Complaints of human rights violations may be made in the following ways at the international level:
There are three main procedures for bringing complaints of before the human rights treaty bodies:
Of the nine core human rights treaties, eight of the their monitoring treaty bodies currently receive and consider individual complaints or communications. These are CCPR, CERD, CAT, CEDAW, CRPD, CED, CESCR and CRC. The individual complaint mechanism for the Committee on Migrant Workers (CMW) has not yet entered into force.
Complaints may be made to a Committee by individuals, and third parties on behalf of individuals against a State.
As matters of admissibility, those lodging complaints must generally have exhausted all domestic remedies, and must not have submitted the complaint to another UN treaty body or regional mechanism such as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the European Court of Human Rights, the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights, or the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights.
Complaints can only be made against a State that:
More on the acceptance of the Committees' competence, including links to the specific Convention Articles and Optional Protocols on the link below.
To see which States have accepted the Committee's competence for a particular Convention, go to the UN Treaty Collection Status of Treaties Chapter IV Human Rights > scroll to the relevant Optional Protocol (ICCPR, CEDAW, CRPD, ICESCR and CRC) or Convention (CERD, CAT, CED and CMW). In the case of the CERD, CAT, CED and CMW Conventions, a list of States that have accepted the Committee's competence is at the bottom of the individual Convention information page.
Alternatively, to see the competence of all the Committees a particular State has accepted, use the Ratification Status by Country database, select a country and scroll to the Acceptance of individual complaints procedures heading.
Each treaty body has its own complaint procedure. Click on the individual treaty body link under the Procedures of the individual Committees heading on the Individual Communications webpage.
For information on finding Committee decisions, see the Decisions box on this page.
Upon receipt of reliable information containing well-founded indications on serious, grave or systematic violations by a State party of the conventions they monitor, CAT (article 20), CEDAW (article 8 of the Optional Protocol to CEDAW), CRPD (article 6 Optional Protocol to CRPD), CED (article 33), ICESCR (article 11 of the Optional Protocol to ICESCR), and CRC (article 13 of the Optional Protocol to CRC) may, on their own initiative, initiate inquiries.
Inquiries may only be conducted with respect to State parties that have accepted the competence of the relevant Committee in this regard. State parties may opt-out from the inquiry procedure, at the time of signature, ratification or accession. To see the competence of all the Committees a particular State has recognised, use the Ratification Status by Country database, select a country and scroll to the Acceptance of the inquiry procedure heading.
The Inquiry procedure is confidential and the results are not published.
More on the Inquiry procedure via the link below.
The Human Rights Council Complaint Procedure was established in 2007 to address consistent patterns of gross and reliably attested violations of all human rights and all fundamental freedoms occurring in any part of the world and under any circumstances. The complaint procedure addresses communications submitted by individuals, groups, or NGOs that claim to be victims of human rights violations or that have direct, reliable knowledge of such violations.
The procedure is confidential - all material provided by governments and individuals, and all documentation related to decisions made by the Human Rights Council are examined in closed meetings of the Council, and not made publicly available.
Special procedures mechanisms can intervene directly with Governments on allegations of violations of human rights that come within their mandates by means of letters which include urgent appeals and other communications. Special procedures submit publicly available Communications Reports to the Human Rights Council containing summaries of the communications sent since the last reporting period. The text of all communications sent and replies received can be accessed through these periodic reports.
More on Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council communications.
See also:
The Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council: a brief look from the inside and perspectives from outside by The United Nations Treaty Body Jurisprudence database (open access) contains all jurisprudence (communications) from the 8 UN Treaty Bodies which receive and consider complaints from individuals. Use the Detailed Search function to search the database by eg: State, region, communication (complaint) number, issue, keyword, UN treaty body, Convention Article etc.
In general, admissibility and merits are decided in the same hearing via links below as well as consideration.
The Committees’ decisions may close the case if it decides that there has been no violation of the treaty or that the complaint is inadmissible. If it considers there has been a violation by the State party of the complainant’s rights under the treaty, it may make recommendations to the State party, but they are not legally binding upon the States. All Committees have developed follow up procedures to monitor whether States parties have implemented their recommendations. More on what happens after a Committee decides a case via the link below.
There is no appeal against Committee decisions. In general, decisions are final.