United Nations Human Rights Committee

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The United Nations Human Rights Committee is a treaty body composed of 18 experts, established by a 1966 human rights treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). The Committee meets for three four-week sessions per year to consider the periodic reports submitted by the 173 States parties to the ICCPR on their compliance with the treaty, and any individual petitions concerning the 116 States parties to the ICCPR's First Optional Protocol.^[1] The Committee is one of ten UN human rights treaty bodies, each responsible for overseeing the implementation of a particular treaty.^[2]

The UN Human Rights Committee should not be confused with the more high-profile UN Human Rights Council (HRC), or the predecessor of the HRC, the UN Commission on Human Rights. Whereas the Human Rights Council (since June 2006) and the Commission on Human Rights (before that date) are UN political bodies: composed of states, established by a UN General Assembly resolution and the UN Charter, and discussing the entire range of human rights concerns; the Human Rights Committee is a UN expert body: composed of persons, established by the ICCPR, and discussing matters pertaining only to that treaty. The Human Rights Committee is often referred to as CCPR (Committee on Civil and Political Rights) in order to avoid that confusion.^[3][4]