By Anjali Sharma
UNITED NATIONS – UN deputy Secretary General Amina Mohammed on Tuesday all the Sustainable Development Goal indicators for persons with disabilities are off track as people around the world gathered for the largest annual meeting on disability-related issues in New York.
Ms. Mohammed said “The message is stark: persons with disabilities face higher poverty, greater unemployment, deeper food and health insecurity and more limited access to education, jobs, and digital technologies,”.
The 18th Session of the Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities will focus to enhance public awareness of the rights and contributions of persons with disabilities for social development.
Chair of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Kim Mi-Yeon, underscored the importance of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, now 20 years old, even amid growing global challenges.
“The CRPD is the most progressive human rights treaty of the 21st century. It marked a decisive shift – from medical and charity models to a rights-based approach and affirms the duty to dismantle structural and gender-based discrimination,” said Mr. Kim.
He highlighted the momentum across the world to boost rights, including the International Forum on Disability Employment in Korea even with the ongoing UN liquidity crisis.
The social development agenda aims to build momentum for disability rights and social development ahead of two major upcoming events: the Second World Summit for Social Development in November and the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development later this month, FFD4 will take place in Sevilla.
The conference will feature speeches by UN and civil society leaders, a public debate on the rights and contributions of persons with disabilities and three roundtables.
The roundtables will explore financing for disability-inclusive development, harnessing artificial intelligence for inclusion and advancing the rights of Indigenous persons with disabilities
Government officials, civil society representatives, UN agencies, and experts will share strategies and best practices throughout the event, Ms. Mohammed added.
