COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD REVIEWS REPORT OF KAZAKHSTAN

CRC
33rd session
4 June 2003




The Committee on the Rights of the Child today considered the initial report of Kazakhstan on how that country is implementing the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Schamscha Berkimbaeva, Minister of Education of Kazakhstan and head of the delegation, said that in recent years, the young sovereign State of Kazakhstan had done a great deal for child rights, creating a national legislative basis for the protection of children, signing a basic agreement with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and integrating the concepts of the rights of the child into various legal documents and into the plan of work of various organizations and programmes.
Recently in Kazakhstan a lot of positive changes had taken place, Ms. Berkimbaeva said. The economy was developing sufficiently for the budget to be directed towards social needs. However, many problems still remained to be dealt with. Every effort would be made to ensure that the children of Kazakhstan in the new millennium would be healthy, happy, and educated.
Committee Experts questioned the delegation, asking, among other things, how Kazakhstan's international commitments had been formulated and implemented at the national level; why the Hague Convention on Adoption had not been ratified; the right of the child to be heard; why there were so many institutionalized children in the country, and why these institutions were not assessed; social, vocational and medical support for disabled children and how had these children participated in drafting and adopting the current report; and the percentage given for education in the national budget and whether this had been reduced, and therefore how was the quality of education assured.
In preliminary concluding remarks, the Committee Expert and Chairman who served as Rapporteur on the report of Kazakhstan, Jacob Egbert Doek, commended the determination of the Government to create a National Plan of Action with a comprehensive strategy. He hoped that the already visible improvement would continue, and that the resources would be available to do all that was planned.
The delegation of Kazakhstan also included Nourlan Danenov, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Kazakhstan to the United Nations Office at Geneva; Bolat Baikadamov, Ombudsman for Human Rights of Kazakhstan; S. Iskakova, Head of the Secretariat of the National Commission for the President of Kazakhstan for Family and Women’s Affairs; Arkin Akhmetov, Minister-Counsellor of the Mission of Kazakhstan; B. Khairullin, Head of the Office for the Protection of the Health of the Mother and the Child of the Ministry of Health; Zaida Nourabaeva, Head of the Office of Civil Affairs of the Ministry of Justice; Mounira Artybekova, First Secretary of the Mission of Kazakhstan; and Janara Juljanova, Attaché to the United Nations Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The Committee will issue its final recommendations on the report of Kazakhstan towards the end of its session which concludes on 6 June. The Committee will reconvene on that date at 10 a.m. to issue its conclusions on the country reports reviewed in the past three weeks and to conclude the session.

Initial Report of Kazakhstan
The initial report of Kazakhstan (CRC/C/41/Add.13) reviews general measures of implementation of the Convention, the definition of the child, general principles of the Convention, civil rights and freedoms, family environment and alternative care, basic health and welfare, education, leisure and cultural activities, and special protection measures taken in the country.
In accordance with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, legislative, administrative and other measures are being adopted in Kazakhstan for the implementation of the norms recognized in the Convention. One of the four main lines of State policy is to improve the health of women and their families. An Outline of a State Population Policy has been drawn up, and a Programme and Plan of Action for its implementation is being prepared, which will include a programme to stimulate the birth rate and a number of other measures aimed at improving the demographic situation in the country, as well as implementing the provisions set out in the Convention.
Under the Convention, every child in Kazakhstan has an inalienable right to life, and the State ensures the survival and healthy development of the child to the maximum possible extent. Further, the Constitution defends the fundamental rights and freedoms which all individuals enjoy from birth, and freedom of thought and expression is guaranteed to all, as stipulated in the Convention.

Presentation of Report
SCHAMSCHA BERKIMBAEVA, Minister of Education of Kazakhstan and head of the delegation, introducing the report, said the Republic of Kazakhstan was deeply respectful of the principles and requirements contained in the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocols. The international standards regarding the protection of the rights of the child were an integral part of the conception of the duties of the State of Kazakhstan.
In recent years, the young sovereign State of Kazakhstan had done a great deal for child rights, creating a national legislative basis for the protection of children, signing a basic agreement with UNICEF, and integrating the concepts of the rights of the child into various legal documents and into the plan of work of various organizations and programmes. Health protection in Kazakhstan was one of the main aims; mother and health care made up 10 per cent of the overall budget, and there was a steady decrease in the rate of child mortality as a result.
Recently in Kazakhstan a lot of positive changes had taken place. Kazakhstan had been recognized by various international bodies as having a market economy and political stability, and the economy was developing sufficiently for the budget to be directed towards social needs. However, many problems still remained to be dealt with. The forthcoming discussion should make it possible to present these and the positive events more clearly, and the suggestions to be made by the Committee would help to resolve these issues. Children were the future of the country and the planet, and those present at the Committee, both delegation members and Experts, were responsible for them. Every effort would be made to ensure that the children of Kazakhstan in the new millennium would be healthy, happy, and educated.

Questions on General Measures of Implementation; Definition of the Child
JACOB EGBERT DOEK, the Committee Expert and Chairperson who served as the Rapporteur on the report of Kazakhstan, said Kazakhstan was a country that had experienced one of the greatest changes among the transition economies since its independence. The 1990s had seen a collapse in living standards, mainly due to mass wage arrears. Revenues had started to increase only since 1997. Fast economic growth had improved the living standards, and a broader section of society was enjoying this improvement. However, education and health services had been affected by the downturn and lack of resources. It went without saying that life for the children of Kazakhstan was far from easy. The future was unclear, work prospects uncertain, and a University education no longer a guarantee of a job. Poverty was increasing, and in short Kazakhstan was a country facing many and complex difficulties. Despite this, the country had tried to implement the Convention, and its achievements in that regard were significant and impressive; these would be mentioned and welcomed during the course of the discussion, and suggestions would be made for addressing some of the problems.
Other Committee Experts asked questions on various topics, including the power of the Women’s and Families Committee, and whether its work was not duplicated by the Committee on Children’s Affairs; how Kazakhstan's international commitments had been formulated and implemented at the national level; issues related to the collection and analysis of statistics; the role of NGOs in decision-making processes concerning children; why more legislation had not been adopted to implement the Constitution nationally; why the Hague Convention on Adoption had not been ratified as many adoptions took place in Kazakhstan; whether NGOs had been involved in drafting the report; how much national education on the rights of the child took place; what machinery existed for implementation of the Convention, and how powerful it was; and how specific information about children was collected.

Response to Questions on General Measures of Implementation; Definition of the Child
Responding to the questions, the delegation thanked the Committee for taking such an interest in the affairs of the children of Kazakhstan. All questions and issues would be analysed and taken into account in the formulation of programmes and standards. With regard to the dissemination of the Convention, this was a very serious issue, and special literature was disseminated to the children, parents and teachers of Kazakhstan on this topic.
When legislation on the rights of the child had been prepared, NGOs had been involved, including those specializing in children and families. When any legislation was discussed, NGOs were directly involved.
Despite the difficulties of transition, there were specific programmes for the Children of the Future, as they were termed in Kazakhstan. Education was a specific problem. There were many programmes for children and families, including ones on building schools in rural areas and schools for gifted children. Priority was given to the rights of the child, even though the budget did not have a specific credit line for this purpose, instead it was included under many programmes. There was however a specific budget item for invalid children and disadvantaged children.
The delegation then spoke of the status of the Ombudsman on Human Rights in Kazakhstan and of various other human rights establishments. The Ombudsman was appointed by the President with the mandatory participation of two parliamentary committees, one from the Upper and one from the Lower House, and this was also the case for the removal of an Ombudsman. He was therefore politically independent from the Presidency. Among his duties, the Ombudsman heard complaints from parents and children, and from NGOs relating to children.
The Commission on Family and Women’s Affairs was an advisory committee, and it took direct part in reporting and in the preparation of the Kazakh report. There had not been a coordinating body or machinery until recently, and this was because there was first a need to identify what coordination was required. Today, to implement the Convention, the coordinating body was the Commission on Family and Women’s Affairs. An inter-departmental commission on humanitarian law and on human rights would be created shortly to be able to report on the overall situation and to create a single methodological approach.
The National Plan of Action had been created. Work was carried out consistently to improve the situation of men, women, and children in Kazakhstan, and problems were worked on by many different organizations and Ministries. Kazakhstan was the only country in the Commonwealth of Independent States that had a National Commission for Women and the Family.

Questions on General Principles; Civil Rights and Freedoms; Family Environment and Alternative Care
Mr. Doek, the Committee's Rapporteur for Kazakhstan, noted that registration of birth and nationality was a particular problem for Kazakh children born abroad, and this needed to be changed. What were the policies and measures taken to address the problem of single-parent families, he asked. What help was given to families suffering under social handicaps, and was there a service in place for counseling and support.
Other Committee Experts asked questions on such issues as parental competencies; the right of the child to be heard and problems related to this mentioned in the report; the promotion of school councils where schoolchildren were the members; what were the difficulties in registering children and attributing citizenship; how problems were resolved in the light of the absence of a Family Court or equivalent; why there were so many institutionalized children in the country, and why these institutions were not assessed; violence in institutions; the lack of child-sensitive procedures in the judiciary; and whether cruel and degrading treatment, including torture, affected children and adolescents.

Response to Questions on General Principles; Civil Rights and Freedoms; Family Environment and Alternative Care
Responding to the questions, the members of the delegation of Kazakhstan said that with regard to the role of the media in disseminating the Convention and strengthening family ties, there was information on the Convention in many of the children’s publications, there were many newspaper articles for women on how to bring up children, and there were special educative programmes for children on television, particularly on the moral upbringing of girls. There was no censorship in Kazakhstan.
With regard to children without parental care, there had been an international conference in Stockholm sponsored by UNICEF, and in the light of the recommendations of that conference, Kazakhstan was developing a strategy for dealing with children in this situation.
Family Courts would be introduced shortly, and a juvenile justice system would be elaborated. A trial experiment on juvenile justice was currently in its second year. This was supplemented by another project in concert with UNICEF with a center for rehabilitation for young offenders, which aimed to prepare them for release into society. Juvenile justice issues were dealt with by the most experienced people available in concert with psychologists and parents.
As for institutionalized children, under the Kazakh system there were several kinds of institutions dealing with children: healthcare, educational, and judicial institutions and bodies under the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection. These were also divided by the age of the children and whether they had special needs. Work was being done on the subject, and there were temporary institutions for children without parental care, which served as a refuge for children in difficult situations. These centres existed in all regions of the country.
Violence in these special institutions was forbidden by Kazakh legislation, and use of physical punishment was not allowed. Violence, not just against children, was prohibited by law. However, more work was required on this issue, and this was recognized as a problem that required solving, so draft legislation was being drafted.
There was direct social assistance to citizens of Kazakhstan who had been repatriated, who were refugees or whose income did not exceed the poverty threshold. Child allowances had been distributed since 1994. A law was now being examined about State child allowances, which were paid until the age of three, to the effect of continuing such allowances until the age of majority at eighteen.

Questions on Basic Health and Welfare; Education, Leisure and Cultural Activities; Special Protection Measures
Yanghee Lee, the Committee Expert who served as Co-Rapporteur on the report of Kazakhstan, said the dialogue so far had been fruitful. With regard to disabled children, she had noted that the Constitution did not have disabled children listed as a group of children under protection from discrimination, and asked for further elaboration on this topic. She was puzzled and concerned that in the report it was noted that the number of children with disabilities had tripled over the last twelve years, and that these children were only covered by the State until the age of 16. She asked for clarification on these matters, and for more information on the new Act on Disabled Children. She was also concerned that nearly 20,000 disabled children were growing up outside the home in institutions, and asked about the right to family life for this group. She noted the progress made in sex education and that it was now taught to children in lower grades, and thought this was contributing to the heightened awareness of children involved in sexual exploitation. But she was still concerned about the high number of teenage pregnancies. Was free primary education available and accessible in all communities, she asked, and what were the efforts of including children in pre-school activities in rural areas.
Other Committee members asked questions on various topics, including vocational training and guidance and what was done in this field; teenage criminality and the age of criminal responsibility; the meaning of the term “socially dangerous acts” and how this was applicable to children and adolescents; social, vocational and medical support for disabled children and how had these children participated in drafting and adopting the current report; the percentage given for education in the national budget and whether this had been reduced, and therefore how was the quality of education assured; the lack of preschooling facilities; the administration of justice for minors and the responsibility of children under the age of fourteen and whether there was an age below which the child was completely outside the criminal scope; and children who were ill-treated and economically exploited due to a lack of implementation of the law on this topic, and what was being done to improve the effectiveness of these laws.

Response to Questions on Basic Health and Welfare; Education, Leisure and Cultural Activities; Special Protection Measures
Responding, the members of the delegation, said the age of primary school attendance varied considerably, and this was due to the influx of Kazakh repatriated children. There was a lack of pre-school institutions, and this was a problem that had been recognized and work was being done in this field. The rural school programme was having various problems, mainly due to a lack of funding, but funds had recently been allocated. There were no problems due to a lack of teachers, despite the dip in numbers, and a special teaching university would be opened soon. The situation was not quite as disastrous as it would seem, as the teacher/pupil ratio was eleven. Financing had more than doubled for schools since 1998, but this was not considered to be sufficient, since it was only at 3.5 per cent of GDP.
Coverage for social expenditure and assistance received almost a quarter of the budget, the delegation said, not including education and health. The last few years had seen a socially oriented and focused budget. The law set down the medical measures for disabled children, and also provided for preventative treatment against invalidity. The number of disabled children had indeed grown, and this was due to various reasons, including environmental issues. About 10 per cent of invalid children were housed in specialized institutions. Considerable work had been done on improving the rate of vaccination, and in increasing the number of beds available for children who required hospitalization.
Maternal mortality figures had declined steadily over the last years. Breast-feeding projects had been introduced, as had others on neo-natal care, safe pregnancy and safe births, and their success was reflected in the demographic indicators.
With regards to HIV/AIDS, this was a serious problem, and today there were 3,511 cases of HIV/AIDS infected people, including 170 pregnant women and 60 newborn children. The problem was there and was developing, but with the support of UNICEF, a strategy was being developed to prevent infection from mother to child.
The trafficking of women and children was a problem, but Kazakhstan had started to work on a law about equal rights and opportunities for the population. Expert views were being given and the matter was being discussed in the Lower House of Parliament. The National Committee on Women and Children had held several seminars over the years on the trafficking of women and children for exploitative purposes. Following lengthy discussions, work was now being carried out to improve the draft law as mentioned above in order to provide a legal cover for this issue.

Preliminary Concluding Remarks
MS. BERKIMBAEVA, the head of the delegation of Kazakhstan, in concluding remarks, repeated again that the Government had proposed to create a coordinating body to cover the implementation of the Convention, and to establish a National Plan of Action for children. She thanked the Committee Experts for their interest in the children of Kazakhstan, and was sure that the next report would be better, since the economy was now stable. The main thing was that there was a political will to improve the situation of the child. All the members of the Committee were invited to Kazakhstan to see for themselves what the situation of the child really was.
MR. DOEK, the Committee Rapporteur on the report of Kazakhstan, said he welcomed these proposals, and commended the determination of the Government to create a National Plan of Action with a comprehensive strategy. The concluding observations would try to be helpful, and the delegation had shown that there was much commitment to the issue, and that a lot had been done to improve difficult circumstances. It was hoped that this improvement would continue, and that the resources would be made available to do all that was planned. There was confidence that indeed the next report would be better.



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