Yes, thank you for that question.
The A status is, as I mentioned, the highest status. There are 88 of those. We also have B status at the ICC, which are near to being Paris Principles-compliant but don't fully meet each of the requirements in the Paris Principles. They're accorded a B status, which means that they do not have standing at the Human Rights Council. All A-status national human rights institutions have full status to appear and speak to every agenda item at the Human Rights Council. We also have some with C status, and they're basically not Paris Principles-compliant at all.
So an application for accreditation is made by a national institution and it is then referred to the subcommittee on accreditation, which is a subcommittee of the ICC. It considers the application, it is reviewed by the national institutions unit of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva, and an analysis is done. Each applicant has to provide material to substantiate its annual reports, its budget, a description of its activities. Field officers of the UN will also provide information and input. The subcommittee on accreditation meets twice a year to consider the applications and reach a decision, a recommendation that is given to the ICC to either accept or reject the recommendations.
The subcommittee consists of one representative of each of the four regions that ICC is broken down into--the Americas, Asia-Pacific, Africa, and Europe. Canada is one of the four members of the subcommittee on accreditation.