A/HRC/34/58 I. Introduction 1. The Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities, Catalina Devandas Aguilar, submits the present report to the Human Rights Council pursuant to its resolution 26/20. It contains a description of the activities she carried out in 2016 and a thematic study on access to support by persons with disabilities. In preparing the study, the Special Rapporteur convened a regional expert consultation in Addis Ababa in September 2016 and analysed the responses to a questionnaire sent to Member States, national human rights institutions, agencies of the United Nations system, civil society organizations and persons with disabilities and their representative organizations. As at 5 December 2016, she had received 114 responses.1 II. Activities of the Special Rapporteur A. Country visits 2. In 2016, the Special Rapporteur visited Zambia from 18 to 28 April (see A/HRC/34/58/Add.2) and warmly thanks the Government for its cooperation prior to, during and after the visit. The planned visit to Morocco (18 to 28 July) was postponed at the last moment at the request of the Government and has not been rescheduled. 3. The Special Rapporteur has agreed to undertake a visit to France during the course of 2017 and has requested invitations to visit Cuba, the Philippines, Qatar and Viet Nam. B. Conferences, meetings and engagement with stakeholders 4. During the year the Special Rapporteur participated in numerous conferences and expert meetings, which allowed her to exchange information, share good practices and raise awareness of disability-related issues. She participated, inter alia, in the fifty-fourth session of the Commission for Social Development in New York (February), the annual interactive debate on the rights of persons with disabilities at the Human Rights Council (March), the World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul, Turkey (May) and the Social Forum of the Human Rights Council (October), which focused on the rights of persons with disabilities in the context of the tenth anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. She also attended a meeting of the Human Dimension Committee of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Forum on Human Rights organized by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Ireland and several expert consultations on social protection, disability assessment and mental health organized by other United Nations experts, agencies, organizations of persons with disabilities or academia. 5. In June, the Special Rapporteur participated in the ninth session of the Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, held in New York, and its parallel events. As mandated by the General Assembly, she also engaged with the United Nations Statistical Division, the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on Sustainable Development Goal Indicators and with several United Nations agencies to advocate for the 1 See www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Disability/SRDisabilities/Pages/Provisionofsupporttopersons withdisabilities.aspx. 3