CHAIRMAN’S REVIEW children of today would grow into adults who are conscious of their rights. It is SUHAKAM’s hope that human rights are embraced as part of the formal education in all schools in line with its aspiration – “Human Rights Education (Taught and Practised) in All Schools by 2020”, and in keeping with Goal 4 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development: to ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning by 2030. Yet there is insufficient support to guarantee the right to education for refugee children. Although the right to education is enshrined in the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugee (1951 Refugee Convention), refugee children in the country who have access to education have to either attend education projects run by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in partnership with Non-Governmental Organisations, or community-based education classes organised by the refugee communities themselves, as they are not eligible to formal education. SUHAKAM will continue to work to ensure that all children can realise their right to education. In September 2015, 170 world leaders gathered at the UN Sustainable Development Summit in New York to adopt the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This new Agenda, grounded in international human rights law, covers a broad set of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and 169 targets and will serve as the overall framework to guide global and national development action for the next 14 years. As the SDGs are derived from human rights principles, it will be crucial to ensure that it is implemented with the necessary political commitment. It is therefore very important that we begin with a full and all rounded acceptance of human rights. But this will be difficult if Malaysia’s international human rights treaties accession status remains at a stalled position, making us one of the few countries in the world that has the lowest treaties ratification/accession rate. Many of these human rights treaties entered into force internationally decades ago, and Malaysia’s continued non-accession reflects its lack of determination to live up to its international obligations. Since its inception, SUHAKAM has been expressing its concern to the Government on Malaysia’s status of accession to the remaining six international human rights treaties. Almost 80% of all UN Member States have ratified or acceded to four or more, of the nine core human rights treaties. In the Southeast Asian region, most countries have ratified or acceded to five or more treaties. Even among Islamic countries, quite a number have ratified or acceded to more of these Conventions than Malaysia. Malaysia has not signed or acceded to the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD) 1969; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) 1976; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) 1976; Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT) 1987; International Convention on the Protection of the 6 SUHAKAM ANNUAL REPORT 2016 suhakam 2new.indd 6 3/23/17 5:54 PM