By IDA

 - December 2, 2012

New York, 3 December 2012 – Today the world celebrates the International Day of Persons with Disabilities with the purpose of increasing awareness and understanding of the rights of persons with disabilities. IDA joins the celebration of this day and takes the opportunity to appeal to the international community to address the discrimination and exclusion faced by persons with disabilities by including persons with disabilities in the post-MDGs framework.

In the last years there has been significant progress in recognizing and proactively addressing the exclusion and discrimination faced by people with disabilities, as evidenced by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Summit outcome document (September 2010), which highlights the need for inclusion of persons with disabilities and the outcome document Rio+20 (2012), which recognizes the participation of persons with disabilities in the development agenda. However, the reality is that persons with disabilities are still excluded from policies and programmes aimed at achieving the MDGs.

An inclusive and accessible new post-MDGs framework would support persons with disabilities in their daily struggle against discrimination and poverty and would empower them to have an active say in choices affecting their lives, in line with the principles of dignity, autonomy and participation enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). “The international community has to mainstream disability in the post-MDGs processes, acting consistently with the CRPD" stated Yannis Vardakastanis, IDA´s Chair "The High Level Meeting on Disability and Development to be held in September 2013 should lead to an increased attention to the rights of persons with disabilities in the post-MDGs international development framework and the participation of persons with disabilities through their representative organizations will be a key element to achieve a disability-inclusive development agenda.”

Within its advocacy work related to the new framework post-MDGs, IDA is participating today, at the UN Headquarters, in the Panel Discussion “The way forward: a disability inclusive development agenda towards 2015 and beyond”, in which IDA will highlight that the new framework has to be focused on the poorest and the most marginalised groups, such as people with disabilities and that all goals are inclusive and mainstream the rights of persons with disabilities. IDA will also highlight the necessity that all relevant stakeholders commit to support the inclusion of people with disabilities in the post-MDG framework. As a first step, it will be important that States, UN agencies and civil society organize consultations at regional and national level to contribute to the zero draft of the outcome document of the High Level Meeting on Disability and Development.

Contact: Vladimir Cuk at vcuk [at] ida-secretariat.org
Website: www.internationaldisabilityalliance.org
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/InternationalDisabilityAllianceIDA
Twitter: http://twitter.com/IDA_CRPD_Forum

 

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