ANNEX I. >> M  etadata sheets on selected indicators Rationale  Article 14 (3) (d) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights provides that defendants should have legal assistance assigned to them, in any case where the interests of justice so require, and without payment if they do not have sufficient means to pay for it. The Human Rights Committee, in its general comment No. 32 (2007), states that “counsel provided by the competent authorities on the basis of this provision must be effective in the representation of the accused”. Furthermore, blatant incompetence by assigned counsel may entail the responsibility of the State. The indicator is an outcome indicator that relates to the “access to and equality before the courts” attribute of the right to a fair trial. As such, it measures the extent to which equality is achieved in practice. Method of computation  The indicator is calculated as the ratio of the conviction rate of defendants provided with legal representation to that of defendants with a lawyer of their own choice for the same crime in the reporting period. The conviction rate is defined as the percentage of persons brought before the courts who are convicted. It is essential that this indicator should be calculated for the two groups of defendants for the same crime, as conviction rates can vary significantly by crime, depending on the nature of the offence and the difficulties in obtaining evidence. Key crimes that should be included are intentional homicide, robbery and burglary. Ideally, the indicator should be calculated on a cohort basis, that is, the conviction rate percentage calculated for each group (indigent and own lawyer) should correspond to the same persons brought before the courts and then convicted or acquitted. However, in practice, obtaining these data can be difficult and an overall average can be used. For example, total (indigent) persons convicted by the courts for intentional homicide in one year as a percentage of total (indigent) persons brought before the courts for intentional homicide in one year (where the two groups of persons are not necessarily the same owing to, for instance, the length of the trial process. Data collection and source  The main sources of data are court records and reports of the office of the prosecutor at the national or subnational level. Periodicity The data, if compiled, should be available annually. Disaggregation  The indicator should be disaggregated by type of crime (e.g., homicide, rape, assault, robbery), stage of proceedings (first hearing or appeal), and by region or administrative unit. It should also be disaggregated by the characteristics of the defendant, in particular by sex, age (at least for children or young people under the age of 18 ), economic and social situation, ethnicity, minority, indigenous, colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, migrant, disability, sexual orientation, place of residence (rural/urban). Comments and limitations  The indicator is a good measure of the relative competence and effectiveness of assigned lawyers, and thus of the effective implementation of the right to a fair trial regardless of the defendant’s economic status. However, particularly in regions or States with a small number of cases, the indicator should not be over‑analysed; each case must be assessed on its own merits. This indicator may also be used jointly with an indicator on the nature and average length of the actual sentences received by indigent defendants with free legal representation and defendants with lawyers of their own choice. Examples of references relevant to the right to a fair trial: Universal Declaration of Human Rights, arts. 10 and 11; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, arts. 14 and 15; International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, art. 5 (a); Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, art. 2; Convention on the Rights of the Child, arts. 12 (2), 37 (d) and 40; International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families, arts. 16 (5)–(9) and 18; and Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, art. 13. 162 Human Rights Indicators