Convention Rights Persons Disabilities

https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/convention-rights-persons-disabilities

Preamble

(a) Recall­ing the prin­ci­ples pro­claimed in the Char­ter of the Unit­ed Nations which rec­og­nize the inher­ent dig­ni­ty and worth and the equal and inalien­able rights of all mem­bers of the human fam­i­ly as the foun­da­tion of free­dom, jus­tice and peace in the world,

(b) Rec­og­niz­ing that the Unit­ed Nations, in the Uni­ver­sal Dec­la­ra­tion of Human Rights and in the Inter­na­tion­al Covenants on Human Rights, has pro­claimed and agreed that every­one is enti­tled to all the rights and free­doms set forth there­in, with­out dis­tinc­tion of any kind,

© Reaf­firm­ing the uni­ver­sal­i­ty, indi­vis­i­bil­i­ty, inter­de­pen­dence and inter­re­lat­ed­ness of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms and the need for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to be guar­an­teed their full enjoy­ment with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion,

(d) Recall­ing the Inter­na­tion­al Covenant on Eco­nom­ic, Social and Cul­tur­al Rights, the Inter­na­tion­al Covenant on Civ­il and Polit­i­cal Rights, the Inter­na­tion­al Con­ven­tion on the Elim­i­na­tion of All Forms of Racial Dis­crim­i­na­tion, the Con­ven­tion on the Elim­i­na­tion of All Forms of Dis­crim­i­na­tion against Women, the Con­ven­tion against Tor­ture and Oth­er Cru­el, Inhu­man or Degrad­ing Treat­ment or Pun­ish­ment, the Con­ven­tion on the Rights of the Child, and the Inter­na­tion­al Con­ven­tion on the Pro­tec­tion of the Rights of All Migrant Work­ers and Mem­bers of Their Fam­i­lies,

(e) Rec­og­niz­ing that dis­abil­i­ty is an evolv­ing con­cept and that dis­abil­i­ty results from the inter­ac­tion between per­sons with impair­ments and atti­tu­di­nal and envi­ron­men­tal bar­ri­ers that hin­ders their full and effec­tive par­tic­i­pa­tion in soci­ety on an equal basis with oth­ers,

(f) Rec­og­niz­ing the impor­tance of the prin­ci­ples and pol­i­cy guide­lines con­tained in the World Pro­gramme of Action con­cern­ing Dis­abled Per­sons and in the Stan­dard Rules on the Equal­iza­tion of Oppor­tu­ni­ties for Per­sons with Dis­abil­i­ties in influ­enc­ing the pro­mo­tion, for­mu­la­tion and eval­u­a­tion of the poli­cies, plans, pro­grammes and actions at the nation­al, region­al and inter­na­tion­al lev­els to fur­ther equal­ize oppor­tu­ni­ties for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties,

(g) Empha­siz­ing the impor­tance of main­stream­ing dis­abil­i­ty issues as an inte­gral part of rel­e­vant strate­gies of sus­tain­able devel­op­ment,

(h) Rec­og­niz­ing also that dis­crim­i­na­tion against any per­son on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty is a vio­la­tion of the inher­ent dig­ni­ty and worth of the human per­son,

(i) Rec­og­niz­ing fur­ther the diver­si­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties,

(j) Rec­og­niz­ing the need to pro­mote and pro­tect the human rights of all per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing those who require more inten­sive sup­port,

(k) Con­cerned that, despite these var­i­ous instru­ments and under­tak­ings, per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties con­tin­ue to face bar­ri­ers in their par­tic­i­pa­tion as equal mem­bers of soci­ety and vio­la­tions of their human rights in all parts of the world,

(l) Rec­og­niz­ing the impor­tance of inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion for improv­ing the liv­ing con­di­tions of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in every coun­try, par­tic­u­lar­ly in devel­op­ing coun­tries,

(m) Rec­og­niz­ing the val­ued exist­ing and poten­tial con­tri­bu­tions made by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to the over­all well-being and diver­si­ty of their com­mu­ni­ties, and that the pro­mo­tion of the full enjoy­ment by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties of their human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms and of full par­tic­i­pa­tion by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties will result in their enhanced sense of belong­ing and in sig­nif­i­cant advances in the human, social and eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment of soci­ety and the erad­i­ca­tion of pover­ty,

(n) Rec­og­niz­ing the impor­tance for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties of their indi­vid­ual auton­o­my and inde­pen­dence, includ­ing the free­dom to make their own choic­es,

(o) Con­sid­er­ing that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties should have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to be active­ly involved in deci­sion-mak­ing process­es about poli­cies and pro­grammes, includ­ing those direct­ly con­cern­ing them,

℗ Con­cerned about the dif­fi­cult con­di­tions faced by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties who are sub­ject to mul­ti­ple or aggra­vat­ed forms of dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of race, colour, sex, lan­guage, reli­gion, polit­i­cal or oth­er opin­ion, nation­al, eth­nic, indige­nous or social ori­gin, prop­er­ty, birth, age or oth­er sta­tus,

(q) Rec­og­niz­ing that women and girls with dis­abil­i­ties are often at greater risk, both with­in and out­side the home, of vio­lence, injury or abuse, neglect or neg­li­gent treat­ment, mal­treat­ment or exploita­tion,

® Rec­og­niz­ing that chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties should have full enjoy­ment of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms on an equal basis with oth­er chil­dren, and recall­ing oblig­a­tions to that end under­tak­en by States Par­ties to the Con­ven­tion on the Rights of the Child,

(s) Empha­siz­ing the need to incor­po­rate a gen­der per­spec­tive in all efforts to pro­mote the full enjoy­ment of human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties,

(t) High­light­ing the fact that the major­i­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties live in con­di­tions of pover­ty, and in this regard rec­og­niz­ing the crit­i­cal need to address the neg­a­tive impact of pover­ty on per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties,

(u) Bear­ing in mind that con­di­tions of peace and secu­ri­ty based on full respect for the pur­pos­es and prin­ci­ples con­tained in the Char­ter of the Unit­ed Nations and obser­vance of applic­a­ble human rights instru­ments are indis­pens­able for the full pro­tec­tion of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, in par­tic­u­lar dur­ing armed con­flicts and for­eign occu­pa­tion,

(v) Rec­og­niz­ing the impor­tance of acces­si­bil­i­ty to the phys­i­cal, social, eco­nom­ic and cul­tur­al envi­ron­ment, to health and edu­ca­tion and to infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tion, in enabling per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to ful­ly enjoy all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms,

(w) Real­iz­ing that the indi­vid­ual, hav­ing duties to oth­er indi­vid­u­als and to the com­mu­ni­ty to which he or she belongs, is under a respon­si­bil­i­ty to strive for the pro­mo­tion and obser­vance of the rights rec­og­nized in the Inter­na­tion­al Bill of Human Rights,

(x) Con­vinced that the fam­i­ly is the nat­ur­al and fun­da­men­tal group unit of soci­ety and is enti­tled to pro­tec­tion by soci­ety and the State, and that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and their fam­i­ly mem­bers should receive the nec­es­sary pro­tec­tion and assis­tance to enable fam­i­lies to con­tribute towards the full and equal enjoy­ment of the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties,

(y) Con­vinced that a com­pre­hen­sive and inte­gral inter­na­tion­al con­ven­tion to pro­mote and pro­tect the rights and dig­ni­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties will make a sig­nif­i­cant con­tri­bu­tion to redress­ing the pro­found social dis­ad­van­tage of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and pro­mote their par­tic­i­pa­tion in the civ­il, polit­i­cal, eco­nom­ic, social and cul­tur­al spheres with equal oppor­tu­ni­ties, in both devel­op­ing and devel­oped coun­tries,

Have agreed as fol­lows :

Article 1 — Purpose

The pur­pose of the present Con­ven­tion is to pro­mote, pro­tect and ensure the full and equal enjoy­ment of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms by all per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, and to pro­mote respect for their inher­ent dig­ni­ty.

Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties include those who have long-term phys­i­cal, men­tal, intel­lec­tu­al or sen­so­ry impair­ments which in inter­ac­tion with var­i­ous bar­ri­ers may hin­der their full and effec­tive par­tic­i­pa­tion in soci­ety on an equal basis with oth­ers.

Article 2 — Definitions

For the pur­pos­es of the present Con­ven­tion:

“Com­mu­ni­ca­tion” includes lan­guages, dis­play of text, Braille, tac­tile com­mu­ni­ca­tion, large print, acces­si­ble mul­ti­me­dia as well as writ­ten, audio, plain-lan­guage, human-read­er and aug­men­ta­tive and alter­na­tive modes, means and for­mats of com­mu­ni­ca­tion, includ­ing acces­si­ble infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tion tech­nol­o­gy;

“Lan­guage” includes spo­ken and signed lan­guages and oth­er forms of non-spo­ken lan­guages;

“Dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty” means any dis­tinc­tion, exclu­sion or restric­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty which has the pur­pose or effect of impair­ing or nul­li­fy­ing the recog­ni­tion, enjoy­ment or exer­cise, on an equal basis with oth­ers, of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms in the polit­i­cal, eco­nom­ic, social, cul­tur­al, civ­il or any oth­er field. It includes all forms of dis­crim­i­na­tion, includ­ing denial of rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion;

“Rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion” means nec­es­sary and appro­pri­ate mod­i­fi­ca­tion and adjust­ments not impos­ing a dis­pro­por­tion­ate or undue bur­den, where need­ed in a par­tic­u­lar case, to ensure to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties the enjoy­ment or exer­cise on an equal basis with oth­ers of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms;

“Uni­ver­sal design” means the design of prod­ucts, envi­ron­ments, pro­grammes and ser­vices to be usable by all peo­ple, to the great­est extent pos­si­ble, with­out the need for adap­ta­tion or spe­cial­ized design. “Uni­ver­sal design” shall not exclude assis­tive devices for par­tic­u­lar groups of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties where this is need­ed.

Article 3 — General principles

The prin­ci­ples of the present Con­ven­tion shall be:

1. Respect for inher­ent dig­ni­ty, indi­vid­ual auton­o­my includ­ing the free­dom to make one’s own choic­es, and inde­pen­dence of per­sons;
2. Non-dis­crim­i­na­tion;
3. Full and effec­tive par­tic­i­pa­tion and inclu­sion in soci­ety;
4. Respect for dif­fer­ence and accep­tance of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties as part of human diver­si­ty and human­i­ty;
5. Equal­i­ty of oppor­tu­ni­ty;
6. Acces­si­bil­i­ty;
7. Equal­i­ty between men and women;
8. Respect for the evolv­ing capac­i­ties of chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties and respect for the right of chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties to pre­serve their iden­ti­ties.

Article 4 — General obligations

1. States Par­ties under­take to ensure and pro­mote the full real­iza­tion of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms for all per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion of any kind on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty. To this end, States Par­ties under­take:
   1. To adopt all appro­pri­ate leg­isla­tive, admin­is­tra­tive and oth­er mea­sures for the imple­men­ta­tion of the rights rec­og­nized in the present Con­ven­tion;
   2. To take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures, includ­ing leg­is­la­tion, to mod­i­fy or abol­ish exist­ing laws, reg­u­la­tions, cus­toms and prac­tices that con­sti­tute dis­crim­i­na­tion against per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   3. To take into account the pro­tec­tion and pro­mo­tion of the human rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in all poli­cies and pro­grammes;
   4. To refrain from engag­ing in any act or prac­tice that is incon­sis­tent with the present Con­ven­tion and to ensure that pub­lic author­i­ties and insti­tu­tions act in con­for­mi­ty with the present Con­ven­tion;
   5. To take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to elim­i­nate dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty by any per­son, orga­ni­za­tion or pri­vate enter­prise;
   6. To under­take or pro­mote research and devel­op­ment of uni­ver­sal­ly designed goods, ser­vices, equip­ment and facil­i­ties, as defined in arti­cle 2 of the present Con­ven­tion, which should require the min­i­mum pos­si­ble adap­ta­tion and the least cost to meet the spe­cif­ic needs of a per­son with dis­abil­i­ties, to pro­mote their avail­abil­i­ty and use, and to pro­mote uni­ver­sal design in the devel­op­ment of stan­dards and guide­lines;
   7. To under­take or pro­mote research and devel­op­ment of, and to pro­mote the avail­abil­i­ty and use of new tech­nolo­gies, includ­ing infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions tech­nolo­gies, mobil­i­ty aids, devices and assis­tive tech­nolo­gies, suit­able for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, giv­ing pri­or­i­ty to tech­nolo­gies at an afford­able cost;
   8. To pro­vide acces­si­ble infor­ma­tion to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties about mobil­i­ty aids, devices and assis­tive tech­nolo­gies, includ­ing new tech­nolo­gies, as well as oth­er forms of assis­tance, sup­port ser­vices and facil­i­ties;
   9. To pro­mote the train­ing of pro­fes­sion­als and staff work­ing with per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the rights rec­og­nized in this Con­ven­tion so as to bet­ter pro­vide the assis­tance and ser­vices guar­an­teed by those rights.
2. With regard to eco­nom­ic, social and cul­tur­al rights, each State Par­ty under­takes to take mea­sures to the max­i­mum of its avail­able resources and, where need­ed, with­in the frame­work of inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion, with a view to achiev­ing pro­gres­sive­ly the full real­iza­tion of these rights, with­out prej­u­dice to those oblig­a­tions con­tained in the present Con­ven­tion that are imme­di­ate­ly applic­a­ble accord­ing to inter­na­tion­al law.
3. In the devel­op­ment and imple­men­ta­tion of leg­is­la­tion and poli­cies to imple­ment the present Con­ven­tion, and in oth­er deci­sion-mak­ing process­es con­cern­ing issues relat­ing to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, States Par­ties shall close­ly con­sult with and active­ly involve per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties, through their rep­re­sen­ta­tive orga­ni­za­tions.
4. Noth­ing in the present Con­ven­tion shall affect any pro­vi­sions which are more con­ducive to the real­iza­tion of the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and which may be con­tained in the law of a State Par­ty or inter­na­tion­al law in force for that State. There shall be no restric­tion upon or dero­ga­tion from any of the human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms rec­og­nized or exist­ing in any State Par­ty to the present Con­ven­tion pur­suant to law, con­ven­tions, reg­u­la­tion or cus­tom on the pre­text that the present Con­ven­tion does not rec­og­nize such rights or free­doms or that it rec­og­nizes them to a less­er extent.
5. The pro­vi­sions of the present Con­ven­tion shall extend to all parts of fed­er­al states with­out any lim­i­ta­tions or excep­tions.

Article 5 — Equality and non-discrimination

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize that all per­sons are equal before and under the law and are enti­tled with­out any dis­crim­i­na­tion to the equal pro­tec­tion and equal ben­e­fit of the law.
2. States Par­ties shall pro­hib­it all dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty and guar­an­tee to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties equal and effec­tive legal pro­tec­tion against dis­crim­i­na­tion on all grounds.
3. In order to pro­mote equal­i­ty and elim­i­nate dis­crim­i­na­tion, States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate steps to ensure that rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion is pro­vid­ed.
4. Spe­cif­ic mea­sures which are nec­es­sary to accel­er­ate or achieve de fac­to equal­i­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties shall not be con­sid­ered dis­crim­i­na­tion under the terms of the present Con­ven­tion.

Article 6 — Women with disabilities

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize that women and girls with dis­abil­i­ties are sub­ject to mul­ti­ple dis­crim­i­na­tion, and in this regard shall take mea­sures to ensure the full and equal enjoy­ment by them of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms.
2. States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to ensure the full devel­op­ment, advance­ment and empow­er­ment of women, for the pur­pose of guar­an­tee­ing them the exer­cise and enjoy­ment of the human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms set out in the present Con­ven­tion.

Article 7 — Children with disabilities

1. States Par­ties shall take all nec­es­sary mea­sures to ensure the full enjoy­ment by chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties of all human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms on an equal basis with oth­er chil­dren.
2. In all actions con­cern­ing chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties, the best inter­ests of the child shall be a pri­ma­ry con­sid­er­a­tion.
3. States Par­ties shall ensure that chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties have the right to express their views freely on all mat­ters affect­ing them, their views being giv­en due weight in accor­dance with their age and matu­ri­ty, on an equal basis with oth­er chil­dren, and to be pro­vid­ed with dis­abil­i­ty and age-appro­pri­ate assis­tance to real­ize that right.

Article 8 — Awareness-raising

1. States Par­ties under­take to adopt imme­di­ate, effec­tive and appro­pri­ate mea­sures:
   1. To raise aware­ness through­out soci­ety, includ­ing at the fam­i­ly lev­el, regard­ing per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, and to fos­ter respect for the rights and dig­ni­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   2. To com­bat stereo­types, prej­u­dices and harm­ful prac­tices relat­ing to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing those based on sex and age, in all areas of life;
   3. To pro­mote aware­ness of the capa­bil­i­ties and con­tri­bu­tions of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.
2. Mea­sures to this end include:
   1. Ini­ti­at­ing and main­tain­ing effec­tive pub­lic aware­ness cam­paigns designed:
      1. To nur­ture recep­tive­ness to the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
      2. To pro­mote pos­i­tive per­cep­tions and greater social aware­ness towards per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
      3. To pro­mote recog­ni­tion of the skills, mer­its and abil­i­ties of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, and of their con­tri­bu­tions to the work­place and the labour mar­ket;
   2. Fos­ter­ing at all lev­els of the edu­ca­tion sys­tem, includ­ing in all chil­dren from an ear­ly age, an atti­tude of respect for the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   3. Encour­ag­ing all organs of the media to por­tray per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in a man­ner con­sis­tent with the pur­pose of the present Con­ven­tion;
   4. Pro­mot­ing aware­ness-train­ing pro­grammes regard­ing per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.

Article 9 — Accessibility

1. To enable per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to live inde­pen­dent­ly and par­tic­i­pate ful­ly in all aspects of life, States Par­ties shall take appro­pri­ate mea­sures to ensure to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties access, on an equal basis with oth­ers, to the phys­i­cal envi­ron­ment, to trans­porta­tion, to infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions, includ­ing infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions tech­nolo­gies and sys­tems, and to oth­er facil­i­ties and ser­vices open or pro­vid­ed to the pub­lic, both in urban and in rur­al areas. These mea­sures, which shall include the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and elim­i­na­tion of obsta­cles and bar­ri­ers to acces­si­bil­i­ty, shall apply to, inter alia:
   1. Build­ings, roads, trans­porta­tion and oth­er indoor and out­door facil­i­ties, includ­ing schools, hous­ing, med­ical facil­i­ties and work­places;
   2. Infor­ma­tion, com­mu­ni­ca­tions and oth­er ser­vices, includ­ing elec­tron­ic ser­vices and emer­gency ser­vices.
2. States Par­ties shall also take appro­pri­ate mea­sures to:
   1. Devel­op, pro­mul­gate and mon­i­tor the imple­men­ta­tion of min­i­mum stan­dards and guide­lines for the acces­si­bil­i­ty of facil­i­ties and ser­vices open or pro­vid­ed to the pub­lic;
   2. Ensure that pri­vate enti­ties that offer facil­i­ties and ser­vices which are open or pro­vid­ed to the pub­lic take into account all aspects of acces­si­bil­i­ty for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   3. Pro­vide train­ing for stake­hold­ers on acces­si­bil­i­ty issues fac­ing per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   4. Pro­vide in build­ings and oth­er facil­i­ties open to the pub­lic sig­nage in Braille and in easy to read and under­stand forms;
   5. Pro­vide forms of live assis­tance and inter­me­di­aries, includ­ing guides, read­ers and pro­fes­sion­al sign lan­guage inter­preters, to facil­i­tate acces­si­bil­i­ty to build­ings and oth­er facil­i­ties open to the pub­lic;
   6. Pro­mote oth­er appro­pri­ate forms of assis­tance and sup­port to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to ensure their access to infor­ma­tion;
   7. Pro­mote access for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to new infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions tech­nolo­gies and sys­tems, includ­ing the Inter­net;
   8. Pro­mote the design, devel­op­ment, pro­duc­tion and dis­tri­b­u­tion of acces­si­ble infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions tech­nolo­gies and sys­tems at an ear­ly stage, so that these tech­nolo­gies and sys­tems become acces­si­ble at min­i­mum cost.

Article 10 — Right to life

States Par­ties reaf­firm that every human being has the inher­ent right to life and shall take all nec­es­sary mea­sures to ensure its effec­tive enjoy­ment by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties on an equal basis with oth­ers.

Article 11 — Situations of risk and humanitarian emergencies

States Par­ties shall take, in accor­dance with their oblig­a­tions under inter­na­tion­al law, includ­ing inter­na­tion­al human­i­tar­i­an law and inter­na­tion­al human rights law, all nec­es­sary mea­sures to ensure the pro­tec­tion and safe­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in sit­u­a­tions of risk, includ­ing sit­u­a­tions of armed con­flict, human­i­tar­i­an emer­gen­cies and the occur­rence of nat­ur­al dis­as­ters.

Article 12 — Equal recognition before the law

1. States Par­ties reaf­firm that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have the right to recog­ni­tion every­where as per­sons before the law.
2. States Par­ties shall rec­og­nize that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties enjoy legal capac­i­ty on an equal basis with oth­ers in all aspects of life.
3. States Par­ties shall take appro­pri­ate mea­sures to pro­vide access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to the sup­port they may require in exer­cis­ing their legal capac­i­ty.
4. States Par­ties shall ensure that all mea­sures that relate to the exer­cise of legal capac­i­ty pro­vide for appro­pri­ate and effec­tive safe­guards to pre­vent abuse in accor­dance with inter­na­tion­al human rights law. Such safe­guards shall ensure that mea­sures relat­ing to the exer­cise of legal capac­i­ty respect the rights, will and pref­er­ences of the per­son, are free of con­flict of inter­est and undue influ­ence, are pro­por­tion­al and tai­lored to the per­son­’s cir­cum­stances, apply for the short­est time pos­si­ble and are sub­ject to reg­u­lar review by a com­pe­tent, inde­pen­dent and impar­tial author­i­ty or judi­cial body. The safe­guards shall be pro­por­tion­al to the degree to which such mea­sures affect the per­son­’s rights and inter­ests.
5. Sub­ject to the pro­vi­sions of this arti­cle, States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate and effec­tive mea­sures to ensure the equal right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to own or inher­it prop­er­ty, to con­trol their own finan­cial affairs and to have equal access to bank loans, mort­gages and oth­er forms of finan­cial cred­it, and shall ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are not arbi­trar­i­ly deprived of their prop­er­ty.

Article 13 — Access to justice

1. States Par­ties shall ensure effec­tive access to jus­tice for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties on an equal basis with oth­ers, includ­ing through the pro­vi­sion of pro­ce­dur­al and age-appro­pri­ate accom­mo­da­tions, in order to facil­i­tate their effec­tive role as direct and indi­rect par­tic­i­pants, includ­ing as wit­ness­es, in all legal pro­ceed­ings, includ­ing at inves­tiga­tive and oth­er pre­lim­i­nary stages.
2. In order to help to ensure effec­tive access to jus­tice for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, States Par­ties shall pro­mote appro­pri­ate train­ing for those work­ing in the field of admin­is­tra­tion of jus­tice, includ­ing police and prison staff.

Article 14 — Liberty and security of the person

1. States Par­ties shall ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, on an equal basis with oth­ers:
   1. Enjoy the right to lib­er­ty and secu­ri­ty of per­son;
   2. Are not deprived of their lib­er­ty unlaw­ful­ly or arbi­trar­i­ly, and that any depri­va­tion of lib­er­ty is in con­for­mi­ty with the law, and that the exis­tence of a dis­abil­i­ty shall in no case jus­ti­fy a depri­va­tion of lib­er­ty.
2. States Par­ties shall ensure that if per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are deprived of their lib­er­ty through any process, they are, on an equal basis with oth­ers, enti­tled to guar­an­tees in accor­dance with inter­na­tion­al human rights law and shall be treat­ed in com­pli­ance with the objec­tives and prin­ci­ples of this Con­ven­tion, includ­ing by pro­vi­sion of rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion.

Article 15 — Freedom from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment

1. No one shall be sub­ject­ed to tor­ture or to cru­el, inhu­man or degrad­ing treat­ment or pun­ish­ment. In par­tic­u­lar, no one shall be sub­ject­ed with­out his or her free con­sent to med­ical or sci­en­tif­ic exper­i­men­ta­tion.
2. States Par­ties shall take all effec­tive leg­isla­tive, admin­is­tra­tive, judi­cial or oth­er mea­sures to pre­vent per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, on an equal basis with oth­ers, from being sub­ject­ed to tor­ture or cru­el, inhu­man or degrad­ing treat­ment or pun­ish­ment.

Article 16 — Freedom from exploitation, violence and abuse

1. States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate leg­isla­tive, admin­is­tra­tive, social, edu­ca­tion­al and oth­er mea­sures to pro­tect per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, both with­in and out­side the home, from all forms of exploita­tion, vio­lence and abuse, includ­ing their gen­der-based aspects.
2. States Par­ties shall also take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to pre­vent all forms of exploita­tion, vio­lence and abuse by ensur­ing, inter alia, appro­pri­ate forms of gen­der- and age-sen­si­tive assis­tance and sup­port for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and their fam­i­lies and care­givers, includ­ing through the pro­vi­sion of infor­ma­tion and edu­ca­tion on how to avoid, rec­og­nize and report instances of exploita­tion, vio­lence and abuse. States Par­ties shall ensure that pro­tec­tion ser­vices are age‑, gen­der- and dis­abil­i­ty-sen­si­tive.
3. In order to pre­vent the occur­rence of all forms of exploita­tion, vio­lence and abuse, States Par­ties shall ensure that all facil­i­ties and pro­grammes designed to serve per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are effec­tive­ly mon­i­tored by inde­pen­dent author­i­ties.
4. States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to pro­mote the phys­i­cal, cog­ni­tive and psy­cho­log­i­cal recov­ery, reha­bil­i­ta­tion and social rein­te­gra­tion of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties who become vic­tims of any form of exploita­tion, vio­lence or abuse, includ­ing through the pro­vi­sion of pro­tec­tion ser­vices. Such recov­ery and rein­te­gra­tion shall take place in an envi­ron­ment that fos­ters the health, wel­fare, self-respect, dig­ni­ty and auton­o­my of the per­son and takes into account gen­der- and age-spe­cif­ic needs.
5. States Par­ties shall put in place effec­tive leg­is­la­tion and poli­cies, includ­ing women- and child-focused leg­is­la­tion and poli­cies, to ensure that instances of exploita­tion, vio­lence and abuse against per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are iden­ti­fied, inves­ti­gat­ed and, where appro­pri­ate, pros­e­cut­ed.

Article 17 — Protecting the integrity of the person

Every per­son with dis­abil­i­ties has a right to respect for his or her phys­i­cal and men­tal integri­ty on an equal basis with oth­ers.

Article 18 — Liberty of movement and nationality

1. States Par­ties shall rec­og­nize the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to lib­er­ty of move­ment, to free­dom to choose their res­i­dence and to a nation­al­i­ty, on an equal basis with oth­ers, includ­ing by ensur­ing that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties:
   1. Have the right to acquire and change a nation­al­i­ty and are not deprived of their nation­al­i­ty arbi­trar­i­ly or on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty;
   2. Are not deprived, on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty, of their abil­i­ty to obtain, pos­sess and uti­lize doc­u­men­ta­tion of their nation­al­i­ty or oth­er doc­u­men­ta­tion of iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, or to uti­lize rel­e­vant process­es such as immi­gra­tion pro­ceed­ings, that may be need­ed to facil­i­tate exer­cise of the right to lib­er­ty of move­ment;
   3. Are free to leave any coun­try, includ­ing their own;
   4. Are not deprived, arbi­trar­i­ly or on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty, of the right to enter their own coun­try.
2. Chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties shall be reg­is­tered imme­di­ate­ly after birth and shall have the right from birth to a name, the right to acquire a nation­al­i­ty and, as far as pos­si­ble, the right to know and be cared for by their par­ents.

Article 19 — Living independently and being included in the community

States Par­ties to this Con­ven­tion rec­og­nize the equal right of all per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to live in the com­mu­ni­ty, with choic­es equal to oth­ers, and shall take effec­tive and appro­pri­ate mea­sures to facil­i­tate full enjoy­ment by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties of this right and their full inclu­sion and par­tic­i­pa­tion in the com­mu­ni­ty, includ­ing by ensur­ing that:

1. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to choose their place of res­i­dence and where and with whom they live on an equal basis with oth­ers and are not oblig­ed to live in a par­tic­u­lar liv­ing arrange­ment;
2. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have access to a range of in-home, res­i­den­tial and oth­er com­mu­ni­ty sup­port ser­vices, includ­ing per­son­al assis­tance nec­es­sary to sup­port liv­ing and inclu­sion in the com­mu­ni­ty, and to pre­vent iso­la­tion or seg­re­ga­tion from the com­mu­ni­ty;
3. Com­mu­ni­ty ser­vices and facil­i­ties for the gen­er­al pop­u­la­tion are avail­able on an equal basis to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and are respon­sive to their needs.

Article 20 Personal mobility

States Par­ties shall take effec­tive mea­sures to ensure per­son­al mobil­i­ty with the great­est pos­si­ble inde­pen­dence for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing by:

1. Facil­i­tat­ing the per­son­al mobil­i­ty of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the man­ner and at the time of their choice, and at afford­able cost;
2. Facil­i­tat­ing access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to qual­i­ty mobil­i­ty aids, devices, assis­tive tech­nolo­gies and forms of live assis­tance and inter­me­di­aries, includ­ing by mak­ing them avail­able at afford­able cost;
3. Pro­vid­ing train­ing in mobil­i­ty skills to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and to spe­cial­ist staff work­ing with per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
4. Encour­ag­ing enti­ties that pro­duce mobil­i­ty aids, devices and assis­tive tech­nolo­gies to take into account all aspects of mobil­i­ty for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.

Article 21 — Freedom of expression and opinion, and access to information

States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties can exer­cise the right to free­dom of expres­sion and opin­ion, includ­ing the free­dom to seek, receive and impart infor­ma­tion and ideas on an equal basis with oth­ers and through all forms of com­mu­ni­ca­tion of their choice, as defined in arti­cle 2 of the present Con­ven­tion, includ­ing by:

1. Pro­vid­ing infor­ma­tion intend­ed for the gen­er­al pub­lic to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in acces­si­ble for­mats and tech­nolo­gies appro­pri­ate to dif­fer­ent kinds of dis­abil­i­ties in a time­ly man­ner and with­out addi­tion­al cost;
2. Accept­ing and facil­i­tat­ing the use of sign lan­guages, Braille, aug­men­ta­tive and alter­na­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion, and all oth­er acces­si­ble means, modes and for­mats of com­mu­ni­ca­tion of their choice by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in offi­cial inter­ac­tions;
3. Urg­ing pri­vate enti­ties that pro­vide ser­vices to the gen­er­al pub­lic, includ­ing through the Inter­net, to pro­vide infor­ma­tion and ser­vices in acces­si­ble and usable for­mats for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
4. Encour­ag­ing the mass media, includ­ing providers of infor­ma­tion through the Inter­net, to make their ser­vices acces­si­ble to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
5. Rec­og­niz­ing and pro­mot­ing the use of sign lan­guages.

Article 22 — Respect for privacy

1. No per­son with dis­abil­i­ties, regard­less of place of res­i­dence or liv­ing arrange­ments, shall be sub­ject­ed to arbi­trary or unlaw­ful inter­fer­ence with his or her pri­va­cy, fam­i­ly, or cor­re­spon­dence or oth­er types of com­mu­ni­ca­tion or to unlaw­ful attacks on his or her hon­our and rep­u­ta­tion. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have the right to the pro­tec­tion of the law against such inter­fer­ence or attacks.
2. States Par­ties shall pro­tect the pri­va­cy of per­son­al, health and reha­bil­i­ta­tion infor­ma­tion of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties on an equal basis with oth­ers.

Article 23 — Respect for home and the family

1. States Par­ties shall take effec­tive and appro­pri­ate mea­sures to elim­i­nate dis­crim­i­na­tion against per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in all mat­ters relat­ing to mar­riage, fam­i­ly, par­ent­hood and rela­tion­ships, on an equal basis with oth­ers, so as to ensure that:
   1. The right of all per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties who are of mar­riage­able age to mar­ry and to found a fam­i­ly on the basis of free and full con­sent of the intend­ing spous­es is rec­og­nized;
   2. The rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to decide freely and respon­si­bly on the num­ber and spac­ing of their chil­dren and to have access to age-appro­pri­ate infor­ma­tion, repro­duc­tive and fam­i­ly plan­ning edu­ca­tion are rec­og­nized, and the means nec­es­sary to enable them to exer­cise these rights are pro­vid­ed;
   3. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing chil­dren, retain their fer­til­i­ty on an equal basis with oth­ers.
2. States Par­ties shall ensure the rights and respon­si­bil­i­ties of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, with regard to guardian­ship, ward­ship, trustee­ship, adop­tion of chil­dren or sim­i­lar insti­tu­tions, where these con­cepts exist in nation­al leg­is­la­tion; in all cas­es the best inter­ests of the child shall be para­mount. States Par­ties shall ren­der appro­pri­ate assis­tance to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the per­for­mance of their child-rear­ing respon­si­bil­i­ties.
3. States Par­ties shall ensure that chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties have equal rights with respect to fam­i­ly life. With a view to real­iz­ing these rights, and to pre­vent con­ceal­ment, aban­don­ment, neglect and seg­re­ga­tion of chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties, States Par­ties shall under­take to pro­vide ear­ly and com­pre­hen­sive infor­ma­tion, ser­vices and sup­port to chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties and their fam­i­lies.
4. States Par­ties shall ensure that a child shall not be sep­a­rat­ed from his or her par­ents against their will, except when com­pe­tent author­i­ties sub­ject to judi­cial review deter­mine, in accor­dance with applic­a­ble law and pro­ce­dures, that such sep­a­ra­tion is nec­es­sary for the best inter­ests of the child. In no case shall a child be sep­a­rat­ed from par­ents on the basis of a dis­abil­i­ty of either the child or one or both of the par­ents.
5. States Par­ties shall, where the imme­di­ate fam­i­ly is unable to care for a child with dis­abil­i­ties, under­take every effort to pro­vide alter­na­tive care with­in the wider fam­i­ly, and fail­ing that, with­in the com­mu­ni­ty in a fam­i­ly set­ting.

Article 24 — Education

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize the right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to edu­ca­tion. With a view to real­iz­ing this right with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion and on the basis of equal oppor­tu­ni­ty, States Par­ties shall ensure an inclu­sive edu­ca­tion sys­tem at all lev­els and life long learn­ing direct­ed to:
   1. The full devel­op­ment of human poten­tial and sense of dig­ni­ty and self-worth, and the strength­en­ing of respect for human rights, fun­da­men­tal free­doms and human diver­si­ty;
   2. The devel­op­ment by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties of their per­son­al­i­ty, tal­ents and cre­ativ­i­ty, as well as their men­tal and phys­i­cal abil­i­ties, to their fullest poten­tial;
   3. Enabling per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to par­tic­i­pate effec­tive­ly in a free soci­ety.
2. In real­iz­ing this right, States Par­ties shall ensure that:
   1. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are not exclud­ed from the gen­er­al edu­ca­tion sys­tem on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty, and that chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties are not exclud­ed from free and com­pul­so­ry pri­ma­ry edu­ca­tion, or from sec­ondary edu­ca­tion, on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty;
   2. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties can access an inclu­sive, qual­i­ty and free pri­ma­ry edu­ca­tion and sec­ondary edu­ca­tion on an equal basis with oth­ers in the com­mu­ni­ties in which they live;
   3. Rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion of the indi­vid­u­al’s require­ments is pro­vid­ed;
   4. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties receive the sup­port required, with­in the gen­er­al edu­ca­tion sys­tem, to facil­i­tate their effec­tive edu­ca­tion;
   5. Effec­tive indi­vid­u­al­ized sup­port mea­sures are pro­vid­ed in envi­ron­ments that max­i­mize aca­d­e­m­ic and social devel­op­ment, con­sis­tent with the goal of full inclu­sion.
3. States Par­ties shall enable per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to learn life and social devel­op­ment skills to facil­i­tate their full and equal par­tic­i­pa­tion in edu­ca­tion and as mem­bers of the com­mu­ni­ty. To this end, States Par­ties shall take appro­pri­ate mea­sures, includ­ing:
   1. Facil­i­tat­ing the learn­ing of Braille, alter­na­tive script, aug­men­ta­tive and alter­na­tive modes, means and for­mats of com­mu­ni­ca­tion and ori­en­ta­tion and mobil­i­ty skills, and facil­i­tat­ing peer sup­port and men­tor­ing;
   2. Facil­i­tat­ing the learn­ing of sign lan­guage and the pro­mo­tion of the lin­guis­tic iden­ti­ty of the deaf com­mu­ni­ty;
   3. Ensur­ing that the edu­ca­tion of per­sons, and in par­tic­u­lar chil­dren, who are blind, deaf or deaf­blind, is deliv­ered in the most appro­pri­ate lan­guages and modes and means of com­mu­ni­ca­tion for the indi­vid­ual, and in envi­ron­ments which max­i­mize aca­d­e­m­ic and social devel­op­ment.
4. In order to help ensure the real­iza­tion of this right, States Par­ties shall take appro­pri­ate mea­sures to employ teach­ers, includ­ing teach­ers with dis­abil­i­ties, who are qual­i­fied in sign lan­guage and/or Braille, and to train pro­fes­sion­als and staff who work at all lev­els of edu­ca­tion. Such train­ing shall incor­po­rate dis­abil­i­ty aware­ness and the use of appro­pri­ate aug­men­ta­tive and alter­na­tive modes, means and for­mats of com­mu­ni­ca­tion, edu­ca­tion­al tech­niques and mate­ri­als to sup­port per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.
5. States Par­ties shall ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are able to access gen­er­al ter­tiary edu­ca­tion, voca­tion­al train­ing, adult edu­ca­tion and life­long learn­ing with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion and on an equal basis with oth­ers. To this end, States Par­ties shall ensure that rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion is pro­vid­ed to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.

Article 25 — Health

States Par­ties rec­og­nize that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have the right to the enjoy­ment of the high­est attain­able stan­dard of health with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty. States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to ensure access for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to health ser­vices that are gen­der-sen­si­tive, includ­ing health-relat­ed reha­bil­i­ta­tion. In par­tic­u­lar, States Par­ties shall:

1. Pro­vide per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties with the same range, qual­i­ty and stan­dard of free or afford­able health care and pro­grammes as pro­vid­ed to oth­er per­sons, includ­ing in the area of sex­u­al and repro­duc­tive health and pop­u­la­tion-based pub­lic health pro­grammes;
2. Pro­vide those health ser­vices need­ed by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties specif­i­cal­ly because of their dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing ear­ly iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and inter­ven­tion as appro­pri­ate, and ser­vices designed to min­i­mize and pre­vent fur­ther dis­abil­i­ties, includ­ing among chil­dren and old­er per­sons;
3. Pro­vide these health ser­vices as close as pos­si­ble to peo­ple’s own com­mu­ni­ties, includ­ing in rur­al areas;
4. Require health pro­fes­sion­als to pro­vide care of the same qual­i­ty to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties as to oth­ers, includ­ing on the basis of free and informed con­sent by, inter alia, rais­ing aware­ness of the human rights, dig­ni­ty, auton­o­my and needs of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties through train­ing and the pro­mul­ga­tion of eth­i­cal stan­dards for pub­lic and pri­vate health care;
5. Pro­hib­it dis­crim­i­na­tion against per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the pro­vi­sion of health insur­ance, and life insur­ance where such insur­ance is per­mit­ted by nation­al law, which shall be pro­vid­ed in a fair and rea­son­able man­ner;
6. Pre­vent dis­crim­i­na­to­ry denial of health care or health ser­vices or food and flu­ids on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty.

Article 26 — Habilitation and rehabilitation

1. States Par­ties shall take effec­tive and appro­pri­ate mea­sures, includ­ing through peer sup­port, to enable per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to attain and main­tain max­i­mum inde­pen­dence, full phys­i­cal, men­tal, social and voca­tion­al abil­i­ty, and full inclu­sion and par­tic­i­pa­tion in all aspects of life. To that end, States Par­ties shall orga­nize, strength­en and extend com­pre­hen­sive habil­i­ta­tion and reha­bil­i­ta­tion ser­vices and pro­grammes, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the areas of health, employ­ment, edu­ca­tion and social ser­vices, in such a way that these ser­vices and pro­grammes:
   1. Begin at the ear­li­est pos­si­ble stage, and are based on the mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary assess­ment of indi­vid­ual needs and strengths;
   2. Sup­port par­tic­i­pa­tion and inclu­sion in the com­mu­ni­ty and all aspects of soci­ety, are vol­un­tary, and are avail­able to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties as close as pos­si­ble to their own com­mu­ni­ties, includ­ing in rur­al areas.
2. States Par­ties shall pro­mote the devel­op­ment of ini­tial and con­tin­u­ing train­ing for pro­fes­sion­als and staff work­ing in habil­i­ta­tion and reha­bil­i­ta­tion ser­vices.
3. States Par­ties shall pro­mote the avail­abil­i­ty, knowl­edge and use of assis­tive devices and tech­nolo­gies, designed for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, as they relate to habil­i­ta­tion and reha­bil­i­ta­tion.

Article 27 — Work and employment

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize the right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to work, on an equal basis with oth­ers; this includes the right to the oppor­tu­ni­ty to gain a liv­ing by work freely cho­sen or accept­ed in a labour mar­ket and work envi­ron­ment that is open, inclu­sive and acces­si­ble to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties. States Par­ties shall safe­guard and pro­mote the real­iza­tion of the right to work, includ­ing for those who acquire a dis­abil­i­ty dur­ing the course of employ­ment, by tak­ing appro­pri­ate steps, includ­ing through leg­is­la­tion, to, inter alia:
   1. Pro­hib­it dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty with regard to all mat­ters con­cern­ing all forms of employ­ment, includ­ing con­di­tions of recruit­ment, hir­ing and employ­ment, con­tin­u­ance of employ­ment, career advance­ment and safe and healthy work­ing con­di­tions;
   2. Pro­tect the rights of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, on an equal basis with oth­ers, to just and favourable con­di­tions of work, includ­ing equal oppor­tu­ni­ties and equal remu­ner­a­tion for work of equal val­ue, safe and healthy work­ing con­di­tions, includ­ing pro­tec­tion from harass­ment, and the redress of griev­ances;
   3. Ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are able to exer­cise their labour and trade union rights on an equal basis with oth­ers;
   4. Enable per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to have effec­tive access to gen­er­al tech­ni­cal and voca­tion­al guid­ance pro­grammes, place­ment ser­vices and voca­tion­al and con­tin­u­ing train­ing;
   5. Pro­mote employ­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties and career advance­ment for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the labour mar­ket, as well as assis­tance in find­ing, obtain­ing, main­tain­ing and return­ing to employ­ment;
   6. Pro­mote oppor­tu­ni­ties for self-employ­ment, entre­pre­neur­ship, the devel­op­ment of coop­er­a­tives and start­ing one’s own busi­ness;
   7. Employ per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the pub­lic sec­tor;
   8. Pro­mote the employ­ment of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the pri­vate sec­tor through appro­pri­ate poli­cies and mea­sures, which may include affir­ma­tive action pro­grammes, incen­tives and oth­er mea­sures;
   9. Ensure that rea­son­able accom­mo­da­tion is pro­vid­ed to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in the work­place;
   10. Pro­mote the acqui­si­tion by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties of work expe­ri­ence in the open labour mar­ket;
   11. Pro­mote voca­tion­al and pro­fes­sion­al reha­bil­i­ta­tion, job reten­tion and return-to-work pro­grammes for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties.
2. States Par­ties shall ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties are not held in slav­ery or in servi­tude, and are pro­tect­ed, on an equal basis with oth­ers, from forced or com­pul­so­ry labour.

Article 28 — Adequate standard of living and social protection

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize the right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to an ade­quate stan­dard of liv­ing for them­selves and their fam­i­lies, includ­ing ade­quate food, cloth­ing and hous­ing, and to the con­tin­u­ous improve­ment of liv­ing con­di­tions, and shall take appro­pri­ate steps to safe­guard and pro­mote the real­iza­tion of this right with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty.
2. States Par­ties rec­og­nize the right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to social pro­tec­tion and to the enjoy­ment of that right with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion on the basis of dis­abil­i­ty, and shall take appro­pri­ate steps to safe­guard and pro­mote the real­iza­tion of this right, includ­ing mea­sures:
   1. To ensure equal access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to clean water ser­vices, and to ensure access to appro­pri­ate and afford­able ser­vices, devices and oth­er assis­tance for dis­abil­i­ty-relat­ed needs;
   2. To ensure access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, in par­tic­u­lar women and girls with dis­abil­i­ties and old­er per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, to social pro­tec­tion pro­grammes and pover­ty reduc­tion pro­grammes;
   3. To ensure access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and their fam­i­lies liv­ing in sit­u­a­tions of pover­ty to assis­tance from the State with dis­abil­i­ty-relat­ed expens­es, includ­ing ade­quate train­ing, coun­selling, finan­cial assis­tance and respite care;
   4. To ensure access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to pub­lic hous­ing pro­grammes;
   5. To ensure equal access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to retire­ment ben­e­fits and pro­grammes.

Article 29 — Participation in political and public life

States Par­ties shall guar­an­tee to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties polit­i­cal rights and the oppor­tu­ni­ty to enjoy them on an equal basis with oth­ers, and shall under­take to:

1. Ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties can effec­tive­ly and ful­ly par­tic­i­pate in polit­i­cal and pub­lic life on an equal basis with oth­ers, direct­ly or through freely cho­sen rep­re­sen­ta­tives, includ­ing the right and oppor­tu­ni­ty for per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to vote and be elect­ed, inter alia, by:
   1. Ensur­ing that vot­ing pro­ce­dures, facil­i­ties and mate­ri­als are appro­pri­ate, acces­si­ble and easy to under­stand and use;
   2. Pro­tect­ing the right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to vote by secret bal­lot in elec­tions and pub­lic ref­er­en­dums with­out intim­i­da­tion, and to stand for elec­tions, to effec­tive­ly hold office and per­form all pub­lic func­tions at all lev­els of gov­ern­ment, facil­i­tat­ing the use of assis­tive and new tech­nolo­gies where appro­pri­ate;
   3. Guar­an­tee­ing the free expres­sion of the will of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties as elec­tors and to this end, where nec­es­sary, at their request, allow­ing assis­tance in vot­ing by a per­son of their own choice;
2. Pro­mote active­ly an envi­ron­ment in which per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties can effec­tive­ly and ful­ly par­tic­i­pate in the con­duct of pub­lic affairs, with­out dis­crim­i­na­tion and on an equal basis with oth­ers, and encour­age their par­tic­i­pa­tion in pub­lic affairs, includ­ing:
   1. Par­tic­i­pa­tion in non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions and asso­ci­a­tions con­cerned with the pub­lic and polit­i­cal life of the coun­try, and in the activ­i­ties and admin­is­tra­tion of polit­i­cal par­ties;
   2. Form­ing and join­ing orga­ni­za­tions of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to rep­re­sent per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties at inter­na­tion­al, nation­al, region­al and local lev­els.

Article 30 — Participation in cultural life, recreation, leisure and sport

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize the right of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to take part on an equal basis with oth­ers in cul­tur­al life, and shall take all appro­pri­ate mea­sures to ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties:
   1. Enjoy access to cul­tur­al mate­ri­als in acces­si­ble for­mats;
   2. Enjoy access to tele­vi­sion pro­grammes, films, the­atre and oth­er cul­tur­al activ­i­ties, in acces­si­ble for­mats;
   3. Enjoy access to places for cul­tur­al per­for­mances or ser­vices, such as the­atres, muse­ums, cin­e­mas, libraries and tourism ser­vices, and, as far as pos­si­ble, enjoy access to mon­u­ments and sites of nation­al cul­tur­al impor­tance.
2. States Par­ties shall take appro­pri­ate mea­sures to enable per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to devel­op and uti­lize their cre­ative, artis­tic and intel­lec­tu­al poten­tial, not only for their own ben­e­fit, but also for the enrich­ment of soci­ety.
3. States Par­ties shall take all appro­pri­ate steps, in accor­dance with inter­na­tion­al law, to ensure that laws pro­tect­ing intel­lec­tu­al prop­er­ty rights do not con­sti­tute an unrea­son­able or dis­crim­i­na­to­ry bar­ri­er to access by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to cul­tur­al mate­ri­als.
4. Per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties shall be enti­tled, on an equal basis with oth­ers, to recog­ni­tion and sup­port of their spe­cif­ic cul­tur­al and lin­guis­tic iden­ti­ty, includ­ing sign lan­guages and deaf cul­ture.
5. With a view to enabling per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties to par­tic­i­pate on an equal basis with oth­ers in recre­ation­al, leisure and sport­ing activ­i­ties, States Par­ties shall take appro­pri­ate mea­sures:
   1. To encour­age and pro­mote the par­tic­i­pa­tion, to the fullest extent pos­si­ble, of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in main­stream sport­ing activ­i­ties at all lev­els;
   2. To ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have an oppor­tu­ni­ty to orga­nize, devel­op and par­tic­i­pate in dis­abil­i­ty-spe­cif­ic sport­ing and recre­ation­al activ­i­ties and, to this end, encour­age the pro­vi­sion, on an equal basis with oth­ers, of appro­pri­ate instruc­tion, train­ing and resources;
   3. To ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have access to sport­ing, recre­ation­al and tourism venues;
   4. To ensure that chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties have equal access with oth­er chil­dren to par­tic­i­pa­tion in play, recre­ation and leisure and sport­ing activ­i­ties, includ­ing those activ­i­ties in the school sys­tem;
   5. To ensure that per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties have access to ser­vices from those involved in the orga­ni­za­tion of recre­ation­al, tourism, leisure and sport­ing activ­i­ties.

Article 31 — Statistics and data collection

1. States Par­ties under­take to col­lect appro­pri­ate infor­ma­tion, includ­ing sta­tis­ti­cal and research data, to enable them to for­mu­late and imple­ment poli­cies to give effect to the present Con­ven­tion. The process of col­lect­ing and main­tain­ing this infor­ma­tion shall:
   1. Com­ply with legal­ly estab­lished safe­guards, includ­ing leg­is­la­tion on data pro­tec­tion, to ensure con­fi­den­tial­i­ty and respect for the pri­va­cy of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   2. Com­ply with inter­na­tion­al­ly accept­ed norms to pro­tect human rights and fun­da­men­tal free­doms and eth­i­cal prin­ci­ples in the col­lec­tion and use of sta­tis­tics.
2. The infor­ma­tion col­lect­ed in accor­dance with this arti­cle shall be dis­ag­gre­gat­ed, as appro­pri­ate, and used to help assess the imple­men­ta­tion of States Par­ties’ oblig­a­tions under the present Con­ven­tion and to iden­ti­fy and address the bar­ri­ers faced by per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties in exer­cis­ing their rights.
3. States Par­ties shall assume respon­si­bil­i­ty for the dis­sem­i­na­tion of these sta­tis­tics and ensure their acces­si­bil­i­ty to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and oth­ers.

Article 32 — International cooperation

1. States Par­ties rec­og­nize the impor­tance of inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion and its pro­mo­tion, in sup­port of nation­al efforts for the real­iza­tion of the pur­pose and objec­tives of the present Con­ven­tion, and will under­take appro­pri­ate and effec­tive mea­sures in this regard, between and among States and, as appro­pri­ate, in part­ner­ship with rel­e­vant inter­na­tion­al and region­al orga­ni­za­tions and civ­il soci­ety, in par­tic­u­lar orga­ni­za­tions of per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties. Such mea­sures could include, inter alia:
   1. Ensur­ing that inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion, includ­ing inter­na­tion­al devel­op­ment pro­grammes, is inclu­sive of and acces­si­ble to per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties;
   2. Facil­i­tat­ing and sup­port­ing capac­i­ty-build­ing, includ­ing through the exchange and shar­ing of infor­ma­tion, expe­ri­ences, train­ing pro­grammes and best prac­tices;
   3. Facil­i­tat­ing coop­er­a­tion in research and access to sci­en­tif­ic and tech­ni­cal knowl­edge;
   4. Pro­vid­ing, as appro­pri­ate, tech­ni­cal and eco­nom­ic assis­tance, includ­ing by facil­i­tat­ing access to and shar­ing of acces­si­ble and assis­tive tech­nolo­gies, and through the trans­fer of tech­nolo­gies.
2. The pro­vi­sions of this arti­cle are with­out prej­u­dice to the oblig­a­tions of each State Par­ty to ful­fil its oblig­a­tions under the present Con­ven­tion.

Article 33 — National implementation and monitoring

1. States Par­ties, in accor­dance with their sys­tem of orga­ni­za­tion, shall des­ig­nate one or more focal points with­in gov­ern­ment for mat­ters relat­ing to the imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion, and shall give due con­sid­er­a­tion to the estab­lish­ment or des­ig­na­tion of a coor­di­na­tion mech­a­nism with­in gov­ern­ment to facil­i­tate relat­ed action in dif­fer­ent sec­tors and at dif­fer­ent lev­els.
2. States Par­ties shall, in accor­dance with their legal and admin­is­tra­tive sys­tems, main­tain, strength­en, des­ig­nate or estab­lish with­in the State Par­ty, a frame­work, includ­ing one or more inde­pen­dent mech­a­nisms, as appro­pri­ate, to pro­mote, pro­tect and mon­i­tor imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion. When des­ig­nat­ing or estab­lish­ing such a mech­a­nism, States Par­ties shall take into account the prin­ci­ples relat­ing to the sta­tus and func­tion­ing of nation­al insti­tu­tions for pro­tec­tion and pro­mo­tion of human rights.
3. Civ­il soci­ety, in par­tic­u­lar per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties and their rep­re­sen­ta­tive orga­ni­za­tions, shall be involved and par­tic­i­pate ful­ly in the mon­i­tor­ing process.

Article 34 — Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

1. There shall be estab­lished a Com­mit­tee on the Rights of Per­sons with Dis­abil­i­ties (here­after referred to as “the Com­mit­tee”), which shall car­ry out the func­tions here­inafter pro­vid­ed.
2. The Com­mit­tee shall con­sist, at the time of entry into force of the present Con­ven­tion, of twelve experts. After an addi­tion­al six­ty rat­i­fi­ca­tions or acces­sions to the Con­ven­tion, the mem­ber­ship of the Com­mit­tee shall increase by six mem­bers, attain­ing a max­i­mum num­ber of eigh­teen mem­bers.
3. The mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee shall serve in their per­son­al capac­i­ty and shall be of high moral stand­ing and rec­og­nized com­pe­tence and expe­ri­ence in the field cov­ered by the present Con­ven­tion. When nom­i­nat­ing their can­di­dates, States Par­ties are invit­ed to give due con­sid­er­a­tion to the pro­vi­sion set out in arti­cle 4.3 of the present Con­ven­tion.
4. The mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee shall be elect­ed by States Par­ties, con­sid­er­a­tion being giv­en to equi­table geo­graph­i­cal dis­tri­b­u­tion, rep­re­sen­ta­tion of the dif­fer­ent forms of civ­i­liza­tion and of the prin­ci­pal legal sys­tems, bal­anced gen­der rep­re­sen­ta­tion and par­tic­i­pa­tion of experts with dis­abil­i­ties.
5. The mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee shall be elect­ed by secret bal­lot from a list of per­sons nom­i­nat­ed by the States Par­ties from among their nation­als at meet­ings of the Con­fer­ence of States Par­ties. At those meet­ings, for which two thirds of States Par­ties shall con­sti­tute a quo­rum, the per­sons elect­ed to the Com­mit­tee shall be those who obtain the largest num­ber of votes and an absolute major­i­ty of the votes of the rep­re­sen­ta­tives of States Par­ties present and vot­ing.
6. The ini­tial elec­tion shall be held no lat­er than six months after the date of entry into force of the present Con­ven­tion. At least four months before the date of each elec­tion, the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations shall address a let­ter to the States Par­ties invit­ing them to sub­mit the nom­i­na­tions with­in two months. The Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al shall sub­se­quent­ly pre­pare a list in alpha­bet­i­cal order of all per­sons thus nom­i­nat­ed, indi­cat­ing the State Par­ties which have nom­i­nat­ed them, and shall sub­mit it to the States Par­ties to the present Con­ven­tion.
7. The mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee shall be elect­ed for a term of four years. They shall be eli­gi­ble for re-elec­tion once. How­ev­er, the term of six of the mem­bers elect­ed at the first elec­tion shall expire at the end of two years; imme­di­ate­ly after the first elec­tion, the names of these six mem­bers shall be cho­sen by lot by the chair­per­son of the meet­ing referred to in para­graph 5 of this arti­cle.
8. The elec­tion of the six addi­tion­al mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee shall be held on the occa­sion of reg­u­lar elec­tions, in accor­dance with the rel­e­vant pro­vi­sions of this arti­cle.
9. If a mem­ber of the Com­mit­tee dies or resigns or declares that for any oth­er cause she or he can no longer per­form her or his duties, the State Par­ty which nom­i­nat­ed the mem­ber shall appoint anoth­er expert pos­sess­ing the qual­i­fi­ca­tions and meet­ing the require­ments set out in the rel­e­vant pro­vi­sions of this arti­cle, to serve for the remain­der of the term.
10. The Com­mit­tee shall estab­lish its own rules of pro­ce­dure.
11. The Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations shall pro­vide the nec­es­sary staff and facil­i­ties for the effec­tive per­for­mance of the func­tions of the Com­mit­tee under the present Con­ven­tion, and shall con­vene its ini­tial meet­ing.
12. With the approval of the Gen­er­al Assem­bly, the mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee estab­lished under the present Con­ven­tion shall receive emol­u­ments from Unit­ed Nations resources on such terms and con­di­tions as the Assem­bly may decide, hav­ing regard to the impor­tance of the Com­mit­tee’s respon­si­bil­i­ties.
13. The mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee shall be enti­tled to the facil­i­ties, priv­i­leges and immu­ni­ties of experts on mis­sion for the Unit­ed Nations as laid down in the rel­e­vant sec­tions of the Con­ven­tion on the Priv­i­leges and Immu­ni­ties of the Unit­ed Nations.

Article 35 — Reports by States Parties

1. Each State Par­ty shall sub­mit to the Com­mit­tee, through the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations, a com­pre­hen­sive report on mea­sures tak­en to give effect to its oblig­a­tions under the present Con­ven­tion and on the progress made in that regard, with­in two years after the entry into force of the present Con­ven­tion for the State Par­ty con­cerned.
2. There­after, States Par­ties shall sub­mit sub­se­quent reports at least every four years and fur­ther when­ev­er the Com­mit­tee so requests.
3. The Com­mit­tee shall decide any guide­lines applic­a­ble to the con­tent of the reports.
4. A State Par­ty which has sub­mit­ted a com­pre­hen­sive ini­tial report to the Com­mit­tee need not, in its sub­se­quent reports, repeat infor­ma­tion pre­vi­ous­ly pro­vid­ed. When prepar­ing reports to the Com­mit­tee, States Par­ties are invit­ed to con­sid­er doing so in an open and trans­par­ent process and to give due con­sid­er­a­tion to the pro­vi­sion set out in arti­cle 4.3 of the present Con­ven­tion.
5. Reports may indi­cate fac­tors and dif­fi­cul­ties affect­ing the degree of ful­fil­ment of oblig­a­tions under the present Con­ven­tion.

Article 36 — Consideration of reports

1. Each report shall be con­sid­ered by the Com­mit­tee, which shall make such sug­ges­tions and gen­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions on the report as it may con­sid­er appro­pri­ate and shall for­ward these to the State Par­ty con­cerned. The State Par­ty may respond with any infor­ma­tion it choos­es to the Com­mit­tee. The Com­mit­tee may request fur­ther infor­ma­tion from States Par­ties rel­e­vant to the imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion.
2. If a State Par­ty is sig­nif­i­cant­ly over­due in the sub­mis­sion of a report, the Com­mit­tee may noti­fy the State Par­ty con­cerned of the need to exam­ine the imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion in that State Par­ty, on the basis of reli­able infor­ma­tion avail­able to the Com­mit­tee, if the rel­e­vant report is not sub­mit­ted with­in three months fol­low­ing the noti­fi­ca­tion. The Com­mit­tee shall invite the State Par­ty con­cerned to par­tic­i­pate in such exam­i­na­tion. Should the State Par­ty respond by sub­mit­ting the rel­e­vant report, the pro­vi­sions of para­graph 1 of this arti­cle will apply.
3. The Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations shall make avail­able the reports to all States Par­ties.
4. States Par­ties shall make their reports wide­ly avail­able to the pub­lic in their own coun­tries and facil­i­tate access to the sug­ges­tions and gen­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions relat­ing to these reports.
5. The Com­mit­tee shall trans­mit, as it may con­sid­er appro­pri­ate, to the spe­cial­ized agen­cies, funds and pro­grammes of the Unit­ed Nations, and oth­er com­pe­tent bod­ies, reports from States Par­ties in order to address a request or indi­ca­tion of a need for tech­ni­cal advice or assis­tance con­tained there­in, along with the Com­mit­tee’s obser­va­tions and rec­om­men­da­tions, if any, on these requests or indi­ca­tions.

Article 37 — Cooperation between States Parties and the Committee

1. Each State Par­ty shall coop­er­ate with the Com­mit­tee and assist its mem­bers in the ful­fil­ment of their man­date.
2. In its rela­tion­ship with States Par­ties, the Com­mit­tee shall give due con­sid­er­a­tion to ways and means of enhanc­ing nation­al capac­i­ties for the imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion, includ­ing through inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion.

Article 38 — Relationship of the Committee with other bodies

In order to fos­ter the effec­tive imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion and to encour­age inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion in the field cov­ered by the present Con­ven­tion:

1. The spe­cial­ized agen­cies and oth­er Unit­ed Nations organs shall be enti­tled to be rep­re­sent­ed at the con­sid­er­a­tion of the imple­men­ta­tion of such pro­vi­sions of the present Con­ven­tion as fall with­in the scope of their man­date. The Com­mit­tee may invite the spe­cial­ized agen­cies and oth­er com­pe­tent bod­ies as it may con­sid­er appro­pri­ate to pro­vide expert advice on the imple­men­ta­tion of the Con­ven­tion in areas falling with­in the scope of their respec­tive man­dates. The Com­mit­tee may invite spe­cial­ized agen­cies and oth­er Unit­ed Nations organs to sub­mit reports on the imple­men­ta­tion of the Con­ven­tion in areas falling with­in the scope of their activ­i­ties;
2. The Com­mit­tee, as it dis­charges its man­date, shall con­sult, as appro­pri­ate, oth­er rel­e­vant bod­ies insti­tut­ed by inter­na­tion­al human rights treaties, with a view to ensur­ing the con­sis­ten­cy of their respec­tive report­ing guide­lines, sug­ges­tions and gen­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions, and avoid­ing dupli­ca­tion and over­lap in the per­for­mance of their func­tions.

Article 39 — Report of the Committee

The Com­mit­tee shall report every two years to the Gen­er­al Assem­bly and to the Eco­nom­ic and Social Coun­cil on its activ­i­ties, and may make sug­ges­tions and gen­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions based on the exam­i­na­tion of reports and infor­ma­tion received from the States Par­ties. Such sug­ges­tions and gen­er­al rec­om­men­da­tions shall be includ­ed in the report of the Com­mit­tee togeth­er with com­ments, if any, from States Par­ties.

Article 40 — Conference of States Parties

1. The States Par­ties shall meet reg­u­lar­ly in a Con­fer­ence of States Par­ties in order to con­sid­er any mat­ter with regard to the imple­men­ta­tion of the present Con­ven­tion.
2. No lat­er than six months after the entry into force of the present Con­ven­tion, the Con­fer­ence of the States Par­ties shall be con­vened by the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations. The sub­se­quent meet­ings shall be con­vened by the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations bien­ni­al­ly or upon the deci­sion of the Con­fer­ence of States Par­ties.

Article 41 — Depositary

The Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations shall be the deposi­tary of the present Con­ven­tion.

Article 42 — Signature

The present Con­ven­tion shall be open for sig­na­ture by all States and by region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tions at Unit­ed Nations Head­quar­ters in New York as of 30 March 2007.

Article 43 — Consent to be bound

The present Con­ven­tion shall be sub­ject to rat­i­fi­ca­tion by sig­na­to­ry States and to for­mal con­fir­ma­tion by sig­na­to­ry region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tions. It shall be open for acces­sion by any State or region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tion which has not signed the Con­ven­tion.

Article 44 — Regional integration organizations

1. “Region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tion” shall mean an orga­ni­za­tion con­sti­tut­ed by sov­er­eign States of a giv­en region, to which its mem­ber States have trans­ferred com­pe­tence in respect of mat­ters gov­erned by this Con­ven­tion. Such orga­ni­za­tions shall declare, in their instru­ments of for­mal con­fir­ma­tion or acces­sion, the extent of their com­pe­tence with respect to mat­ters gov­erned by this Con­ven­tion. Sub­se­quent­ly, they shall inform the deposi­tary of any sub­stan­tial mod­i­fi­ca­tion in the extent of their com­pe­tence.
2. Ref­er­ences to “States Par­ties” in the present Con­ven­tion shall apply to such orga­ni­za­tions with­in the lim­its of their com­pe­tence.
3. 3. For the pur­pos­es of arti­cle 45, para­graph 1, and arti­cle 47, para­graphs 2 and 3, any instru­ment deposit­ed by a region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tion shall not be count­ed.
4. Region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tions, in mat­ters with­in their com­pe­tence, may exer­cise their right to vote in the Con­fer­ence of States Par­ties, with a num­ber of votes equal to the num­ber of their mem­ber States that are Par­ties to this Con­ven­tion. Such an orga­ni­za­tion shall not exer­cise its right to vote if any of its mem­ber States exer­cis­es its right, and vice ver­sa.

Article 45 — Entry into force

1. The present Con­ven­tion shall enter into force on the thir­ti­eth day after the deposit of the twen­ti­eth instru­ment of rat­i­fi­ca­tion or acces­sion.
2. For each State or region­al inte­gra­tion orga­ni­za­tion rat­i­fy­ing, for­mal­ly con­firm­ing or acced­ing to the Con­ven­tion after the deposit of the twen­ti­eth such instru­ment, the Con­ven­tion shall enter into force on the thir­ti­eth day after the deposit of its own such instru­ment.

Article 46 — Reservations

1. Reser­va­tions incom­pat­i­ble with the object and pur­pose of the present Con­ven­tion shall not be per­mit­ted.
2. Reser­va­tions may be with­drawn at any time.

Article 47 — Amendments

1. Any State Par­ty may pro­pose an amend­ment to the present Con­ven­tion and sub­mit it to the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations. The Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al shall com­mu­ni­cate any pro­posed amend­ments to States Par­ties, with a request to be noti­fied whether they favour a con­fer­ence of States Par­ties for the pur­pose of con­sid­er­ing and decid­ing upon the pro­pos­als. In the event that, with­in four months from the date of such com­mu­ni­ca­tion, at least one third of the States Par­ties favour such a con­fer­ence, the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al shall con­vene the con­fer­ence under the aus­pices of the Unit­ed Nations. Any amend­ment adopt­ed by a major­i­ty of two thirds of the States Par­ties present and vot­ing shall be sub­mit­ted by the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al to the Gen­er­al Assem­bly for approval and there­after to all States Par­ties for accep­tance.
2. An amend­ment adopt­ed and approved in accor­dance with para­graph 1 of this arti­cle shall enter into force on the thir­ti­eth day after the num­ber of instru­ments of accep­tance deposit­ed reach­es two thirds of the num­ber of States Par­ties at the date of adop­tion of the amend­ment. There­after, the amend­ment shall enter into force for any State Par­ty on the thir­ti­eth day fol­low­ing the deposit of its own instru­ment of accep­tance. An amend­ment shall be bind­ing only on those States Par­ties which have accept­ed it.
3. If so decid­ed by the Con­fer­ence of States Par­ties by con­sen­sus, an amend­ment adopt­ed and approved in accor­dance with para­graph 1 of this arti­cle which relates exclu­sive­ly to arti­cles 34, 38, 39 and 40 shall enter into force for all States Par­ties on the thir­ti­eth day after the num­ber of instru­ments of accep­tance deposit­ed reach­es two thirds of the num­ber of States Par­ties at the date of adop­tion of the amend­ment.

Article 48 — Denunciation

A State Par­ty may denounce the present Con­ven­tion by writ­ten noti­fi­ca­tion to the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Unit­ed Nations. The denun­ci­a­tion shall become effec­tive one year after the date of receipt of the noti­fi­ca­tion by the Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al.

Article 49 — Accessible format

The text of the present Con­ven­tion shall be made avail­able in acces­si­ble for­mats.

Article 50 — Authentic texts

The Ara­bic, Chi­nese, Eng­lish, French, Russ­ian and Span­ish texts of the present Con­ven­tion shall be equal­ly authen­tic.

In wit­ness there­of the under­signed plenipo­ten­tiaries, being duly autho­rized there­to by their respec­tive Gov­ern­ments, have signed the present Con­ven­tion.