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appreciates the continuing efforts of the Office to establish systems that
will further improve the ability of the mechanisms to cooperate, with a view
to avoiding duplication of communications in respect of certain cases.
II.
ACTIVITIES OF THE SPECIAL RAPPORTEUR
5.
A significant development for the mandate was the invitation, contained
in Commission resolution 1998/38, paragraph 30, for the Special Rapporteur to
present an oral interim report to the General Assembly at its fifty-third
session on the overall trends and developments with respect to his mandate.
On 5 November 1998, he accordingly addressed the Assembly’s Third Committee
under agenda item 110 (a). The text of the statement is annexed to the
present report. In its resolution 53/139, paragraph 24, the General Assembly
requested the Special Rapporteur to present an interim report to it at its
fifty-fourth session.
6.
During the period under review the Special Rapporteur undertook a
mission to Turkey (9-19 November 1998). The report on this visit may be found
in Addendum 1 to the present report. The Governments of Cameroon, Kenya and
Romania have invited the Special Rapporteur to visit their countries, for
which he is most grateful. Initial positive reactions from the Permanent
Missions of Algeria and Egypt to his requests in 1997 for invitations to visit
their countries (see E/CN.4/1998/38, para. 4) did not yield the hoped for
invitations. His requests for invitations to visit China, India and Indonesia
remain without positive response. During the year the Special Rapporteur also
sought invitations to visit Bahrain, Brazil and Tunisia.
7.
The Permanent Representative of Bahrain indicated that an invitation
should await the planned visit of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and
that a joint visit, as tentatively suggested by the Special Rapporteur, risked
complicating decision-making regarding cooperation with the Commission’s
mechanisms. The Deputy Permanent Representative of Brazil gave a positive
initial reaction, while explaining a need to allow time for new federal and
State administration fully to establish themselves.
8.
On 19 May 1998, the Special Rapporteur participated in the first joint
meeting with the Committee against Torture and the Voluntary Fund for Victims
of Torture, together with the High Commissioner for Human Rights. The other
bodies with mandates connected with torture exchanged views and information on
how each of them works and the complementarity of their mandates. The meeting
also adopted a statement for 26 June, the United Nations International Day in
Support of Victims of Torture. The Special Rapporteur believes that such
meetings would be valuable on a periodic basis. He also participated in the
fifth meeting of special rapporteurs/representatives, experts and chairpersons
of working groups of the special procedures of the Commission on Human Rights
and of the advisory services programme, held in Geneva from 25 to 29 May. On
the nomination of the Chairperson of that meeting, from 22 to 25 June he
attended the Diplomatic Conference on the Establishment of an International
Criminal Court, held in Rome from 15 June to 17 July 1998. He also attended a
round table of the International Institute of Humanitarian Law on the
resulting Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, held in San Remo,
from 2 to 4 September 1998.