to the CEDAW Committee. These Committees are not Courts but their views are respected since they are mandated to ensure that a country that has signed a treaty is fulfilling the obligation of the State to implement it (See Annex). It is also important to recognize that successive governments have submitted progress reports to these international treaty Committees or bodies, and UN Committees have commented on these reports. Civil society organizations have a right to appear before these Committees, and give their own evaluation of the progress in implementing a treaty. Such reports are called “Shadow reports” and also considered by the Committee. The Committees complete the sessions with “Concluding Observations” on the reports presented by States. States have an obligation under these treaties to consider these Concluding Observations and amend their laws and policies. [See Annex for some Concluding Comments and references of the ICCPR and CEDAW Treaty Committees]. The list given above indicates that successive Sri Lankan governments have been influenced and persuaded by these Concluding Observations to bring laws in Parliament to harmonise treaty standards. Some Sri Lankans have been nominated by the Government of Sri Lanka and served as elected members of the Human Rights Committees of ICCPR, the CEDAW Committee, and until last year, the CRC Committee. A Sri Lankan Ambassador chaired the Committee monitoring the Convention on Migrant Workers. The Sri Lankan governments have participated in major conferences on Human Rights including those that have dealt with Reproductive Health and Rights. It adopted the document that emerged from these major international conferences e.g. International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Beijing Platform for Action (BPFA), and follow up documents of these meetings. Sri Lanka has also submitted country reports for the Universal Periodic Review process of the Human Rights Council (2008 and 2012) in Geneva (See Annex). It is very important for those involved in the administration of justice including judges, lawyers and law enforcement officials of the Police to understand that the idea of human rights including reproductive rights and protecting women from GBV have been absorbed into the legal system of Sri Lanka. These are not culturally alien or foreign concepts imposed on us by foreigners or countries with a history of colonialism. Understanding this can help all those agencies to contribute to bringing these norms and standards into our legal system in diverse ways. Challenge of Harmonizing International Laws and Obligations of Sri Lanka and Integrating them into the Legal System We have already noted that Parliament and our Supreme Court have made some efforts to integrate International law into domestic law. However these measures must be adopted in a proactive manner, since Sri Lanka influenced by our colonial legal heritage, follows the approach of English Law, and considers international law as a distinct and separate system unless there are specific interventions to incorporate these principles locally. This is described as the “duallist” approach to the application of international law. This approach was followed in the Singarasa Case, referred to earlier. The case concerned the conviction of a Tamil taken into custody for acts of terrorism. The Supreme Court was petitioned by lawyers to review the decisions of our courts on the basis of views expressed by the Human Rights Committee on a communication filed by Singharasa before them, under the Optional Protocol to ICCPR. The Human Rights Committee expressed the view that the accused had not been afforded due process under the 42 COMPENDIUM ON LAW, GENDER BASED VIOLENCE AND REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS