September 5, 2010
Harper government eroding democracy, human rights: Amnesty head
By Harry Sterling, Edmonton Journal
Opponents
of Prime Minister Harper claim he is an ideologically driven
authoritarian, intolerant of opinions contrary to his own and
contemptuous of the traditional give-and-take of parliamentary
democracy.
Although
the jury may still be out on whether such views are well founded, an
unexpected new critic of his government has entered the picture:
Amnesty International, the world's leading defender of human rights.
And what
Amnesty International's new secretary general has to say about the
human rights approach of Harper's government is sobering for those who
support such fundamental rights as freedom of opinion and respect for
democratic principles.
Amnesty
International's new leader, 49-year-old Salil Shetty, told delegates
attending the Aug. 23 CIVICUS World Assembly meeting held in Montreal
on citizen participation in society that his organization was worried
about human rights in Canada.
Shetty
stated: "Amnesty International is more and more concerned about the
serious worsening of the human rights approach of this government."
"There is
a real shrinking of democratic spaces in this country ... Many
organizations have lost their funding for raising inconvenient
questions." (A reference to the case of several Canadian NGOs which
discovered their long-standing funding arrangements with the federal
authorities terminated by the Harper government, including one NGO
falsely accused by cabinet minister Jason Kenney of being anti-Semitic.)
Shetty
also castigated the Harper government for its indifference towards the
imprisonment and military trial in Guantanamo, Cuba, of Canadian-born
Omar Khadr, who, when a fifteen-year-old youth was captured fighting
for al-Qaida in Afghanistan by the Americans and accused of throwing a
grenade which killed a U.S. soldier.
Shetty
said Omar Khadr should never have been imprisoned and that his trial
violated international law on child soldiers. He urged the government
to seek Omar Khadr's release.
In press
interviews, the new Amnesty leader said the Harper government's
unwillingness to sign the International Covenant on Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples was a major disappointment. He suggested Canada used to be
first in such things.
Shetty
said Canada is now taking much more different positions on issues such
as torture and the death penalty where it once was far more progressive.
In remarks
last June at the founding of a new human rights oriented coalition,
Voices-Voix, Alex Neve, the secretary general of Amnesty International
Canada, said: "It is vitally important that concrete steps be taken
immediately to arrest this erosion. Canada's reputation as a human
rights leader is on the line."
The new
Voices-Voix coalition, comprised of various human rights groups,
women's movements, aboriginal, labour, environmental, student,
religious and development organizations, issued a "Raise Your Voices"
declaration in June, calling upon the Harper government to respect the
right to freedom of opinion and expression, act in accordance with
Canada's democratic traditions and values, and be transparent.
The
declaration states that "Since 2006 the Government of Canada has
systematically undermined democratic institutions and practices, and
has eroded the protection of free speech, and other fundamental human
rights. It has deliberately set out to silence the voices of
organizations or individuals who raise concerns about government
policies or disagree with government positions."
Shetty's
own comments about the government's policies on various human rights
issues are remarkable for their bluntness, especially since in the past
Amnesty's annual report on Canada normally was focused on relatively
mild criticism of the plight of this country's indigenous people,
particularly those on reservations lacking adequate living conditions
and infrastructures. (In recent times, human rights organizations have
also questioned the role of provincial human rights tribunes vis-a-vis
freedom of speech.)
But describing the Canadian government of undermining democracy itself is an unprecedented action by any standard.
However, such blunt criticism is unlikely to be the last.
Shetty's
own background will ensure that. For the past six years he has been
Director of the United Nations Millenium program, gaining considerable
global respect for his endeavours in that high priority issue. In
addition, as the first Indian national to head Amnesty International,
Shetty comes from a family of militants, both his father and mother
active in India's human rights movement, the father arrested on several
occasions for his activism.
According
to Amnesty's new leader, "... the lesson I learnt was that the root of
injustice is people who have captured power abusing it -- and holding
those people to account is what Amnesty is all about."
And unlike
those before him, Shetty apparently does not intend to limit Amnesty's
major attention on solely political repression and such things as
government-sanctioned torture but rather expand its role in other
areas, including education, culture and the environment.
He wants
to emphasize the indivisibility of all rights and to find new ways of
connecting economic, social and cultural rights with civil and
political rights. "The only way to address economic and climate
injustice, caused by the reckless abuse of power and blatant violation
of human rights by governments and corporations, is for ordinary people
across the world to stand up for their rights."
Under
Shetty's leadership Amnesty International seems set to be far more
militant in promoting a broadened range of perceived human rights for
ordinary people everywhere, including Canada.
******
Harry Sterling is a retired foreign service officer. He lives in Ottawa.
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Original link: Edmonton Journal, September 5, 2010
http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Harper+government+eroding+democracy+human+rights+Amnesty+head/3484439/story.html
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