INTRODUCTION 1. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Optional Protocol thereto were adopted by the General Assembly on 16 December 1966 and entered into force on 23 March 1976. 2. In accordance with article 28 of the Covenant, the States parties established the Human Rights Com­ mittee on 20 September 1976. 3. Under the Optional Protocol, individuals who claim that any of their rights set forth in the Covenant have been violated and who have exhausted all available domestic remedies may submit written communications to the Human Rights Committee for consideration. Of the 80 States which have acceded to or ratified the Covenant 34 have accepted the competence of the Com­ mittee to receive and consider individual complaints by ratifying or acceding to the Optional Protocol.* These States are Barbados, Bolivia, Cameroon, Canada, the Central African Republic, Colombia, Congo, Costa Rica, Denmark, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Finland, France, Iceland, Italy, Jamaica, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Mauritius, the Netherlands, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Senegal, Suriname, Sweden, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela, Zaire and Zambia. No communication can be received by the Committee if it concerns a State party to the Covenant which is not also a party to the Optional Protocol. 4. Under the terms of the Optional Protocol, the Committee may consider a communication only if cer­ tain conditions of admissibility are satisfied. These con­ ditions are set out in articles 1, 2, 3 a n d 5 of the Op­ tional Protocol and restated in rule 90 of the Commit­ tee's provisional rules of procedure, pursuant to which the Committee shall ascertain: (a) That the communication is not anonymous and that it emanates from an individual, or individuals, sub­ ject to the jurisdiction of a State party to the Protocol; (b) That the individual claims to be a victim of a violation by that State party of any of the rights set forth in the Covenant. Normally, the communication should be submitted by the individual himself or by his representative; the Committee may, however, accept to consider a communication submitted on behalf of an alleged victim when it appears that he is unable to sub­ mit the communication himself; (c) That the communication is not an abuse of the right to submit a communication under the Protocol; (d) That the communication is not incompatible with the provisions of the Covenant; • A s at 31 December 1984. (e) That the same matter is not being examined under another procedure of international investigation or settlement; (f) That the individual has exhausted all available domestic remedies. 5. From the time when the Committee started its work under the Optional Protocol at its second session in 1977 to its sixteenth session in 1982, inclusive, 124 communications relating to alleged violations by 13 States parties were placed before it for consideration. During that period 249 formal decisions were adopted, as follows: (a) Decisions at pre-admissibility stages (mainly under rule 91 of the Committee's provisional rules of procedure, requesting additional information or obser­ vations on questions relating to admissibility): 112; (b) Decisions declaring a communication inadmiss­ ible, discontinued or suspended (relating to 39 com­ munications): 36; (c) Decisions declaring a communication admiss­ ible: 54; (d) Further interlocutory decisions after a com­ munication has been declared admissible (requesting ad­ ditional information or explanations from the parties): 16; (e) Views under article 5 (4): 31. 6. Although article 5 (3) of the Optional Protocol provides that "the Committee shall hold closed meetings when examining communications under the present Protocol", the Committee decided at its seventh session that the terms of the Protocol did not preclude publication of its "views" adopted after consideration of a communication, that publication was desirable in the interest of the most effective exercise of the Com­ mittee's functions under the Protocol, and that publica­ tion in full was preferable to publication of a summary only. In the annual reports of the Human Rights Com­ mittee, beginning with the 1979 report and up to the 1982 report, 31 final views, one decision on inadmissi­ bility and one decision to discontinue consideration have been pubhshed in full.' 7. At its fifteenth session the Committee decided, in addition, to proceed with the periodical publication of a selection of its decisions under the Optional Protocol in a suitably edited form. The present volume covers deci­ sions taken from the second to the sixteenth sessions, in­ clusive. It contains all "views" adopted under article ' See Official Records of the General Assembly, Thirty-fourth Ses­ sion, Supplement No. 4 0 ( A / 3 4 / 4 0 ) ; Thirty-fifth Session, Supplement No. 40 ( A / 3 5 / 4 0 ) ; Thirty-sixth Session, Supplement No. 40 ( A / 3 6 / 4 0 ) ; Thirty-seventh Session, Supplement No. 40 ( A / 3 7 / 4 0 ) .