The Convention on the Rights of the Child adopted by the United Nations General Assembly resolution 44/25 on November 20, 1989 was last reported in this column in the Winter of 1990 (IJLI, v. 18, no. 3). As noted then, the Convention entered into force on September 2, 1990. The initial documentation of the States parties to the Convention and the Committee on the Rights of the Child now provide additional information. These documents carry the words “Convention on the Rights of the Child” on the upper left corner of the cover pages and the new symbol “CRC” on the top of the upper right corner. The first documents noted emanate from the first meeting of the States parties to the Convention which opened at UN headquarters on February 27, 1991. The initial document, a single-page item carrying the symbol CRC/SP/1, dated November 30, 1990, is the provisional agenda of the first meeting.

The united nations recently issued a compilation of national legislation against racial discrimination. The publication, which has a 1991 imprint, bears the title: Second Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination: Global Compilation of National Legislation against Racial Discrimination. This volume covers 205 pages and carries the symbol: HR/PUB/90/8.

The Charter of the United Nations, which was signed in June 1945 at San Francisco, entrusts the UN with promoting and ensuring respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms “for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion.” The General Assembly, in one of its first resolutions, declared in 1946 “that it is in the higher interests of humanity to put an immediate end to religious and so-called racial persecution and discrimination.” The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the General Assembly December 10, 1948, is the most fundamental human rights instrument adopted by the United Nations. Since that time there have been numerous conventions and declarations aimed specifically at eliminating racial discrimination. These include the Declaration and International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, adopted November 20, 1963 and December 21, 1965, respectively, and the Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid, adopted November 30, 1973.