PART II – CERD AND ITS WORK information submitted by the State concerned to other UN organs, in the absence of such material, reports and information prepared by UN organs would be used. In practice CERD also considers relevant information from other sources, including NGOs. This is intended to encourage dialogue between the State party and the Committee despite the absence of a report, to ensure all States parties participate in some level of review. In a good number of instances this procedure prompted States parties to expedite the submission of overdue reports and enabled the Committee to resume the dialogue with these States. Examples of cases: Gambia was reviewed under this procedure at the 74th session of CERD and the Committee adopted concluding observations in the absence of a state report or delegation. Panama, which was scheduled for the review procedure at the 74th session, submitted its report prior to the session. At its 75th session CERD decided to postpone scheduled review of Maldives and Kuwait, since the former submitted its report before the session and the latter gave a commitment to finalise its reports in the near future. h) Status of National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) At its 71st session CERD amended rule 40 of its rules of procedure regarding input from NHRIs that are accredited to take part in the deliberations of the UN Human Rights Council i.e. comply with the Paris Principles. According to this new rule NHRIs, with consent of the State party concerned, are allowed to formally take the floor during official meeting in which the respective States’ report is considered. 2.2 Consideration of Individual Communications (Article 14) Under Article 14 of the ICERD, individuals or groups of individuals who claim that any of their rights enumerated in the Convention have been violated by a State party and who have exhausted all available domestic remedies may submit written communications to CERD for consideration, provided that the state concerned has made a declaration to recognize CERD’s competence under Article 14 (ref. Annex I, 4). It came into operation in 1982 when a State party made the 10th of such declarations recognising CERD’s competence; as of 20 April 2011, 54 States parties made such declarations. The Convention further provides, in its Article 14 (2), that states having made this declaration may establish or indicate a national body competent to receive petitions from individuals or groups of individuals who claim to be victims of violations of any of the rights set forth in ICERD and who have exhausted other locally available remedies. Consideration of communications takes place in closed meetings. All documents pertaining to the work of the Committee under Article 14 (submissions from the parties and other working documents of the Committee) are confidential. Details on this procedure can be also found in rules 80 – 97 of the rules of procedure of CERD. As of 2 May 2011, 48 cases had been submitted to the Committee, of which 4 cases are still in consideration and 16 cases were decided as inadmissible. Of 27 admissible cases CERD found violations in 13 cases (no violation in 14 cases, cf. Annex II). One case was discontinued. CERD includes in its annual report a summary of communications examined and, where appropriate, a summary of the State party’s explanation and statements regarding the action it has taken in conformity with the Committee’s suggestions and recommendations. The full texts of the Committee’s decisions are also reproduced in an annex to its annual reports. a) Consideration of the admissibility of communications Once a communication has reached the Committee, it first considers whether the communication, i.e. petition, is admissible. All the cases before CERD are examined by the Plenary (full Committee), while CERD’s rules of procedure leave the possibility open for the Committee to form a Working Group consisting of 5 Committee members, when the Committee’s workload increase dramatically. Conditions for admissibility of communications can be summarized as follows: 17 ICERD & CERD: A GUIDE FOR CIVIL SOCIETY ACTORS