CCPR UNITED NATIONS International covenant on civil and political rights Distr. GENERAL CCPR/C/21/Rev.2/Add.12 18 September 2002 Original: ENGLISH General Comment No. 30 [75] Reporting Obligations of States parties under article 40 of the Covenant Adopted on 16 July 2002 (2025th meeting) This General Comment would replace former General Comment 1 1. States parties have undertaken to submit reports in accordance with article 40 of the Covenant within one year of its entry into force for the States parties concerned and, thereafter, whenever the Committee so requests. 2. The Committee notes, as appears from its annual reports, that only a small number of States have submitted their reports on time. Most of them have been submitted with delays ranging from a few months to several years and some States parties are still in default, despite repeated reminders by the Committee. 3. Other States have announced that they would appear before the Committee but have not done so on the scheduled date. 4. To remedy such situations, the Committee has adopted new rules: (a) If a State party has submitted a report but does not send a delegation to the Committee, the Committee may notify the State party of the date on which it intends to consider the report or may proceed to consider the report at the meeting that had been initially scheduled; (b) When the State party has not presented a report, the Committee may, at its discretion, notify the State party of the date on which the Committee proposes to examine the measures taken by the State party to implement the rights guaranteed under the Covenant: (i) If the State party is represented by a delegation, the Committee will, in presence of the delegation, proceed with the examination on the date assigned; GE.02-44496 (E) 200902