The U.N General Assembly will meet on 17 May to elect new members to the Human Rights Council. Within the Asian group, India,Indonesia, Philippine and Qatar will bid for one seat each. Since the seats were uncontested, candidates hope to secure a further three years on the Council. Concerned with their pledges and commitments, NGOs today submitted open letters to the Indonesian and Philppines Presidents.
Regional Human Rights Network issues concerns over Indonesia’s and the Philippines’ uncontested bids for re-election to the UN Human Rights Council

The U.N. General Assembly will meet on 17 May to elect 14 new members to the 47-nation Human Rights Council. Within the Asian Group, four candidates (India, Indonesia, the Philippines and Qatar) will be running for four seats. In view of the uncontested nature of the vote, which will secure candidates a further three years on the Human Rights Council, a list of concerns regarding the ASEAN members’ pledges and commitments was today sent in open letters to the Presidents of Indonesia and the Philippines. The letter, from Asia Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA) and its partners, urges the Governments of both countries to:

• Play a leadership role within the Human Rights Council to address human rights concerns that arise from within the ASEAN region. In particular, more needs to be done to highlight the grave human rights violations that continue to occur within Myanmar. As Mr. Anselmo Lee, Executive Director of FORUM-ASIA, observes with regards to Indonesia, “As a member of the UN Security Council that abstained from voting on the proposed resolution on Myanmar with the argument that the issue should be dealt with by the Human Rights Council, we expect to see much more from Indonesia on bringing this issue forward.”
• Become more active within ASEAN in pushing for the inclusion of human rights and an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism in the first draft of the ASEAN Charter (to be presented to the 13th ASEAN Summit in Singapore in November). Mr. Lee states, “With this year marking ASEAN’s 40th anniversary, it is about time that this regional organisation began to live up to its responsibilities and assume the task of helping to protect and promote the human rights of the ASEAN people.”
• Make available to its citizens the full range of individual complaints mechanisms offered through UN human rights treaties. With Asia being the only continent without a regional human rights mechanism, the Governments in the region have an even greater responsibility to ratify relevant optional protocols and issue the relevant declarations under the core human rights treaties to make available to their people alternative means of protection against human rights violations.
• Be more proactive in pushing for the strengthening of the UN special procedures system (independent experts mandated to report on human rights violations around the world) during this key period of institution building within the Human Rights Council. Described by former Secretary-General Kofi Annan as the “crown jewels” of the UN human rights machinery, Mr. Lee urges the Governments of Indonesia and the Philippines to “look beyond narrow self-interest and recognise the special importance of special procedures to the people of Asia who do not have an alternative human rights mechanism to turn to.”

FORUM-ASIA and its partners urge the Philippines to:

• Do more to tackle extra-judicial killings and involuntary disappearances by seriously considering allegations against its own armed forces. Mr. Lee adds, “More fundamental reform programmes need to be initiated, including systematic human rights training for the military, security and police, along with the strengthening of the National Human Rights Commission to provide it with independent powers to initiate investigations and prosecutions.” The Government should also accept the request for a visit by the special procedures’ Working Group on enforced and involuntary disappearances, and implement the recommendations emerging from the 2007 visit of the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.
• Specify how its anti-terrorism policies (including the 2007 Human Security Act) integrate respect for human rights, as the Government has proclaimed, and to accept the request for a visit by the Special Rapporteur on human rights and counter terrorism.
• Ratify the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (abolition of the death penalty).
• Ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture (allowing for independent visits to places of detention), emphasising that the pledge to sign and ratify was contained in the Philippines’ previous list of pledges and commitments for the inaugural Human Rights Council Elections in 2006.
• Ratify the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Mr. Lee emphasises that “it has now been nearly six and a half years since the Philippines signed the Statute, and there continues to be a lack of progress in moving towards ratification.”
• Submit the thirteen overdue state reports to the relevant UN human rights treaty bodies¹.
• [In the absence of a standing invitation to special procedures] Respond to individual requests for country visits that have been made by the Special Rapporteur (SR) on migrants (requested in 2006), the SR on toxic waste (2005), the SR on freedom of expression and opinion (2004), the SR on the right to food (2006), the Working Group on enforced and involuntary disappearances (2006), the SR on human rights and counter terrorism (2005), and the International Expert on the question of human rights and extreme poverty (2006).

FORUM-ASIA and its partners urge Indonesia to:

• Show more leadership, as the world’s most populous Muslim nation, in demonstrating the compatibility of Islam and human rights, and to properly address conservative interpretations of religion within Indonesia that threaten to undermine basic human rights standards. “To accept the requests for country visits by the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, and the Special Rapporteur on the right to freedom of opinion and expression would be a good start” says Mr. Lee.
• Implement its previous commitments and pledges regarding the ratification of existing key human rights treaties prior to the inaugural Human Rights Council Elections in 2006². Mr. Lee adds that, “Not only is it vital that these treaties are ratified from a human rights standpoint, but also for the reason that it was on the basis of the pledges made in April 2006 that Indonesia secured its election onto the Human Rights Council.”
• Ratify the remaining optional protocols to the core human rights treaties³. As Mr. Lee emphasises, “They represent the very basic human rights standards to which any member of the Human Rights Council should be committed to.”
• [In the absence of a standing invitation to special procedures] Respond to individual requests for country visits that have been made by the Special Rapporteur (SR) on summary executions (requested in 2004), the SR on freedom of religion or belief (1996), and the SR on the right to freedom of opinion and expression (2002). Mr. Lee states, “For Indonesia to take up to 11 years to respond requests for visits from special procedures is clearly not the behaviour of a responsible member of the Human Rights Council.”
• Strengthen the National Human Rights Commission (komnas ham) by providing sufficient funding and manpower. Mr. Lee emphasises that “employing 160 staff members and providing an annual budget of Rp 40 billion (US$4.3 million) to cover a nation of 245 million people is not sufficient.” Furthermore, action needs to be taken to ensure that recommendations from the Commission are implemented, and members of the government, military, House of Representatives, Attorney General’s Office and judiciary are obliged to cooperate with the investigations of the Commission.

¹ These are: CCPR, third periodic report, due November 2006; ICERD, fifteenth periodic report, due January 1998; ICERD, sixteenth periodic report, due January 2000; ICERD, seventeenth periodic report, due January 2002; ICERD, eighteenth periodic report, due January 2004; ICERD, nineteenth periodic report, due January 2006; CAT, second periodic report, due June 1992; CAT, third periodic report, due June 1996; CAT, fourth periodic report, due June 2000; CAT, fifth periodic report, due June 2004; Optional Protocol to CRC on children in armed conflict, initial report, due September 2005; Optional Protocol to the CRC on the sale of children, initial report, due June 2004; Convention on the Rights of Migrant Workers, initial report, due July 2004.

³ These are: the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (allowing for independent visits to places of detention); and the Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (aiming at the abolition of the death penalty).

See also

• 
  Open letter to the Philippine Government and attached document on the "Philippines’ commitments and voluntary pledges in relation to its candidature for re-election to the UN Human Rights Council or the term 2007-2010"
• Open letter to the Indonesian Government and attached document on "Indonesia’s commitments and voluntary pledges in relation to its candidature for re-election to the UN Human Rights Council for the term 2007-2010"

For more information, please contact Mr. Daniel Collinge, FORUM-ASIA (Bangkok), Programme Officer on ASEAN Advocacy, at [email protected], tel: (66-2) 391-8801 ext 603; or Mr. Anselmo Lee, FORUM-ASIA (Bangkok), Executive Director, at [email protected].