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The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women can receive and consider individual communications, also known as complaints, from or on behalf of a person or group of persons claiming to be victims of a violation of the Convention by a State party (set out in the Optional Protocol to the Convention).

For the Committee to be able to receive individual complaints, the State party concerned must have recognized the Committee’s competence by ratifying the Optional Protocol. You can check this here.

The following resources provide more information on submitting complaints:

Recent complaints

The Committee publishes a list of all complaints that have been received on an annual basis. This list is not comprehensive:

The CEDAW Working Group on communications under the Optional Protocol follows up on ongoing CEDAW communications and inquiries.

Jurisprudence

Jurisprudence highlights

Follow up

How to submit a complaint

Complaints should be submitted using the online submission form.

Learn more: Treaty bodies communications page