GSP Plus status: Provinces asked to implement UN conventions

Ministry asks them to form law cells, mandated to prepare required reports for the federation. PHOTO: FILE

ISLAMABAD: 

As implementation of 27 UN conventions on fundamental human and labour rights depends on the will of the provinces, the federal government’s role has been reduced at best to a mere coordinator in making duty free access to Europe successful.

In view of that, the government has written to the provinces for implementation of the subject conventions, the Ministry of Law, Justice and Human Rights told the lower house in reply to a question.

“The provincial governments have been requested to establish legal cells in the respective provinces mandated to prepare required reports for the federation,” the ministry said in its reply, adding that such a cell had been established by the government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Both the 21st and 22nd periodic reports have been overdue since January 2012.

After 18th Amendment in the Constitution and under the Rule 49 (3) of the Rules of Business 1973, the implementation of international agreements is the responsibility of the provincial governments.

The European Union (EU) granted the GSP Plus status to Pakistan on December 13 last year. The benefit of zero rate duty will be applicable to Pakistani products entering in the EU on or after January 1, 2014. The increase in textiles and clothing exports can be expected to be around 38%.

As per the foreign office, the conditionality for the GSP Plus status related to human rights conventions under which a country must commit to ratify and effectively implement 27 international conventions. Broadly, these conventions are related to the governance, human rights, labour standards, sustainable development and climate change. Pakistan has ratified all these mandatory conventions.

As per the requirement of the duty free access status, Pakistan has also accepted the monitoring and conventions reporting requirements without reservations.

Out of these 27, seven conventions are related to human rights. These include Convention on Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and International Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (ICRD) — rectified on September 21, 1966.

While six conventions have been assigned to the ministry’s human rights wing. The human rights ministry was devolved to the provinces after the 18th Amendment.

The six conventions that come under law ministry’s human rights wing are Convention on the Rights of Child (CRC), The Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), The International Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), The International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and Convention Against Torture and other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment of Punishment.