Decision adopted by the Committee under the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, concerning communication No. 204/20211*, 2**
- *Adopted by the Committee at its seventy-eighth session (8–26 September 2025). ↩
- **The following members of the Committee participated in the examination of the communication: Aslan Abashidze, Nadir Adilov, Lazhari Bouzid, Peijie Chen, Laura-Maria Crăciunean-Tatu, Charafat El Yedri Afailal, Peters Sunday Omologbe Emuze, Santiago Manuel Fiorio Vaesken, Ludovic Hennebel, Joo-Young Lee, Karla Vanessa Lemus de Vásquez, Seree Nonthasoot, Giuseppe Palmisano, Laura Elisa Pérez, Julieta Rossi, Preeti Saran and Michael Windfuhr. ↩
State Party: Uruguay
The authors of the communication are 45 families who, at the time of submission of the communication, consisted of 183 persons, including children, all of whom were inhabitants of the Nuevo Comienzo settlement. All of the authors are citizens of Uruguay and they filed their complaint as a group. The authors claim that the State Party would violate their rights under article 11 of the Covenant in the event of their eviction.
In January 2020, various families who were living in poverty occupied an abandoned plot of rural land and began to build shanty dwellings in the settlement named Nuevo Comienzo, in the Santa Catalina area of Montevideo. The owners of the land subsequently initiated criminal proceedings for the offences of encroachment and theft of electricity. According to the authors, the public prosecutor laid charges against at least 20 persons, giving them until 3 January 2021 to leave the property. On 26 April 2020, the residents of the settlement met with the authorities in an attempt to reach an agreement with the owners through mediation by the State Party. On 15 July 2020, the public prosecutor’s office formed a dialogue group including the parties, but, on 2 September 2020, the Parliament concluded that mediation was not possible since, under Uruguayan law, the land could be used for rural purposes only. At a meeting of the dialogue group held on 28 October 2020, no agreement was reached. To avoid having a criminal record, many of the families decided to leave the property. On the suggestion of the public prosecutor’s office, and without opposition from the attorneys defending the accused, a ban on entering the property was imposed as of 27 November 2020.
The Committee, acting through its Working Group on Communications, registered the communication and requested the State Party to take interim measures to suspend the eviction of the authors pending consideration of the communication or to provide them with adequate alternative housing, in genuine and effective consultation with them.
The State Party submitted its observations on the communication, which were transmitted to the authors, who provided their comments. According to the information provided, three of the families that are part of the authors’ group applied for amparo against the eviction. On 24 March 2021, the Family Court of First Instance issued a writ of amparo ordering that three of the families be provided with alternative housing. The State party provided alternative housing for one of these families. On 3 May 2021, the Ministry of Housing approved rental subsidies for the other two families, in lieu of the fines that the State owed for failure to comply with the court order. According to the authors, another inhabitant of Nuevo Comienzo, who lives alone, filed a petition for amparo before the Administrative Court, which was dismissed in the first instance but granted on appeal.
At its meeting on 24 September 2025, the Committee, having considered the fact that some of the authors obtained housing or a rental subsidies and having noted that the authors have not provided updated information to clarify the situation of the other authors, decided to discontinue the consideration of the communication in accordance with rule 18 of its rules of procedure under the Optional Protocol.