[Missouri-l] U.S. signs U.N. disabilities pact, in change of course |

[Denny Huff]

Subject: [leadership] U.S. signs U.N. disabilities pact, in change of course
|

 

By Patrick Worsnip

 

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The United States signed a U.N. convention on
Thursday aimed at ensuring equal rights for the world's 650 million disabled
people,

a pact that the former Bush administration refused to endorse.

 

In a ceremony at U.N. headquarters, U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice inked the
pact, billed by the United Nations as the first human rights treaty of the
21st

century. It came into force last year.

 

The 32-page U.N. Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
outlaws all forms of discrimination at work on the basis of disability,
including

in hiring, promotion and working conditions. It requires equal pay for work
of equal value.

 

It also calls on signatory states to promote the employment of disabled
people, including through "affirmative action" programs that favor them.

 

The pact stipulates the disabled may not be excluded from mainstream
education systems. It demands that governments provide them with physical
access to

transportation, schools, housing, medical facilities and workplaces.

 

Bush administration officials had said the document was weaker than the 1990
U.S. Americans with Disabilities Act and therefore could complicate
enforcement

of that law.

 

But Rice said the United States was "very pleased to join 141 other
countries that have signed this convention in pursuit of a more just world."
Sixty-one

countries have ratified the pact.

 

President 

Barack Obama

 would soon submit the convention for Senate approval, Rice said at the
ceremony attended by representatives of U.S. disability groups.

 

Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to Obama, told the gathering the signing
was a "historic step toward advancing our global commitment to the
fundamental

human rights for all persons with disabilities."

 

She also announced the creation of a senior-level position at the State
Department to develop a strategy to promote the rights of disabled people
around

the world.

 

The signing underlined the more favorable attitude toward the United Nations
of the Obama administration than that of its predecessor, which often
criticized

the world body and was leery of international treaties that could have an
impact on U.S. law.

 

Human Rights Watch, one of several advocacy groups that welcomed the
signing, said the United States had signed six out of nine core
international human

rights treaties but ratified only three -- on racial discrimination, civil
and political rights, and torture.

 

Jamil Dakwar of the American Civil Liberties Union said that Thursday was "a
great day for the rights of people with disabilities and a step forward for

the U.S. human rights movement."

 

(Editing by Peter Cooney)

 

C Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved 

 

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American Council of the Blind

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Phone: (202) 467-5081

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