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Uzbekistan Law to Protect Disability Rights, in Compliance with CRPD
By Andrea Shettle, MSW | August 8, 2008
Uzbekistan has now passed a law meant to expand social and human rights protections for people with disabilities, PRinside.com has reported ("The New Law to Enhance the Social Protection in Uzbekistan"). Among other things, this law is intended to encourage more employers to hire people with disabilities; enforce the right of people with disabilities to have access to public transportation, information, and communications; and the right to access rehabilitation programs if one wishes to do so.
This law in part used the United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) as a model. The CRPD is an international agreement among countries to protect the human rights of people with disabilities, including some that are now incorporated into Uzbekistan’s new law.
The CRPD is legally binding, but only for countries that have ratified the treaty. Countries that have ratified the CRPD are legally obligated to abolish laws that violate the treaty, and to create new laws as needed to give people with disabilities the human rights protections required by the CRPD.
Uzbekistan has not yet joined the 32 countries to ratify the CRPD. In fact, it is not even among the 130 countries to sign the CRPD. Signing a treaty is not legally binding, but it does signal strong interest in ratifying it in the future, and it does obligate the country to avoid any action that would violate the spirit and intent of the treaty. This law exemplifies one way that the CRPD can influence the status of people with disabilities even in countries that have not yet chosen to sign or ratify the treaty.
Learn more about the new law in Uzbekistan at:
http://www.pr-inside.com/the-new-law-to-enhance-the-r691557.htm
Find out if your country has signed or ratified the CRPD at http://www.un.org/disabilities/countries.asp?navid=12&pid=166
Learn more about the CRPD by skimming the RatifyNow FAQ.
Learn how you can become involved with the global campaign to promote the ratification and implementation of the CRPD and Optional Protocol in your country and elsewhere.
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