SUVA, March 20 (Xinhua) -- The Fijian government will recommend to the parliament that Fiji ratify the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities this week, leading local newspaper the Fiji Sun reported Monday.
Once the convention is ratified, the government is legally obliged to put a lot of measures in place, said Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum.
"We have to make sure that there are ramps for crossing the streets from one end to the other," Sayed-Khaiyum said while giving an example.
The attorney-general was responding to concerns raised by people living with disabilities, including high cost of obtaining a medical report, unavailability of different modes of transport, difficult access to microfinance assistance, and communication problems for the deaf when seeking help in public hospitals.
Around 1.4 percent of Fiji's total population of less than 1 million are people with disabilities, government statistics showed.
The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is an international human rights treaty of the United Nations intended to protect the rights and dignity of persons with disabilities. Parties to the convention are required to promote, protect, and ensure the full enjoyment of human rights by persons with disabilities and ensure that they enjoy full equality under the law.
