A/78/195 for minorities, a permanent forum for minorities, the drafting of a global treaty for minority rights, and the relaunch and implementation of the guidance note of the Secretary-General on racial discrimination and protection of minorities, issued in 2013, in which the then Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, set out guiding principles and a framework for United Nations action for mainstreaming minority rights, with a view to ensuring a comprehensive and coherent United Nations approach from Headquarters to regional and country presences. 24 C. Impact and positive developments for specific minority communities 50. Generally speaking, the efforts of Special Rapporteurs are usually discrete or longer term in their impact or visibility. This is also the case for the Special Rapporteur on minority issues, although there have been a few areas of notable and concrete impact that can nevertheless be highlighted at the end of his mandate. 1. Recognition of sign languages, including in the Constitution of Slovenia 51. Early in the Special Rapporteur’s mandate, and consistent with the clarifications he provided in the definition of a member of a linguistic minority, set out in his thematic report on the four categories of minorities under United Nations instruments (A/75/211), he identified users of sign languages as users of natural languages, who were therefore able to constitute members of a linguistic minority. As a result, in addition to frequently ensuring the provision of interpretation services for members of this linguistic minority at the Forum on Minority Issues or some regional forums, when possible, the Special Rapporteur continuously raised the rights of users of sign languages in his country visits throughout his mandate. The eleventh session of the Forum on Minority Issues, held in 2018, was the first session at which interpretation into international sign language was provided, and the twelfth session of the Forum, held in 2019, was the first at which a representative of the sign language minority community was invited to participate as an expert panellist. 52. The Special Rapporteur’s first country visit, in which he visited Slovenia, and his recommendations to recognize and use sign languages subsequently contributed to the decision of State authorities to modify the country’s Constitution. On 4 June 2021, the parliament of Slovenia unanimously modified the Constitution of the Republic of Slovenia to recognize three national sign languages by adopting article 62 (a), which read, “The free use and development of the Slovenian sign language is guaranteed. In areas of municipalities where Italian or Hungarian are also official languages, the free use of Italian and Hungarian sign language is guaranteed.” 2. Clarifying and opening up the categories of minorities, especially for descent based minorities and religious or belief minorities 53. Uncertainties and lack of guidance on who constituted a national or ethnic, religious or linguistic minority often permitted the exclusion of many persons who belonged to these minorities from the recognition and protection of their human rights because of bias, prejudice or simply ignorance about who could claim to be a member of a minority under international law. In practical terms, the absence of any comprehensive guidance allowed at times ad hoc or arbitrary denial that particular groups were a minority in a given country. This occurred not only among State __________________ 24 23-15818 United Nations, “Guidance note of the Secretary-General on racial discrimination and protection of minorities”, March 2013. 13/21