Conference on the Human Dimension (Hansard, 17 February 1992)

§ Mr. Trimble
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many requests have been made by countries involved in the CSCE process to initiate the involvement of independent experts as agreed at the Moscow conference on the human dimension; and if he will list the subject matter of the problem and the outcome.

§ Mr. Lennox-Boyd
None. The mechanism evolved at the Moscow conference on the human dimension has not yet come into operation.

§ Mr. Trimble
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list the occasions when the United Kingdom has used the conference on the human dimension inquiry mechanisms agreed at the Vienna CSCE meeting in 1989, indicating the countries to which the inquiry was directed, the subject matter and the inquiry and the outcome.

§ Mr. Lennox-Boyd
The United Kingdom has made use of the CHD mechanism eight times. Prior to the fall of the communist regimes, the United Kingdom addressed the treatment of ethnic minorities in Bulgaria, the detention of human rights activists in Czechoslovakia—three times—and Romania—twice. The mechanism was also used to raise two family-reunion cases with the Soviet Union, which was subsequently resolved.
Additionally, the United Kingdom has been associated with 14 uses of the mechanism by the member states of the European Community acting together.

§ Mr. Trimble
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what reservations the United Kingdom entered concerning the independent expert procedure agreed at the Moscow meeting of the conference on the human dimension of the CSCE.

§ Mr. Lennox-Boyd
The United Kingdom made no reservations about the independent expert procedure, but4W did make an interpretative statement on the experts' access. A further interpretative statement on the use of this procedure was made jointly by Belgium, France, Spain and the United Kingdom. The text of both statements is attached to the copy of the concluding document of the Moscow conference, which is available in the Library of the House.