Sep 9, 2019
At the opening of the 42nd session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the ICJ and other NGOs call on States and intergovernmental organisations to address systemic failures of the rule of law in China.
Key concerns include lack of due process, lack of an independent and impartial judiciary, unjustified restrictions on freedom of expression, association and assembly, and on the freedom of lawyers to practice their profession, and other restrictions on civic space.
The letter reads as follows:
Open letter on the rule of law in China
9 September 2019
Across the People’s Republic of China, human rights violations are a systemic reality. Over the past year, the UN has once again documented legal and policy frameworks that fail to protect against discrimination; stigmatise Islam and stifle freedom of religious belief; undermine a wide range of socioeconomic rights and those who defend them; and permit gross violations of due process, including secret trials and arbitrary and incommunicado detention.
Over the past year, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet and other international human rights experts, as well as governments have pressed for access to China, in particular to Uyghur, Tibetan and other ethnic areas. The High Commissioner has urged dialogue and a de-escalation of violence in Hong Kong, following allegations of excessive use of force by police to disperse massive public protests and the criminalisation of demonstrators.
Independent experts of the UN Human Rights Council have requested information and prompt action from the government regarding a broad range of alleged violations and especially the criminalisation of human rights defenders and civil society, such as citizen journalists, lawyers, democracy movement leaders, religious leaders, workers’ rights activists, social workers, public health advocates and students.
In June of this year, more than two dozen governments informed the High Commissioner and the Human Rights Council president of their concerns about the use of re-education camps to target Uyghur and other Muslim minority groups in western China. They reiterated the need for prompt, independent and unfettered access.
Despite these efforts at engagement, the Chinese government has refused to allow independent visits of relevant human rights experts, including the Special Procedures of the UN Human Rights Council; refused constructive dialogue, sowed disinformation and stoked violence in Hong Kong; used a push for sinicisation to eliminate cultural and religious diversity; and continued a fierce campaign against critics within China and many abroad, including other States. Chinese officials have stated, clearly and forcefully in public and in private, that ‘China is a country of rule of law’ and ‘will not accept interference in its internal affairs’.
This is patently misleading.
The Communist Party of China uses China’s laws to maintain state power, not to ensure justice. Overly broad charges that do not comply with the principle of legality are used to wrongfully detain, prosecute, and convict individuals for the peaceful exercise of internationally protected rights and participation in public affairs. In effect, any person who expresses views that differ from the Party narrative, or who seeks to highlight negative impacts of Party and government policies, can be caught in the crosshairs of criminalisation.
The Chinese government has refined and replicated a practice of characterizing all difference or dissent as terrorism, subversion, or a threat to national security. The tactics deployed in Hong Kong are regularly used against Uyghur and Tibetan peoples to justify a hard-line crackdown on the legitimate exercise of human rights. This is a dangerous departure from international human rights standards.
Furthermore, the Chinese government’s human rights record is no longer an issue limited by its borders. The government has actively used laws and practices to disappear and detain foreign nationals, restrict access to information overseas, conduct surveillance of Chinese nationals and other exile communities, embolden its law enforcement outside Chinese borders, and impede public participation, sustainable development and transparency in third countries where China has political and economic interests.
Human rights defenders of all kinds have been specifically targeted. The silence of the international community has not only allowed this to decimate civil society within China, but also to endanger civil society, defenders and other individuals critical of the Chinese government wherever they may be, including in the halls of the UN.
The same laws that allow the arbitrary deprivation of liberty of lawyers, public interest advocates, housing rights activists, and Christians in China’s wealthy eastern areas are further refined and weaponised against ethnic and religious minorities in the west of the country, including Tibet, where international access is a significant concern. The large-scale detention program in Xinjiang, which has detained Uyghurs and other minorities, may amount to crimes against humanity.
Read and download the full letter here, in PDF format: UN-Advocacy-OpenLetter-China-2019
Sep 8, 2019 | News
At a training event for senior prosecutors hosted by the Union Attorney General’s Office (UAGO) on 7 September 2019 in Yangon, Nay Pyi Taw, the ICJ made presentations on the international standards and legal obligation on unlawful killings.
Representing each of Myanmar’s 14 states and regions, some 30 law officers attended the activity, which was a capacity-building training hosted by the UAGO. This is part of the ICJ’s ongoing engagement with authorities in Myanmar as well as in neighboring countries on the Minnesota Protocol on the investigation of potentially unlawful death (the Minnesota Protocol).
The Minnesota Protocol provides guidance on the State’s implementation of its duty under international law to investigate potentially unlawful killings, including when State actors may have been involved. It applies to deaths under custody, suspicious deaths, and enforced disappearances. Myanmar has experienced widespread incidents of such deaths, including in recent years those constituting serious crimes under international law.
ICJ Associate Legal Adviser, Jenny Domino, introduced salient points of the Minnesota Protocol and shared relevant examples from experience promoting and protecting human rights in the Philippines. She highlighted the significance of the State’s duty to investigate potentially unlawful killings in upholding the right to life under international human rights law.
ICJ Legal Researcher, Ja Seng Ing, shared the case of Laotian activist Sombath Somphone, who was subjected to enforced disappearance on 15 December 2012 with the apparent consent or acquiescence of State agents. To date, Laotian authorities have failed to conduct effective investigations with a view to revealing the fate or whereabouts of Somphone. ICJ has repeatedly called for accountability on the issue.
Participants discussed these cases in relation to the comparative remedies and practical challenges related to the conduct of investigations in Myanmar, where police and prosecutors both have roles to play in the conduct of investigations.
First published in 1991 and subsequently revised in 2016 under the auspices of the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Minnesota Protocol includes guidelines on conducting investigations to ensure that they are prompt; effective and thorough; impartial and independent; and transparent.
Since December 2017, the ICJ has co-hosted several regional workshops in Asia focused on this topic, with lawyers, academics, and State authorities from Thailand, Cambodia, Nepal, India, and Myanmar attending the events.
See also:
https://www.icj.org/thailand-launch-of-the-revised-minnesota-protocol/
https://www.icj.org/myanmar-reverse-laws-and-practices-that-perpetuate-military-impunity-new-icj-report/
Sep 7, 2019
An open letter to the UN Secretary General signed by 16 international NGOs regarding the recent report by Gert Rosenthal, “A Brief and Independent Inquiry into the Involvement of the United Nations in Myanmar from 2010 to 2018.”
The Rosenthal report describes the UN’s failure to stop, mitigate, or even draw attention to violence that the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission found amounted to crimes under international law including crimes against humanity, and warrants an investigation of the crime of genocide against Rohingya.
Download the letter here: Myanmar-Letter UNSG Rosenthal-Advocacy-open letters-2019-ENG.pdf
Sep 6, 2019 | News
The ICJ, along with 124 other international and domestic civil society groups from around the world have condemned the actions of Indian government in publishing an incomplete and discriminatory Assam National Register of Citizens (NRC) on 31 August, 2019.
The NRC excludes some 1.9 million people – nearly 6 percent of the population of Assam – thereby rendering them at risk of statelessness. The statement points to violations of rights to equality and non-discrimination, as the process has disproportionately affected Muslims of Bengali descent, undocumented women and children as well as other minorities.
The groups call on India to take measures to redress the situation in a non- discriminatory and non-arbitrary manner, with full regard to due process rights and a commitment to protect the right to a nationality and to avoid statelessness of all long-term residents and their children.
Arbitrary deprivation of nationality is a human rights violation, which undermines the enjoyment of the human rights of those affected and their ability to participate fully in society. International law prohibits the arbitrary deprivation of nationality and obliges States to avoid statelessness, while guaranteeing the right of every child to acquire and preserve their nationality and to be protected from statelessness.
In 2015, the Assam state government, pursuant to a Supreme Court decision, announced it would initiate a process of updating the NRC, requiring every person in Assam who recognized themselves as an Indian citizen, to submit proof of their ancestry (or birth) in the country pre-dating 1971, the year that Bangladesh was formed. The act of requiring individuals to prove their citizenship by providing documentary evidence dating back over 50 years, and excluding applicants on the basis of their inability to fulfill this evidentiary burden, has led to arbitrary deprivation of nationality, contrary to Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Further, poor birth registration rates, despite an obligation under Article 7 of the Convention of the Rights of the Child to immediately register every birth has denied numerous applicants of a critical piece of evidence to establish their citizenship. Similarly, many people who possessed the required documents, have nonetheless been penalized due to administrative errors.
Despite repeated calls to action by UN human rights authorities, India has refused to reverse the process and other States have done little to press the Indian government to reverse course.
Those excluded from the list must appeal within 120 days to Foreigners Tribunals (FT), a quasi-judicial institution mandated to determine citizenship. In essence, this implies that the government already considers those excluded from the NRC to be foreigners, and not Indian citizens.
Find the full statement, endorsed by the ICJ and 124 other international and domestic civil society groups from around the world here: https://files.institutesi.org/cso-joint-statement-on-assam-nrc.pdf
Contact:
Maitreyi Gupta (Delhi), ICJ International Legal Adviser for India, t: +91 7756028369 e: maitreyi.gupta(a)icj.org
Frederick Rawski, ICJ Asia-Pacific Director, t: +66 64 478 1121; e: frederick.rawski(a)icj.org
Sep 4, 2019 | News
From 2 to 3 September 2019, the ICJ co-hosted a workshop in Bangkok for justice sector authorities from Thailand on ‘Human Rights Compliant Criminal Investigation and Investigative Interviewing’. The event focused on international law and standards regarding investigative interviewing of victims, witnesses and suspects in criminal cases.
The workshop was co-hosted with Thailand’s Ministry of Justice and the Norwegian Centre of Human Rights, University of Oslo.
The participants included 50 criminal investigators, public prosecutors, representatives of the Ministry of Justice’s Department of Special Investigation (DSI), the Internal Security Operations Command, Ministry of Defense’s Judge Advocate General’s Office, the National Anti-Corruption Commission, the Office of the Narcotics Control Board and the Royal Police Cadet Academy.
A primary objective of the workshop was to promote and explain the principle that interviews which are conducted in compliance with human rights standards produce much more effective results without resort to torture, ill-treatment or coercion. The workshop also addressed the problem of a ‘confession culture’ and looked into how unlawful interrogations threatened the quality and legitimacy of justice sector officials and bodies in meting criminal justice. Participants also conducted discussions and participated in group activities on human memory, investigative management and the conducting of interviews grounded in fundamental principles of international human rights law.
Speakers at the Workshop included:
- Aim-orn Siangyai, Deputy Director General of Thailand’s Rights and Liberties Protection Department, Ministry of Justice;
- Frederick Rawski, Asia Pacific Regional Director, ICJ;
- Gisle Kvanvig, Programme Director for ASEAN/Vietnam, Norwegian Center for Human Rights;
- Asbjørn Rachlew and Dr. Ivar A. Fahsing, experienced investigators from the Norwegian Police Department;
- Lilian M. Stein, Professor at the Psychology Postgraduate Department, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul; and
- Mary Schollum, a criminologist and lead drafter of the Universal Guidelines on Investigative Interviewing.
Background
This workshop is part of the ICJ’s ongoing efforts to ensure the domestic implementation of international law and standards in crime investigation.
Previous ICJ workshops on the above topic have included:
Regional Workshops
National Workshops
