A/HRC/55/51/Add.2 Kyrgyz and other languages have indicated that the equipment and facilities provided to them are not as high quality as in majority Tajik schools. Upon visiting a public school in a Mugat community, the Special Rapporteur was able to verify that that seemed to be the situation in at least that one case. 58. While the National Strategy on Human Rights and the associated Action Plan address the issue, in part, they contain only broad actions and goals. There is as yet no evidence of any impact that they might actually have on the ground for minority schools. 59. In addition, there are barriers for children who have been taught in a minority language, except for Russian, and wish to pursue higher studies. They are often excluded from higher education because they are disadvantaged with respect to the entrance exams, which are offered by the National Testing Centre only in Tajik or Russian and therefore are discriminatory under international law. 60. Finally, deaf children and other users of sign languages have to contend with the lack of awareness of their needs in public education and elsewhere as members of a linguistic minority The teaching of sign language in schools is not always highly valued or even available. Sign language should be formally recognized as a language for the purposes of education and a more comprehensive approach should be adopted in policy documents under the National Strategy on Human Rights and the associated Action Plan for its use in public services, including measures to provide for and support related interpretation services. C. Ethnic minorities 61. Two ethnic groups are particularly vulnerable when it comes to the protection of their human rights in Tajikistan, namely, the Pamiri and the Mugat, although for very different reasons. 1. Mugat (also known as Jughi or Roma) 62. The Mugat of Tajikistan, as is unfortunately the case for the Roma in most parts of the world, tend to be stigmatized, with negative stereotypes and even prejudice and a lack of knowledge about their history and community still very common. They are usually omitted from official data and experience significant marginalization in such areas as education, housing and public health. There is not a single specific reference to the Mugat in the National Strategy on Human Rights or the associated Action Plan. A visit to one Mugat community confirmed their apparent segregation on small plots of land, a lack of equal access to public services and crowded and underresourced education facilities when compared with those of the Tajik majority. That is despite the call by the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination for the Government of Tajikistan to take steps to end such cases of discrimination, including by adopting an action plan to improve the situation of the Mugat. 63. While the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination referred to structural discrimination, the Special Rapporteur’s own observations in Tajikistan led to a different conclusion: the lack of public infrastructure for water, sewage treatment, power and other public services, such as public education of equal quality, are the direct result of discriminatory actions by State officials in terms of resource allocation, planning decisions and other measures where double standards appear to be applied on the basis of ethnicity. He witnessed the obvious differences in budgetary investments between a Tajik majority school and a school catering to Mugat children and the lack of sewage treatment facilities and running water for parts of a Mugat community, while next door, a brand-new sports stadium was being constructed by the authorities. None of those differences were accidental or simply structural: they were the result of wilful decisions and policies made by local and national officials. 2. Pamiri in the Kŭhistoni Badakhshon Autonomous Region 64. The Pamiri are a distinct ethnic, linguistic and religious group who share several Eastern Iranian languages and are mainly members of the Ismaili Shi’a community. Many of them are concentrated in the Kŭhistoni Badakhshon Autonomous Province. The Government GE.24-00946 13