Gwangju Declaration on the occasion of 20th anniversary of adoption of Asian Human Rights Charter

A number of human rights activists and others interested in the cause of human rights gathered at the city of Gwangju for several days to discuss three declarations: Right to Justice, Right to Peace and Right to Culture.

The discussions on these documents centered around the problem of the gap between the United Nations’ human rights conventions and the period to practically implement them in the developing countries, particularly in the countries of Asia.

The participants discussed the problems of very widespread extrajudicial killings that are taking place in many of the countries of Asia. It particularly noted the problems of large scale of extrajudicial killings that have taken place under President Duterte in the Philippines. Similar extrajudicial killings have happened in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka and many other countries. Most of extrajudicial killings are in the form of enforced disappearances, which is also widely practiced in many of the countries in Asia. What the ‘enforced disappearances means, the abduction in place of arrest, detention and another’s pressure for such detention, torture, killings and the disposal of bodies. Despite of high public condemnations of such violent crimes as enforced disappearances they had hardly been any successful investigation, or prosecution of any of the offenders of this crime from any of the countries. There is a conspiracy to protect the offenders of such crime. Years and years of campaigning by mothers of the disappeared and other social movements, there is hardly any response except things like appointments of some commissions, or projects relating to disappearances, which are merely created only for camouflaging the issue and not to do anything, that may be called an effective remedy the human rights violation and the Article 2 of ICCPR.

Equally disturbing is the manner in which torture is practicing of many of the Asian countries in the course a criminal investigation. Even in investigations into petty crimes, the most brutal forms of torture is being a practice. Closer examination of the widespread practice of torture clearly demonstrates that guaranteeing of the rights of the accused has to be a part of the administrative of criminal justice in the Asian region. And the gathering of the evidence of the way of the torture also points to the fact that often these cases does not end by way of a fair trial in an open court. Torture is being used to bring about forced settlements and whatever complaints that are to be made on the issue also is not investigated simply because there is no credible authority to investigate into the absence of the police or security forces. Investigations done by the security forces are often meant to bring settlements in the meantime and to hash out these complaints.

Personal security which is the aim of the state to provide is no longer considered as the ideal that the state agencies should follow. Doctrine of public security has virtually repressed the notion of the international law relating to personal security of every citizen. The primary task of a state is to protect an individual citizen. That was the basic notion that has prevailed for several centuries and the basis in which many of the criminal justice institutions are being built. However, other than the verbal agreement on the issue of personal security, there is no really trust and the individual is threatened almost in the ways that pre-democratic societies used to treat the subjects. What is being undermined this way is the very notion of a democratic state. While all the constitutions speak about the need to improve a democracy in that of all the basics that goes to constitute a democratic state.

The absence of personal security drags the individuals into the most powerless positions. There are manifest tendencies in many of the countries that many of the people are abandoned with their basic rights for to live in peace without any further harassment. Search for justice leads to further harassments and people realizing this and very often having experience this to begin to draw upon themselves and accept humiliating forms of settlements by willingly abandoning their own rights.

The denial of civil and political rights also lead to very extreme form of poverty, which produces such frightening experiences as malnutrition and wasting of a human beings. Impact of malnutrition and such wasting is to create a retarded individual who will suffer the consequences of these experiences for the rest of their life. The government turns the blind eye to this horrible experience even such governments as the government of India just used all the resources to feed its entity of the population. The emergency measures that used to be adopted whenever the malnutrition appears are now not so vigorously pursued. This virtually tremendous a crime against the population has not been seriously dealt with even by international human rights and humanitarian agencies.

Denial of education in particularly to poor sections of society is too frequent occurrence now. Those who can afford create private schools for themselves and by usual their children receives an excellent education. This possibility exist only a very small section of the full population. There are schools without children because the children and parents find that their school do not provide them the proper education seizes to take interest in attending to these schools. There are schools without teachers, schools without facilities that are necessary to provide a proper education.

The same can be said of the right to proper healthcare. While a new island of affluences is create within which the latest achievements of medical science could be provided for those who can pay, the poor are denied of such treatment, and often prematurely die that need not come under circumstance that leads to death. The absence of the expenditure on development of cultural activities is an encouragement of creativity as virtually brought to a standstill. Many creative ventures that used to take place in developed countries. Development of cinema, development of mass communication facilities for educational and ethical purposes and providing opportunities for association among people to improve solidarity among the persons who have suffered in negatives.

In the midst of these clarifying occurrences, new problems have emerged that is role of mass migration and in some instances pushing the minor population away from where they used to live forcing them for situation of statelessness and absence of places to stay. Some such instances have been noted as possible of crimes against humanity. Still, getting some action done and how emergency measures with the intervention of the UN special agencies for these things have also setbacks due to poor allocation of funds.

Another aspects of migration is the transport of the people which is known as trafficking of human individual often for sexual purposes or for slavery. People unable to make a living begin to sell themselves and their selling can take in many shocking forms. People selling their organs in order to get some money for surviving their families has been reported quite often. The level of destitution is as such that today most kind of inhuman acts do not even attract public condemnation or public attempt to intervene to find ways to resolve problems. There is throughout the countries a paralysis of will to address the social evils that they are facing in their countries. The paralysis of the will influences the type of culture that prevails in these countries. All indifference to what happens in name and all sufferings has become common features.

Within such contexts, breakdown of peace is only natural. And the possibility of nuclear war even looms in Asian region. Much of the talk about disarmament of nuclear weapons remain more at the sentimental level than at any practical levels. No organized attempts can be seen in addressing this issue. The use of weapons of the mass destruction and also the use of conventional weapons to create extraordinary crimes is very much happening in the area.

Making use of this situation, there has a reason that menace affects survival of people. There is menace of trafficking of drugs. In some countries, this has been so widespread and there are nothing to stop such spreading. The people are willing to even expose the young people to take drugs into extrajudicial killings, but that is no solution to this problem.  Again, what is lacking is the consensus to fight this evil. All powerful social forces benefit from the drug trade and even acquires large wealth that they are unwilling to openly oppose this evil.

Societys stability depends on the ability to maintain institutions that can guarantee security, meaning personal security. These situations are with police’s prosecution branches and judiciary. Unfortunately, these branches have been exposed to so many problems and deprived of the human and financial resources that they are unable to cope up with any of these problems. Besides, independence of judiciary has often been undermined by the executive and legislature in many countries. Separation of power is being paid only lip service but in a real sense, judiciary is treated as a secondary power or which has no real capacity to stop the wrongs that are done by the legislature and executive.

In this context, people’s movements need a new perspective to deal with the present situation. The new kind of solidarity need to be emerged within which dragging people into extreme forms of poverty and absence of personal security should be brought into public discourse and the conversations should take place all the time about change. This conversation can only be created by active agents and civil society and those who are committed to democracy. They unfortunately lack a perspective and as told by a poet that “lack of conviction”. We need a self-reflection, and internal reflection about our own roles and rediscovery of the attempts to define human life, human freedom and all that goes in the name of democracy and human rights.

This is the message of the three declarations which are now added to the Asian Charter. These three declarations will form an addition to the Asian Human Rights Charter and will help discuss these contemporary matters in order to make the Asian Charter as an instruments with rights in the difficult times.