REFUGEE FLOWS FROM KOSOVO INCREASING, HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS REPORTS
Press Release
HR/CN/929
REFUGEE FLOWS FROM KOSOVO INCREASING, HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR HUMAN RIGHTS REPORTS
19990422 Commission on Human Rights Hears Update on Kosovo, Completes Debate on Advisory Services and Technical Cooperation Programmes(Reissued as received.)
GENEVA, 22 April (UN Information Service) -- High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson told the Commission on Human Rights this afternoon that the number of refugees and displaced persons in the Kosovo conflict was still growing.
In her weekly update on the situation in the Balkans, Mrs. Robinson said human-rights violations in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia had not ceased, and again urged responsible authorities there to work in concert with the international community to reach a peaceful resolution to the conflict.
Her comments came after the Commission completed the debate on its agenda item on advisory services and technical cooperation in the field of human rights.
Mrs. Robinson described a number of aspects of the conflict, including increased flows of refugees and displaced persons; ethnic cleansing; summary and arbitrary executions; and killing and wounding of civilians.
She said scores of civilians had been killed by North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) bombings, while hundreds of thousands of people and families had been left jobless and homeless because of the destruction of industrial facilities and residential buildings.
Meanwhile, the number of refugees was nearing 600,000, according to staffers of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, she said. More than half had crossed the border into Albania, and some, including children, showed signs of maltreatment.
Earlier in the afternoon, the Commission heard calls from national delegations and non-governmental organizations for enhanced support services
and practical and technical advice to help States implement human-rights initiatives.
A representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross said its advisory committee in the past year had been busy aiding Governments with the implementation of the 1997 Ottawa Treaty, which banned anti-personnel landmines.
And a representative from Iran called the technical cooperation and advisory services offered by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights a "turning point". He also said the Faculty of the legal and political science departments at Tehran University was working with the United Nations Development Programme to implement a four-year joint project on human-rights education and research.
Indonesia, Iran and Egypt spoke at the meeting, along with the International Committee of the Red Cross; Comision Para La Defensa de Los Derechos Humanos en Centro America; Lawyers Committee for Human Rights; and Jeunesse Etudiante Catholique Internationale.
The Commission will reconvene at 10 a.m. on Friday, 23 April to begin action on draft resolutions.
Statements
MARY ROBINSON, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said the number of persons dislocated by the crisis in Kosovo had continued to grow. Figures provided by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees indicated there were 32,300 refugees in Bosnia, 68,200 in Montenegro, 132,100 in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and 359,000 in Albania, which brought the total to 591,600. Figures for Serbia were not available. There were six Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights staff in Skopje, five in Tirana and three in Podgorica. Five human-rights officers contributed by the Government of Switzerland reinforced the field office in Tirana.
Mrs. Robinson said the number of refugees within the last few days had grown substantially and human-rights violations of various extreme forms had been reported, including abuses of refugees and displaced persons. Other rights violations included forced displacement and ethnic cleansing, summary and arbitrary executions, abuses and violations of children and other vulnerable groups, arbitrary detention, enforced or involuntary disappearances, mistreatment of women, abuses in regard to economic, social and cultural rights, and civilians killed and wounded.
Mrs. Robinson said there were accounts of children and elderly people dying of exposure on their way out of the country. Reportedly refugees had been forced to pay substantial bribes to border officials and there were signs
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of maltreatment and beatings, and of cases of malnutrition. There were numerous testimonies of inhabitants forced by police or Serb military or paramilitary forces to leave their homes and Kosovo. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights staff had received accounts of mass executions and killings in Kosovo. Among the refugees were a significant number of handicapped children and adults who required special care. Newly arrived refugees had stated that thousands of Kosovo Albanians had been detained between Mitrovica and Djakovica and were being used as forced labour. As many as 100,000 Kosovo Albanian men were unaccounted for. Alleged sexual assaults and other reported violations against women had been noted. Finally there were obvious devastating economic, social and cultural effects on the situation in Kosovo. The effects of the NATO bombing on the economic and social rights in Serbia were not known.
The High Commissioner called again on responsible authorities in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and on the international community to increase efforts to reach a peaceful resolution of the conflict in order to put an end to the suffering of the people of Kosovo and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The valuable work carried out by international organizations, especially by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, was commended.
LUCIA RUSTAM (Indonesia) said that in 1955, the United Nations had begun introducing promotional activities through the Programme of Advisory Services in the field of human rights. Advisory services and technical cooperation were one of the most effective means of promoting human rights and were to be provided at the request of Governments to develop their national capacities in the field of human rights. Putting excessive emphasis on the protection aspect of human rights and putting aside the promotional aspect often led to the politicization of human-rights deliberations. This unfortunately seemed to be the mood of the Commission, year in year out. The monitoring aspect of the Commission should spend more effort on activities in support of technical cooperation and advisory services.
In June 1998, President Habibie had launched the Indonesia National Plan of Action on Human Rights 1998-2003. It aimed at providing an effective instrument for the fulfilment of the vital aspirations of the Indonesian people for a just and civilized existence. Strategic steps had been taken to develop the national human-rights infrastructure as well as enhance human-rights awareness at all levels of Indonesian society. The Indonesian Government deemed international cooperation to be an important element in the promotion and protection of human rights. Hence it carried out bilateral and multilateral cooperation to support the implementation of its National Plan of Action.
JAVAD AMIN-MANSOUR (Iran) said the call for an enhanced programme of advisory services and technical assistance as well as a more efficient and transparent management of the programme was a turning point in the expansion
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of cooperation. Iran welcomed the report of the Secretary-General on the subject, which indicated an increase in the number of requests for advisory services and technical cooperation. This had signalled a positive trend showing the success of the initiative. It also encouraged human-rights activists to go forward.
Iran was concerned that the Office of the High Commissioner had not been able to meet all requests due to lack of adequate capacity and the fact that programme resources in recent years had not kept pace with the growing number of requests for advisory services from member States and non-governmental organizations. Advisory services and technical cooperation should be provided in an impartial, non-political and transparent manner. The Office of the High Commissioner had acceded to Iran's request for technical assistance and advisory services. The faculty of legal and political science of Tehran University had concluded an agreement with the United Nations Development Programme office in Tehran to implement a four-year joint project on human-rights education and research.
CRISTINA PELLANDINI, of International Committee of the Red Cross, said that on August 12 the ICRC would be celebrating the half-century of the four Geneva Conventions for the protection of war victims. To support efforts made in this field by a growing number of States, the ICRC's Advisory Service on International Law had continued throughout the past year to develop a dialogue with Government authorities in order to offer them practical and technical advice regarding national enforcement of humanitarian-law treaties. Taking advantage of the process of legislative reform that was under way in many States in the area of criminal law and procedure, the Advisory Service had been focusing on the need to prevent repressive war crimes and other serious violations of international humanitarian law (IHL).
Technical advice had also been provided for the drafting of national laws to prevent misuse of the red cross, red crescent and other emblems protected under IHL and for the drafting and implementation of legislation to implement the 1997 Ottawa treaty on anti-personnel landmines. The measures that States needed to adopt to meet their treaty obligations under IHL were varied and complex. An increasing number of States -- 47 so far -- had set up national interministerial committees to facilitate the adoption of these measures. The ICRC's Advisory Service had therefore continued to support the establishment and work of such committees. The activities of ICRC's Advisory Service were complementary to those conducted by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
HASSAN ABDEL MONEIM (Egypt) said the training of security forces had helped Egypt combat all forms of torture. There should be awareness of the indivisibility of human rights, so there should be no double standards or selectivity when it came to voluntary contributions to advisory-services and technical-cooperation programmes and to deciding which countries received help from such programmes.
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JUAN LEON, of Commission for the Defense of Human Rights in Central America (CODEHUCA) and International Indian Treaty Council, said day by day there was an increasing need to strengthen and expand personal, group, institutional and State awareness of the management of human-rights-related subjects. It was essential that specialized teams exist for social groups and States to generated dialogue, negotiations, agreements and treaties, and to establish adequate mechanisms for the solution of structural problems which troubled most countries and which had been the cause of systematic, persistent and serious violations of human rights in Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Ecuador, Paraguay, and other countries.
Guatemala had an urgent need for a United Nations team of experts to help the Government and the Maya community implement the recommendations put forward by the Commission on Truth. There also should be a Special Rapporteur on the independence of the judiciary in the face of impunity. The governments of Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Brazil and other countries with serious human-rights violations in regard to their indigenous populations were called on to demonstrate with Guatemala their cooperation with human-rights Special Rapporteurs.
MIREILLE HECTOR, of Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, said the Committee welcomed the report of the Special Representative on Cambodia, Thomas Hammarberg, and wanted to highlight some areas of concern regarding the human-rights situation in Cambodia. There was a climate of impunity and political interference in the judicial process, as well as harassment of NGOs working to promote and protect human rights. These difficulties posed major obstacles to improvement of the overall human-rights situation in Cambodia. Two recent cases of violence against Cambodian human-rights workers clearly illustrated these concerns. In December 2, two human-rights activities from the Cambodian League for Defense and Promotion of Human Rights were arrested after a demonstration against the dumping of toxic wastes. The Lawyers Committee suggested that in case of a trial, the venue of this trial be changed in order to guarantee its fairness and independence. Also in December 1998, an activist with the Cambodia Human Rights and Development Association was shot six times while standing in the doorway of his home. The motive behind this murder appeared to related to his assistance to 15 families who were fighting forcible eviction from their land by a local gravel company.
The Lawyers Committee for Human Rights fully supported the recommendation of the UN Group of Experts in Cambodia that an international criminal tribunal be established to bring to justice persons responsible for heinous crimes committed during the Khmer Rouge period.
GUY OWONA, of Jeunesse Etudiante Catholique Internationale, in a joint statement with Pax Romana, said violations of human rights in Haiti remained widespread. Theologian and human-rights worker Jean Pierre-Louis had been savagely murdered there last August. In legal matters, his priority was to clean up politics and establish an effective judiciary. Although he had died,
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violations against those who were doing the same work he was doing had continued. The problem of impunity was prevalent in Haiti. Policemen identified as violators of human rights had been released by judges. Several judges had been surprised to find detainees whose warrants were dated 1997, but whose cases had never been heard. There needed to be a plan of action for reforming the judiciary in Haiti. Without it, there was no hope for combatting human-rights problems there.
Assistance from the High Commissioner's office was vital. It was essential that the Commission monitor very carefully violations against human-rights defenders. The High Commissioner's office should also use all of its powers to advise countries that had the most violations.
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