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Clockwise from top: Myanmar – Singapore – Malaysia – Indonesia – Philippines |
From Malaysia to Myanmar, human rights is taking the back stage while progress achieved throughout Southeast Asia in the battle for the respect of such rights is suffering from the obsession with terrorism, as rights activists are bleeding from the defeat handed over by the September 11 attacks on the U.S. and its aftermath.
In December 2001, representatives of dozens of rights organizations from eighteen Asian countries and peoples' groups meeting in Bangkok urged governments in the region to improve their rights records and to protect human rights defenders from violent reprisals.
They said perpetrators of violence against rights defenders in Asia have included military and paramilitary groups, armed rebels, thugs in the service of economic interests, socially powerful groups, as well as other vested interests.
The fact that such abuses are increasing raises the question of the commitment by Asian governments to protect and promote human rights. Such abuses also threaten to undermine some of the fragile democracies in the region, as democracy can only be consolidated where there is a strong and unrestricted civil society, of which human rights defenders are an indispensable part.
Rights activists in Asia emphasized that many Asian governments are using the September 11 attacks in the United States as justification for new national security measures and anti-terrorism campaigns, in many cases directly eroding hard-won human rights protections needed by all citizens.
Arbitrary detention without trial, curtailment of fundamental freedoms, no access to lawyers and, most importantly, no access to the views of those arrested and jailed summarily is common in the U.S. today as it has been for years in Asia.
Malaysia, Singapore, and Brunei (and some time back Indonesia) practice some of the worst anti-rights laws in existence around the world. Burma joined the fray when a military junta jailed opposition leaders of the Democratic Front in the mid-1990s, banishing political opposition in the country.
Freedom of expression - a basic human right - is almost non-existent in Laos, while in Thailand, separatism has been crushed, and with it, the identity of an entire Malay-Muslim group.
In Vietnam and Cambodia the situation is slightly different from what it was during the war years. People now have the right to have different opinions. In Vietnam, however, freedom of expression, as well as respect of human rights, is still to be desired.
In Indonesia, a new democracy is whisking away the right of abuse by both politicians and the military, notwithstanding influential members of the so-called "new era," which under former President Suharto, did almost anything they thought was worth doing.
In the Philippines, democracy remains the driving force behind the rights of the people to seek justice and redress. When politicians tried to suppress those rights, separatism took shape and the country sank into desolation.
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the flamboyant lady President of the economically downtrodden country is battling both army officers and political opponents to re-establish a state of righteousness in the Philippines.
Megawati Sukarnoputri, tempted to overdose Indonesia with the favorite pills of her heroic father Ahmad Sukarno, first president of the largest Muslim nation on earth, is kept at bay by the powerful democratic figures of today.
Incidentally and ironically speaking, it is the very pro-Islam outlook backed by Muslims on the streets and in Parliament, which has emerged as the check and balance in Indonesia.
Democracy today in the country of 212 million Muslims is surviving mostly because of the support it has from the same Muslims who brushed aside a member of the ulama (religious scholars), Abdurrahman Wahid.
Headed by Amien Rais, whose party, the National Mandate Party (PAN), was one of the first to adopt Islam in their constitution. Under the PAN’s leadership, Muslims have formed an ‘axis’ preventing Megawati from going overboard, despite support she has from the military.
Hamza Haz, Indonesia’s vice president, is also a member of the ‘axis’ and was instrumental in the ousting of the lame, ailing and politically-outdated Wahid. Both Haz and Rais today represent icons of democracy and defenders of human rights in Indonesia. And Megawati is indeed, herself, on the same wavelength with them.
The current situation in the restive province of Aceh where the military has a free hand gunning down combatants and civilians is another form of rights abuse that the Asian giant cannot afford to tolerate. However, there seems to be no end to the conflict there.
Malaysia is another country where rights activism has made great leaps forward. This, however, was before September 11. Singapore also took some steps towards a relaxation of rules and laws curbing basic rights of expression. This, again, was before September 11.
In its annual review on the state of human rights in Malaysia, the civil group Suaram described 2001 as "a bad year" for the country and warned of even gloomier days ahead.
Suaram director Kua Kia Soong said 2001 was one bad year for human rights in Malaysia. "If we don't do something about it, we may be heading for stormy weather at the rate things are going," he told a press conference at the Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall in Kuala Lumpur a few weeks ago.
Statistics revealed that 2,520 people were held in 2001 without trial under various preventive detention laws, including the controversial Internal Security Act (ISA).
The SUHAKAM, or the Malaysian Human Rights body, an organization set up by the Foreign Ministry in Kuala Lumpur, has almost given up on its fight against rights abuses, activists say. And politicians from the opposition say SUHAKAM has lost its vibrancy.
The comments by the chairman of the group and former deputy prime minister Musa Hitam that human rights must take the back seat and allow national security concerns to take the lead, has enraged many in Malaysia and elsewhere. Many people believe that SUHAKAM is just a camouflage, not designed to challenge the government, but rather accommodate it.
Asked to give his opinion on comments by Hitam, Party Islam Se-Malaysia (PAS) Secretary General Nasharudin Mat Isa said he was not sure what the SUHAKAM chief meant by human rights taking the back seat. He, however, added with sarcasm, that if SUHAKAM meant that "it should shut its mouth from saying the truth; I think that would be very unprofessional of a respected body."
"We expect an organization like that, which is not supposed to be related in anyway to the government, an independent organization like SUHAKAM, should be in the forefront to say what is right, what is true, especially in defending the rights of the oppressed in this country," he added.
Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has repeatedly said the West - once blamed the Malaysian government for its use of the ISA and human rights violations - is now learning from Malaysia on how to deal with terrorism.
"It is a serious misinformation because even though the United States and Britain have made new legislation, those are not meant to detain their own citizens without trial," Suaram said, adding that "The September 11 attacks provided further fodder for the government to not only arrest arbitrarily, but also to justify the use of draconian laws."
Singapore's arrest of 15 Muslims under its own ISA and the subsequent jailing of those arrested for two years without trial, is also a setback that will definitely hurt the surge in human rights in the tiny island-nation.
The complete media blackout on those arrested does not help the cause against terrorism or rebellion in any of the countries on earth. The accused have the right to express themselves and it is the courtesy of the governments to allow the suspects to defend themselves.
No one gains when there is no fair trial, less when there is no trial at all. No trial and a lengthy detention of suspects is an abuse of individual's rights perpetrated by oppressive regimes under the cover of the fight against terror, says an analyst in Jakarta who strongly opposes both terrorism and legislation like that in Malaysia and Singapore.
But then does that mean the ISA, for example, is doomed, and governments, from the U.S. to Singapore and elsewhere, would not have an upper hand on terrorist activities?
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