12. MONITORING OF STATE RATIFICATION ON HUMAN RIGHTS CORE TREATIES The Commission wishes to stress that the use of such policy borders on absurdity as the process and period of implementation would inevitably be continuous, and there would always be laws or policies deemed to contravene these treaties. The government should view ratification to these treaties as a positive act to spur the government to fulfil its obligations and fulfilment of the spirit and intention of the treaties. 6 Article 2, International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Article 4, Convention on the Rights of Children Article 4(2), Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities S U H A K A M A N N U A L R EPOR T 2017 31 1 The Commission takes note of the existence of several steering committees placed under several government agencies to discuss on the possibility of acceding to the six remaining core human rights treaties. From the series of meetings with several government agencies held throughout 2017, the Commission was informed that the government had a policy of not ratifying any international treaties unless it conformed to national laws. The Commission notes that throughout the government’s responses on the issue of acceding to international treaties, the government has always taken the view that conformity between national laws and international treaties must exist prior to ratification. The Commission believes that this view is itself fallacious as the government has undeniably undertaken and implemented many positive changes and initiatives on issues concerning elements embraced and expounded in international treaties such as the ‘progressive realisation’ of many rights of its citizens.6 C H A P T E R Malaysia has only ratified three of the nine treaties, namely Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). It was 5 years back when Malaysia ratified both the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Commission is deeply concerned that Malaysia has ratified the least number of treaties compared to other countries in ASEAN and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).