SE Asia divided on human rights
Monday, 30 July 2007
MANILA, July 29 (AFP): Southeast Asian nations headed into a week of security and political talks Sunday looking to seal a landmark cooperation deal but sharply divided on how to deal with human rights abuses -- and each other.
Despite two years of work, the 10-nation ASEAN bloc failed to hammer out agreement on a proposed human rights commission as part of a new charter that the group will approve this week and formally adopt later in the year.
Diplomats said strong opposition from military-ruled Myanmar, a bane of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and a target of international sanctions, had helped scupper the commission.
"There was no agreement," one diplomat who asked not to be named told the news agency.
The charter is intended to turn ASEAN, which marks its 40th anniversary next month, into a rules-based organisation roughly along the lines of the European Union, with norms that all countries adhere to.
Struggling to shake off a tradition of non-interference in each other's affairs, however, the bloc could not agree on how to punish those who violate those norms or on a human rights commission to investigate members' behaviour.
Sanctions for punishment have been ruled out of the charter, and Sunday's failure on the commission means the bloc effectively has only a matter of weeks to try again before the document is adopted at a Singapore summit in November.
"There is a universal declaration of human rights in the charter of the United Nations," Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo of the Philippines, whose country has been pressing the issue, said Saturday as the talks dragged on.
"It's a universal desire that there must be a human rights commission, and I believe that ASEAN can do no less," he said.
Member states have also battled over whether to abandon their policy of operating on consensus in favour of taking decisions by vote -- a move which would also amount to forcing individual countries to abide by group rules.
That has been a particularly tricky question when it comes to Myanmar.
The pariah state, formerly known as Burma, has drawn international sanctions due to its slow moves to restore democracy and the continued house arrest of democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
"Non-interference in internal affairs may have been the factor that has kept socially responsible ASEAN members silent over human rights violations in the past," said Tint Swe, a member of her political party living in exile.
"The time has come to change that attitude," he told the news agency.
The foreign ministers of ASEAN -- which groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam -- were to open their meetings Sunday night.
Despite two years of work, the 10-nation ASEAN bloc failed to hammer out agreement on a proposed human rights commission as part of a new charter that the group will approve this week and formally adopt later in the year.
Diplomats said strong opposition from military-ruled Myanmar, a bane of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and a target of international sanctions, had helped scupper the commission.
"There was no agreement," one diplomat who asked not to be named told the news agency.
The charter is intended to turn ASEAN, which marks its 40th anniversary next month, into a rules-based organisation roughly along the lines of the European Union, with norms that all countries adhere to.
Struggling to shake off a tradition of non-interference in each other's affairs, however, the bloc could not agree on how to punish those who violate those norms or on a human rights commission to investigate members' behaviour.
Sanctions for punishment have been ruled out of the charter, and Sunday's failure on the commission means the bloc effectively has only a matter of weeks to try again before the document is adopted at a Singapore summit in November.
"There is a universal declaration of human rights in the charter of the United Nations," Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo of the Philippines, whose country has been pressing the issue, said Saturday as the talks dragged on.
"It's a universal desire that there must be a human rights commission, and I believe that ASEAN can do no less," he said.
Member states have also battled over whether to abandon their policy of operating on consensus in favour of taking decisions by vote -- a move which would also amount to forcing individual countries to abide by group rules.
That has been a particularly tricky question when it comes to Myanmar.
The pariah state, formerly known as Burma, has drawn international sanctions due to its slow moves to restore democracy and the continued house arrest of democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
"Non-interference in internal affairs may have been the factor that has kept socially responsible ASEAN members silent over human rights violations in the past," said Tint Swe, a member of her political party living in exile.
"The time has come to change that attitude," he told the news agency.
The foreign ministers of ASEAN -- which groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam -- were to open their meetings Sunday night.