A/72/165 overview of the main developments in the States concerned regarding the implementation of the recommendations. The full responses of the States are available on the website of the mandate holder. 2 A. Bosnia and Herzegovina 47. The Special Rapporteur welcomes the establishment of the National Minorities Council under the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The role and funding of the Council, which gathers representatives of the 17 national minorities recognized by law, has been strengthened. The Special Rapporteur also welcomes the fact that the 2013 population census allowed multiple responses with regard to self-identification, in line with her recommendation that census questions should allow open and multiple responses, and that the enumeration was conducted in three languages (Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian) using Latin and Cyrillic script. Preliminary census results, published in 2016, show that 50.11 per cent of the population identify as Bosniaks, 30.78 per cent as Serbs and 15.43 per cent as Croats. Less than 3 per cent of the population falls under the category of “others”, including members of the 17 national minorities and other ethnic groups. 48. With respect to the recommendations on the situation of Roma communities, the State referred to the adoption of a revised action plan for Roma in the areas of employment, housing and health care, covering the period 2013 -2016, and provided examples of the scope of specific measures and the number of Roma beneficia ries in those areas. With regard to the drafting of the iteration of the action plan for 2017 2020, the Special Rapporteur stresses the importance of including Roma in all stages of planning, implementation and evaluation and calls upon the State to continue its efforts to improve the situation of Roma communities. 49. The Special Rapporteur regrets the lack of implementation of her recommendation with respect to national minorities and those within the category of “others” having equal rights to stand for any government position, including the need for constitutional reform to remove discriminatory provisions following the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Sejdić and Finci v. Bosnia and Herzegovina. The State is of the opinion that the enforcement of this decision and others by the Court would adequately tackle discriminatory provisions for national minorities and members of the category “others”, but states that the implementation of this decision requires political agreement in the country. The Special Rapporteur reiterates that constitutional reform should not be portrayed as a threat to peace or the rights of any group, but as a positive process necessary to ensure equal opportunities of political participation for all. B. Bulgaria 50. Bulgaria informed the Special Rapporteur that in 2012 the minorities portfolio had been transferred to the National Council for Cooperation on Ethnic and Integration Issues, a coordinating and consultative body tasked with assisting the Government in the formulation of a policy on the integration of minority groups. The Special Rapporteur was pleased to learn that a specialized body had been established within the Council to monitor the implementation of the national strategy for Roma integration, which covers the period 2012-2020. __________________ 2 12/22 See www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Minorities/SRMinorities/Pages/ Followuponcountryvisitrecommendations.aspx. 17-12138

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