A/HRC/14/18 63. Pastor Elías Murillo Martínez, a member of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, was invited by the Working Group to give a presentation on the collection of disaggregated data as a tool in fighting structural discrimination. In his presentation, he pointed to the experience of capturing disaggregated data to combat discrimination against women as an example to be followed regarding people of African descent. He then laid out the international legal framework and the Committee guidelines with respect to the inclusion of disaggregated data in States’ periodic reports. He gave an overview of progress in the disaggregation of data in the Americas, as well as its use for the formulation of adequate public policies, including special measures. 64. Mr. Murillo noted that the stereotypes of barbarity, lack of humanity and profound inferiority affecting people of African descent were deeply rooted in theories by European philosophers such as Hegel and Kant which had underpinned colonialism, apartheid, racism and structural discrimination. 65. He stated that the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, held in Durban in 2001, had led to major progress in the recognition of discrimination against people of African descent. The link established in Durban between poverty and racism had proved fundamental in formulating public policies benefiting people of African descent. He also cited paragraph 92 of the Durban Programme of Action, which called for the collection, analysis and publication of statistical data at the national and local levels regarding the situation of victims of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance. The Durban World Conference and the regional preparatory meeting for the Americas in Santiago had led to the inclusion of targeted questions in the 2000 census on the continent. Indeed, since Durban, people of African descent had finally become “visible”. 66. With respect to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the panellist reported that the situation of people of African descent was receiving increasing attention from the Committee. A thematic discussion on the question was scheduled for the Committee’s seventy-seventh session. 67. Self-identification was signalled by the panellist as an issue of frequent controversy in the collection of disaggregated data, but also one of increasing international legitimacy. A national context of profound historical, social and political discrimination could make people of African descent reluctant to identify themselves as such. Others might be in denial about the colour of their skin. As a result, people of African descent in South America were systematically underrepresented in statistics. 68. Ms. Jenkins, the UNICEF representative, noted that the black population in the Americas had been counted from the very start, on slave ships and in church registries. She also called on States to disaggregate data so as to better allocate resources for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. 69. Mr. Makanaky emphasized that the term “people of African descent” was relatively new and not necessarily familiar to the persons to which it applied. Instead, an array of other denominations was used in South America to describe persons of African descent. In Colombia, that had led to the challenge of choosing the right denomination for inclusion in the census. He also pointed out that traditional colonial policies, which had discouraged people of African descent from identifying as blacks, hampered the process of selfidentification. Mr. Makanaky advocated for data to be collected through formal and informal structures and gave the example of people of African descent who did not use State medical facilities, but trusted traditional medicine instead. If one were to effectively measure the prevalence of a certain illness among children in order to devise a public programme to eradicate that illness, one would have to take such social and cultural factors into account. 11