Al-Ansari highlighted that Kingdom of Bahrain has presented CEDAW’s third national report in the scheduled time in July 2011, and that the national team concerned with updating the data of the third official report for CEDAW has finished with such work according to the adopted mechanism in preparing such international reports.
Al-Ansari expressed her thanks and appreciation for the national efforts, which facilitate the work of the national team during the discussion, and announced that for the first time, there will be an active community partnership through the participation of various official ministries and institutions in the Kingdom. This is in addition to a number of the relevant civil society institutions, women societies, and Bahrain Women Union for the first time since Bahrain’s consent on such important world commitment.
Al-Ansari added that Bahrain Women Union and for the first time participates with naming two members of the Union’s member within the national team concerned with updating the data of the third national report of CEDAW. These members are the Chairman of CEDAW committee at the Women Union, Fawzia Al-Khaja, and the member of CEDAW committee, and counselor at Bahrain Women Union’s Bureau, Mariyam Al-Ruwaiee.
According to Al-Ansari, the General Secretariat of the Council and in implementation of the decision of the Supreme Council for Women in its last meeting maintains its efforts in collaboration with the relevant parties and institutions in the Kingdom.
The Secretariat desires to study the possibility of lifting or re-drafting the reservations on some articles of CEDAW convention, and without inconsistency with the provisions of Islamic law and also preserves the sovereignty of the state, in the framework of the implementation of the recommendations of CEDAW Committee, and the recommendations of Human Rights Council in this regard.
It’s worth noting that Kingdom of Bahrain has signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) on June 18th 2002, and has been committed to implementing its obligations with the provisions of this convention on level of the programmes of raising the awareness with the articles of this convention. On the other hand, Kingdom of Bahrain is committed to the provisions of this convention at the level of preparing the periodical official reports on following up the implementation of the articles of this convention, or following considering the comments of CEDAW committee on these reports concerning eliminating discrimination against women in accordance with the articles of the convention.
Meanwhile, CEDAW committee at U.N. has discussed the first official report and the second complementary report concerning CEDAW convention dated 30th October 2008 at U.N. headquarters in Geneva. The report was written with scientific method based on the comments of the committee on the other international reports, and had dealt with the actual reality of the Bahraini Women’s condition in the legislations and measures, ending with highlighting the challenges that may face developing the role of women, and proposing the suitable measures to face such challenges.
CEDAW convention consists of an introduction and six parts divided into thirty articles covering the economic, social, cultural, political, legal and humanitarian areas to adopt equality between women and men, elevating women and ensuring their rights, as well as eliminating all forms of discrimination against them based on gender.
The CEDAW convention is distinguished by imposing certain systems to monitor the states and see the extent of their commitment to the terms of the Convention, and this monitoring is carried out by the obligation to submit a preliminary report after a year of signing or ratifying the Convention, and then submitting the reports every four years.