The Committee Against Torture’s 61^st session finished on 11 August. During the session, the Committee examined four states’ implementation of the Convention Against Torture and issued recommendations on corporal punishment to all states:

• To Antigua and Barbuda, which was examined in the absence of a report, the Committee welcomed the Child Justice Act 2015 (which prohibited judicial corporal punishment) but expressed concern that corporal punishment was still lawful in all other settings. The Committee recommended explicit prohibition in all settings and the repeal of all provisions which authorise its use.
• To Panama, the Committee recommended that the Government adopt legislation prohibiting corporal punishment in all settings, undertake public awareness campaigns on its harmful effects and promote non-violent and positive forms of discipline. Panama has been in the process of drafting a comprehensive law on the rights of the child since 2007 – this provides the Government with an opportunity to explicitly prohibit all corporal punishment of children.
• The Committee welcomed the recent bans of all corporal punishment in Ireland and Paraguay, enacted in 2015 and 2016 respectively.

For further details, see the Global Initiative’s individual country reports for Antigua and Barbuda, Ireland, Panama and Paraguay.

For further information on the obligation to prohibit corporal punishment under the Convention Against Torture and to see the Committee’s recommendations in full, see the Global Initiative's page on the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.