According to the information of State Statistics Committee by the end of 2015 the number of persons with disabilities who receive pension and allocation is 568149 and 65482 of them are children under 18 with limited health capacities.
One of the main directions of the activity of the Azerbaijani Commissioner is protection of the rights of persons with disabilities. Thus, the following actions are carried out by the Commissioner for protection, provision and promotion of the rights of persons with disabilities:
- Appeals received by persons with disabilities ( proposals, applications and complaints) are investigated, relevant surveys, proposals and recommendations are prepared and sent to respective state bodies for possible solution of their problems and for their active integration to the society.
- National legislation base is analyzed from the perspective of provision of the rights of persons with disabilities, proposals are worked out for their development and bringing them into the conformity with international treaties.
- Relevant work carried for fulfillment of functions of independent mechanism for promotion and monitoring of UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, drafting parallel report on implementation of commitments arising from that international treaty, promotion of implementation of recommendations on the report submitted by the state to relevant treaty body.
- Awareness raising work is carried out for protection of the rights of persons with disabilities, the importance of not only the medical but social approach to these persons based on human rights from the perspective of proper understanding of disability in the society is promoted, close cooperation is built with relevant state bodies, civil society institutions, as well as with specialized NGOs and media, etc.
During her term in Office the Commissioner paid close attention to issues on protection of the rights of persons with disabilities, carried out different actions for possible solution of their problems under her competences as subscribed by the Constitutional Law.
Specialized advisor on rights of persons with disabilities of the Ombudsman was appointed among the employees of the Ombudsman Office with the relevant order of the Commissioner for coordination of protection of the rights and freedoms of persons with disabilities and the work carried out in this sphere. Specialized advisor is responsible for analyzing national legislation and international-legal acts, the situation in the country, to developing and implementing comments, proposals, recommendations and plan of actions.
The Commissioner conducted different events aimed at protection of rights of these persons, made important proposals to the relevant state bodies and kept under the control the implementation of these proposals. In most cases the issues highlighted in proposals were solved.
On 13 December 2006 the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities adopted by the UN General Assembly and its Optional Protocol was opened for signature of member states and entered into force on May 3 2008.
Under the law of the Republic of Azerbaijan from 2 October 2008, both documents were ratified with the relevant statement considering the proposals of the Commissioner as well and entered into force on 28 January 2009.
Ombudsman Institute as the National Human Rights Institution accredited with “A” status was delegated the functions of independent monitoring mechanism pursuant to the Article 33.2 of the Convention. Thus, The Commissioner was recommended to carry out the relevant actions for executing the functions following the letter#2/387 addressed to the Commissioner by the head of the Presidential Administration on 14 May 2011.
The first report of the Azerbaijani Government on the implementation of the commitments under the above mentioned Convention was submitted to the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in 2011 and the first parallel report of the Azerbaijani Commissioner was submitted in 2013.
In the meetings 125-126 of the 11th session of the Committee held on 1-2 April 2014 the first report of the Azerbaijani Government was reviewed and appreciated. Later on in the 139th meeting of the Committee held on April 10 2014, final Recommendations consisting of 57 items were sent to the Government.
It is noteworthy that the Commissioner together with the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of Population held discussions with the representatives of Social Policy Committee, relevant state bodies, NGOs and mass-media, dedicated to recommendations of the UN Committee on Rights of Persons with Disabilities on the first report of the Azerbaijani Government on the Convention on the Rights on 22 May 2014.