Launch of the new United Nations Guidelines

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“The new Guidelines frame the confinement of disabled people to nursing homes, psychiatric hospitals and other settings as discrimination. As a result, the European Union can no longer justify the funding of institutions, including group homes, as being in line with the UNCRPD. I encourage the EU to accept this argument as the US Supreme Court did 20 years ago”.

– Gerard Quinn, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

On 9 September 2022, the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities of the United Nations adopted the Guidelines on deinstitutionalisation, including in emergencies. On December 1 the UN OHCHR Regional Office in Brussels and the European Network on Independent Living – ENIL officially launched the new Guidelines in the presence of key EU stakeholders, such as Ms Katarina Ivankovic-Knezevic, Director on Social Rights and Inclusion at DG Employment of the European Commission.

The aim of these first global guidelines on deinstitutionalisation is to guide and support States parties in implementing the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) and with it the right of persons with disabilities to live independently and to be included in the community. The guidelines were adopted involving input by over 500 persons with disabilities and organisations from across the world.

Media inquiries should be directed to Florian Sanden, ENIL Policy Coordinator, florian.sanden@enil.eu, 00 32 2 893 25 83.


The European Network on Independent Living – ENIL is a Europe-wide network of disabled people, with members throughout Europe. ENIL is a forum for all disabled people, Independent Living organizations and their non-disabled allies on the issues of Independent Living. ENIL represents the disability movement for human rights and social inclusion based on solidarity, peer support, deinstitutionalisation, democracy, self-representation, cross disability and self-determination. More information is available at: www.enil.eu