language interpretation, legal and judicial information in accessible formats for, multiple means of communication, easy read versions of documents, Braille and video link testimony, among others.25 Procedural accommodations should also encompass procedural flexibility to accommodate specific requirements for participation, for example allowing sign language interpreters to participate in confidential jury debates, extending or adjusting procedural deadlines and adjusting procedural formalities. 25. The obligation to provide procedural accommodations derives directly from civil and political rights. It is directly linked to the principle of non-discrimination and is not subject to progressive realization. In the negotiations on article 13 of the Convention, it was debated whether the language to be adopted should refer to “procedural accommodation” or 20 21 22 23 24 25 See general comment No. 2 (2014) on accessibility, para. 22. Decision T-573/2016. Resolución Judicial de la Primera Sala de la Suprema Corte de la Nación en el Amparo en Revisión 159/2013. Available from www.cdc.gov/nchs/washington_group/wg_questions.htm. See Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 32, para. 13. See general comment No. 1 (2014) on equal recognition before the law, para. 39; CRPD/C/ARM/CO/1, para. 21; CRPD/C/BIH/CO/1, para. 24; CRPD/C/CAN/CO/1, para. 30 (b); and CRPD/C/CYP/CO/1, para. 36. 7