COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS CONTINUES DEBATE ON PROMOTION OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND ADVISORY SERVICES
Press Release
HR/CN/850
COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS CONTINUES DEBATE ON PROMOTION OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND ADVISORY SERVICES
19980413 (Reissued as received.)GENEVA, 8 April (UN Information Service) -- The Commission on Human Rights this morning continued a wide-ranging discussion on the further promotion and encouragement of human rights and the question of advisory services, covering such issues as gender mainstreaming, mass exoduses and displaced persons, the provision of technical assistance to countries and reform of its own methods.
Concerning gender issues, government delegations called for action against trafficking in women and girls, genital sexual mutilation and violence against women, both in peacetime and during armed conflict. The representative of the United Kingdom, speaking on behalf of the European Union, recommended that the statute of the proposed international criminal court provide for the prosecution of all crimes of sexual violence, especially rape, committed during armed conflict.
Several countries also outlined their efforts on behalf of the internally displaced and refugees, and highlighted problems they faced. The delegation of Austria said there was a need to address the lack of an established system for international assistance for internally displaced persons similar to the one in place for refugees. The representative of Malaysia said the recent deportation of illegal immigrants from that country needed further explanation. The current economic crisis was such that Malaysia was unable to provide jobs even for its own nationals. It was compelled, however reluctantly, to begin a policy of deporting all illegal immigrants in as orderly a way as possible. The delegate added that none of the immigrants deported was a legitimate political refugee.
Regarding the work of the Commission, several delegations called for depoliticization and greater balance in the promotion of economic, social and cultural rights.
Statements this morning were also made by the representatives of the Germany, Madagascar, China, United States, Denmark, Cuba, Russian Federation, Italy, Bangladesh, Ukraine, Mexico, El Salvador, Pakistan, South Africa, Poland and Tunisia.
The Commission will meet in private session for the rest of the day to look at the situation in a number of countries under the confidential "1503" procedure, named after the Economic and Social Council resolution that gave birth to it. When it meets again at 10 a.m. tomorrow, the Chairman will announce the countries discussed under the procedure as well as the countries no longer under scrutiny.
Further Promotion of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms
As it continued to examine the further promotion and encouragement of human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the question of its programme and methods of work, the Commission took up the report of the Secretary-General on the integration of the human rights of women throughout the United Nations system (document E/CN.4/1998/49).
In that report, the Secretary- General recalls that the United Nations system-wide medium-term plan for the advancement of women (1996-2001) stresses the importance of collaborative action to assist individual countries to translate the outcome of various international conferences and summits into concrete national policies and programmes. In general, the three main areas requiring collaboration are development of international standards and norms, policy formulation and advice and operational programmes. The report concludes that treaty bodies should continue their efforts in developing a gender analysis of each article of the treaties whose implementation they monitor, cross-referenced with the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, including the development of gender-sensitive model questions to be used in the review of the States parties' reports. It also recommends that the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights should establish a guideline on gender inclusivity for use in the preparation of all its communications, reports and publications.
Statements
AUDREY GLOVER (United Kingdom), speaking on behalf of the European Union and Central and Eastern European countries associated with it, said there were now 161 States parties to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the keystone in the international structure of women's human rights. But the European Union remained seriously concerned at the number of reservations by State parties to that treaty. At the 1995 United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women, many who looked at the world through women's eyes for the first time saw clearly it was an unfair place, one where gender dictated the privileges that a newly born child might enjoy
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in the future. It was particularly intolerable that in some countries women and girls were statutorily denied even their basic rights to health care, education, work and participation in public life. The Beijing Platform for Action, adopted at that Conference, remained the blueprint for international efforts to achieve gender equality, and at its heart were the principles of mainstreaming and empowerment.
Violence against women in all its forms could not be tackled alone: a holistic approach was required, she said. The experiences of the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and for the Former Yugoslavia were that women were frequently the victims of violence committed during armed conflicts. The European Union strongly supported the establishment of an international criminal court as a means of holding the perpetrators of war crimes to account. The statute of such a court should include the prosecution of all crimes of sexual violence committed during a conflict, including rape and systematic rape.
GERHART R. BAUM (Germany) said his Government would highlight the issue of human rights of women in a special expert conference in Bonn entitled "Women's Rights are Human Rights". It was one of the events being organized to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. At the threshold of the twenty-first century, it was time to discard the fiction that violations of human rights or threats to the enjoyment of human rights were generally gender-neutral. It required that one approached every topic with one fundamental question in mind: How did it affect women and men differently?
In the area of violations of women's human rights, Germany was currently focusing on combating the international trade in women, sex tourism, the situation of female refugees and genital mutilation, he said. It placed great value on cooperation with non-governmental organizations, whose experience and contacts on the ground were likely to optimize the measures. Germany was one of the destinations of the trade in women, particularly from Central and Eastern Europe. To combat that problem, the Government was actively participating in all the relevant international bodies with a view to improving cooperation in bringing to trial and prosecuting the perpetrators and also protecting and reintegrating the victims.
INGRID KIRCHER (Austria) said whatever its causes, internal displacement of populations exposed human beings to many dangers and often denied them basic human rights; it also often was the first step to massive international refugee flows. However, there was no established system for protecting the internally displaced. The guiding principles developed by the Special Representative were an encouraging first step; the Secretary-General's decision to designate the United Nations emergency relief coordinator with the responsibility for the protection and assistance to the internally displaced also was a useful measure. More specific training should be provided to field
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staff on the subject; country visits should continue to be carried out by the Special Representative; and sufficient resources should be provided to enable him to prepare and undertake more of such visits.
MAXIME ZAFERA (Madagascar) said his country's Constitution of 1992 had included in its provisions the promotion and protection of human rights and had prescribed the creation of a national commission to that effect. The national commission had been created in 1996 and the nomination of its members would take place in the near future. Its members would include personalities with great experience in human rights. In the meantime, a working group -- composed of representatives of the public administration, civil society and international organizations -- promoted human rights. In addition, Madagascar had ratified numerous international human rights instruments and had criminalized discrimination based on race, colour, sex, religion and opinion. The rights to freedom of opinion, expression and religion, and to a free press were fully guaranteed constitutionally, as was the independence of the judiciary. In order to facilitate any complaints by citizens on violations of rights, the Government had created an office of mediator.
XIE BOHUA (China) said there were two problems facing the Commission on Human Rights. One was the North-South confrontation, which had plagued the Commission since the end of the cold war. For example, since 1992, the Commission had adopted 87 country resolutions, almost all of them directed against developing countries. The second problem was that the Commission placed too much emphasis on civil and political rights while it was not paying enough attention to economic, social and cultural rights and the right to development. In seeking gradual solutions to those problems, the Commission should strengthen dialogue and cooperation and reduce confrontation. Emphasis should be placed on the study of economic, social and cultural rights and the right to development, and on strengthening international cooperation and actions in that field so as to gradually reverse the serious imbalance in the work of the Commission. China suggested the strengthening of advisory services and technical cooperation in the field of human rights and the promotion of national human rights capacity-building.
He said the forced recruitment of women in Asian countries as military "comfort women" had been one of the heinous crimes committed by the Japanese militarists during the Second World War. The measures taken by the Japanese side included offering compensation to the victims. China held, however, that the issue was a political one and could not be solved simply by economic compensation. What was important was for Japan to admit historical facts forthright and to show deep repentance and make sincere apologies.
CRAIG KUEHL (United States) said some States still claimed that universal rights did not apply to their citizens, and yet they wondered why the train of human progress had passed them in the night. It was better to acknowledge the lessons the Universal Declaration of Human Rights kept
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teaching than to curse the darkness -- respect for fundamental human rights paid handsome dividends. The next century must be the age of prevention; the world could not afford to have nations hide their human rights abuses behind religious, historical, or cultural veils. Human rights were universal; they belonged to every person in every country in the world. History had already determined that, and it was time for every nation to accept it. If the nations of the world insisted on slouching into the next century half despotic and half free, he feared for the consequences.
OLE HARTLING (Denmark) said health professionals were often the first people to have detailed knowledge of such violations. They should be allowed to move freely and be able to uphold the ethical principles of their profession. Otherwise, the rights of their patients to receive treatment were threatened. In a number of cases health professionals had been in danger solely because of their professional activities. Likewise, patients had been excluded from receiving medical attention, or their human rights had been violated when seeking medical treatment. On the other hand, Denmark was aware that there were deplorable examples of health professionals, particularly doctors, having abused human rights. They might have done that knowingly and willingly, but in most case they were pressed to take part in the human rights violations. Health professionals might become human rights defenders or they might becomes violators themselves.
MARIA DEL CARMEN HERRERA CASEIRA (Cuba) said the celebrations for the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the five-year review of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action were a good opportunity to analyse progress made by the two and to look at the obstacles facing them. When the Universal Declaration was adopted, almost two thirds of the world lived under the colonial yoke. Also, around the same time, the abhorrent apartheid system in South Africa was being formulated. Fortunately, the struggle for the independence of peoples and national liberation had continued. This year's celebrations should reaffirm the commitment to all rights and consolidate developments achieved in the past 50 years. The World Conference on Human Rights held in Vienna was also a landmark in human rights because it recognized the right to development as an integral part of all human rights. Unfortunately, little had been done to ensure the effective implementation of that right. Stressing the indivisibility, universality and interdependence of human rights was another of the successes of the Conference. There was a need to seek compliance with that principle by strengthening international cooperation in human rights, including depoliticization.
MUSA HITAM (Malaysia) said the deportation by Malaysian authorities of illegal immigrants, much reported in the media, needed further explanation. The country had some 2.4 million non-nationals, many of them illegal. That was equivalent to more than 10 per cent of the national population, and the totals were mounting rapidly. During periods of economic growth, the country
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had the ability to absorb comfortably those immigrants, but the current economic crisis was such that Malaysia was unable to provide jobs even for its own nationals. Thus it was compelled, however reluctantly, to begin a policy of deporting all illegal immigrants in as orderly a way as possible. None of these immigrants was a legitimate political refugee, and Malaysia wished to submit that violations of economic, social, and cultural rights were a plausible cause for mass exoduses, and should be recognized as such. A broadened definition of "prevention" of such exoduses should therefore be developed, to include actions by the international community against descent into economic chaos as well as persistent underdevelopment.
VLADIMIR KARTASHKIN (Russian Federation) said minimizing the politicization of human rights and selectivity was essential. Genuine cooperation among States was also important to enhance the causes of human rights and to tackle new tendencies hindering their promotion and protection. The Russian Government supported the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the strengthening of United Nations mechanisms aimed at promoting and protecting human rights. Attention should be focused on, among other things, the agenda of the Commission, especially as it related to the integration of human rights components in such fields as peacekeeping. He intended to submit a draft resolution on the subject of human rights and arbitrary deprivation of citizenship. The Russian Federation had established a human rights commission to advise the President of the country on matters pertaining to legislation and the general promotion of human rights.
Ms. GLOVER (United Kingdom), speaking on behalf of the European Union and the Central and Eastern European countries associated with it, said the purpose of technical cooperation and advisory services was to assist governments in their primary task of protecting and promoting human rights. The task was daunting and many countries needed support and encouragement, on a bilateral, regional or international basis. The type and level of support required depended on the local situation and on the level of development in the recipient country. Technical assistance should be precisely targeted to the needs of the beneficiary country and should be established with the cooperation of the concerned government. Some countries needed technical assistance for justice and the rule of law, while others needed support of the public administration to reinforce democratic systems.
The European Union was committed to promoting activities on the ground and to developing assistance in the area of human rights, she said. For example, the European initiative in Rwanda provided support for efforts to re-establish the legal system. All member States of the European Union also funded many technical assistance programmes through their bilateral and multilateral aid programmes. These included donations to the United Nations Voluntary Fund for Technical Cooperation. It should be noted that programmes of technical cooperation and advisory services needed a sound financial basis to have a proper impact, and demand for it far exceeded the funds available.
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It was essential that sufficient resources be provided for human rights in the regular United Nations budget, and voluntary contributions to the Fund were also essential.
MARIO ALESSI (Italy) said that generally the international community approached human rights issues through the context of States, but in the case of Somalia there was no functioning overall government and no State to approach. In that situation, was it possible that the international community should ignore the immense suffering of women, children, and other vulnerable people? It could not be accepted that there were regions of the world that were no-man's lands in terms of human rights. There was, in that country, the resurgence of dangerous traditional practices. There were over 1 million landmines in that country. Referring to alleged offenses committed in Somalia by the militaries of three countries serving in the United Nations forces, he said extensive investigations were being undertaken by Italian soldiers. If the allegations were verified, punishment of those responsible would follow. The Government would inform the competent United Nations agencies of the results of those investigations. Italy supported the proposal to place in the field in Somalia a human rights officer. It would contribute to development and humanitarian assistance projects in Somalia, provided the political situation indicated that such projects would help the civilian population and not the warring factions.
NANCY RUBIN (United States) said little information flowed into United Nations human rights bodies from women's groups and others fighting for the human rights of women. Non-governmental groups of women's advocates were human defenders, too. They should be organized as such. Their insights and information should be included in the work of the thematic and country rapporteurs, not as an afterthought, but as an essential component of the human rights picture. In Afghanistan, women had been silenced, dismissed from their jobs, and turned away from school. Algeria was another case where women's rights had been badly abused: news of massacres filled the newspapers, and many non-governmental organizations had called for investigations. But had anyone looked at the conflict through women's eyes? If so, one would see violence and atrocities terrorizing the civilian population and terrorist groups had pledged to eliminate virtually every human right for women. What religion or international law could permit beheading, mutilations, rape, forced "temporary marriages" and the like? Those responsible for those atrocious abuses of human rights should be held to account, not brought into power. In order to combat that type of abuse, the United States had advocated efforts by the International Criminal Tribunals for the Former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda to ensure the investigation and prosecution of crimes of sexual violence coming within their purview.
MIJARUL QAYES (Bangladesh) said there was still a long way to go to ensure women's equality and equity in empowerment and development. The problem, in most cases, was not in the statute books and legislation; rather,
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it was a product of societal attitudes and traditions. That was why Bangladesh wanted to stress ensuring women's and the girl child's access to education, which in many ways was the key to the development of the family and the society. One of the largest non-governmental organizations in Bangladesh, BRAC, had pioneered a successful non-formal primary education programme which now had 28,500 schools with 900,000 children who had never been to school or who had dropped out before gaining any meaningful education.
Women in Bangladesh had also not always been able to benefit from macro-policies and major programmes and projects, he said. However, a number of government and non-governmental organization-sponsored initiatives had demonstrated that developmental goals could effectively be achieved by enhancing the capacity of women. It should be noted that what was revolutionizing women's empowerment at the grass-roots level was employment facilitated by micro-credit, an innovative approach providing the poor with access to credit. However, for innovative endeavours to succeed, there was need for a broader sustained framework of international activities and mechanisms, hence the relevance of a United Nations system-wide integration of a gender perspective for all human rights activities and programmes.
VLADYSLAV ZOZULYA (Ukraine) said coordination of field programmes must be improved and reform of the Commission's working methods was critical if it was to retain its ability to respond to today's challenges. Priority should be given to preventive programmes, human rights and domestic conflicts, self-determination under non-colonial situations, and responsibilities of the State for mass violations of human rights. Some two years after the 1996 Geneva Regional Conference on the problems of refugees, displaced persons, and other forms of involuntary displacement in the post-Soviet countries and relevant neighbouring States, the resulting programme was only beginning to be implemented. Ukraine was very concerned at the modest response to the joint fund-raising appeal. Without proper financing the programme would be nothing but a hollow dream. The most challenging problem for Ukraine was accommodation of returning Crimean Tartars, amounting to some 250,000. There also were 12,000 returnees of other ethnic groups. To date budgetary allocations to deal with their needs, although extensive, were only a small part of what was badly needed, and which Ukraine could not provide alone. More help was needed from the international community to aid in solving these vast regional problems.
JUAN GOMEZ-ROBLEDO (Mexico) said his country was a land of freedom and tolerance for people coming to settle as refugees. Those who had come to Mexico as refugees had either returned voluntarily to their countries of origin or adopted the country as their home. Those who had stayed had contributed to the multi-cultural composition of the country. He paid homage to the work of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for its cooperation in that connection. As for the 50,000 Guatemalan refugees in Mexico, they had been there since the 1980s. They were given land to be
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self-sufficient and productive, and their initial camps had been progressively converted into a rural development area. At the end of 1997, 35,000 had returned voluntarily to Guatemala. The remaining had opted to stay behind and had been permanently integrated within Mexican society.
VICTOR MANUEL LAGOS PIZZATI (El Salvador) said international human rights laws had enshrined the rights of men and women, and they highlighted the fundamental point of non-discrimination. There had also been laws to protect women specifically. In El Salvador, the full participation of women was fundamental, with the Government actively promoting their productive role in society. The Government had established in 1996 the Salvadorian Institute for the Development of Women. The problem of violence against women had been dealt with in many national and international forums at length. The agreed conclusion was that it was essential to eliminate that problem along with discrimination against women. Violence against women was an element in current social problems and it must be treated on an integrated basis. In El Salvador, in response to the domestic violence many women experienced, there was a programme to encourage harmony within the family and to provide psychological, legal and other aid to victims. Concerning technical assistance and advisory services, his Government had signed two agreements for technical cooperation with the United Nations in January 1997. El Salvador had witnessed the positive impact of those agreements, which encouraged it to continue such efforts. As a country which had recently overcome armed conflict, El Salvador realized the importance of preventive policies that consolidated a culture of peace and spread that culture among the people.
AKRAM ZAKI (Pakistan) said the international community must condemn all forms of terrorism and cooperate to eliminate it. Many States had become independent by exercising their right to self-determination. Yet a deliberate effort was under way to portray freedom fighters as terrorists in Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir. No one should be misled by the political and conceptual confusion created in recent years by the campaign to denigrate such a legitimate freedom struggle as a terrorist movement. Instead, the Commission should focus on the chief problem in Kashmir, which was State terrorism, in which overwhelming military force was being used against unarmed civilian populations. The most desperate and dangerous type of State terrorism was sponsorship of such terrorism against people of other sovereign States. Pakistan had faced such terrorism when it supported the freedom struggle of the Afghan people against foreign intervention. Now it was suffering from similar attacks because of its support and advocacy of the struggle of the Kashmiri people for self-determination. An internationally supervised investigation should be conducted into the numerous specific allegations of human rights violations in occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
MUZIWAKHE THEMBA KUBHEKA (South Africa) said the Universal Declaration had come as a balm and a tonic, offering a battered and bloody humanity a vision of a free and fraternal future after the agony of the Second World War.
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All hopes for early reform were dashed in South Africa at that time when a government that was determined to apply a new and pernicious policy, that of apartheid, was installed. Many South African democrats found themselves on the brink of defeatism and despair. It was at that turning point in the history of South African people that news came of the adoption of the Universal Declaration. The then new apartheid South African Government had opposed the adoption of the Declaration at San Francisco, a move that remained to date a stain on the history of South Africa. The Declaration itself would of course never again be put to the vote, nor was it a treaty which could be signed, approved or ratified. What South Africa could do was to co-sponsor and support a commemorative resolution in the Commission. ROMAN KUZNIAR (Poland) said there had been some suggestions that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights should be reviewed to include local particularities and to strike a new balance in today's understanding and implementation of the treaty. Poland did not share this position. There was no need to re-interpret or improve the Universal Declaration. There was already in it a balance between the different categories of rights. Any division of rights into political ones and economic ones was artificial. The deficient fulfilment of the rights in the Universal Declaration was mainly due to States and governments which had, for various reasons, been unable to ensure the full enjoyment of rights and freedoms of their peoples. Therefore, the Commission should avoid at any price a text which would dilute or distort the meaning of the Universal Declaration. KAMEL MORJANE (Tunisia) said States should work to eliminate obstacles preventing women from enjoying their fundamental rights. It was obvious that women contributed as much to their societies as men did. However, although important progress had been made, much remained to be done and immense efforts needed to be made on behalf of women's rights. Tunisia had been a forerunner in the promotion of the rights of women in society. Reform movements which had marked the history of Tunisia had placed women at the centre of their concerns while reconciling the needs for cultural authenticity of society with the demands of modernity. The massive movement for social reform now under way enshrined the equality of women in the Tunisian Constitution. Polygamy had been abolished and divorce provisions had been improved. The labour code had explicit provisions for equality of treatment of women. A fund for guaranteeing alimony had been created in 1993 to pay alimony in cases of divorced women whose spouses did not meet their obligations. Mandatory schooling was required for all children aged 6 to 16, so that in 1997, 99 per cent of girts of that age were in school. Women's health also had improved dramatically in Tunisia in recent years. * *** *
CORRECTION:The following statement was inadvertently omitted from Press Release HR/CN/846:
TESFAMICAEL GHEBREHIWET, of the International Council of Nurses, said his organization was concerned over the growing number of health professionals imprisoned, detained or tortured for treating detainees or other ill persons. The Commission was urged to recognize health as a fundamental right for detainees, prisoners and victims of torture. It must condemn the denial of health care for political, geographical, racial or religious reasons. Health professionals must be protected and their codes of conduct respected.
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