Hina Jilani, UN Special Representative on Human Rights Defenders

Mr. Chair Person, friends, fellow human rights defenders, it is a great privilege for me to be able to participate in this gathering of human rights defenders today. Many of the people that I see today in the audience are those with whom I have had the privilege of working for many years in my capacity as a human rights defender in my own country, in my own region and at the international level. I am also very satisfied and happy to see amongst the defenders gathered here today some of those in the case of whom the United Nations human rights mechanisms were able to act and perhaps give them a level of safety and security which makes it possible for them to be amongst us today. Let me, above all, thank Front Line for making it possible for human rights defenders from so many parts of the world to be gathered here today. I cannot overstate the value of this contribution. These gatherings, in the first place, impress upon human rights defenders themselves the legitimacy and the value of the work that they do, when we meet each other, when we see each other engaged in the same kind of activity in their parts of the world, and we find these are activities for which they are being commemorated, these are the activities which are being held as valuable activities all over the world. This gives us more confidence to work for the promotion and protection of human rights however difficult the circumstances in which we work may be. This is a very important contribution in order to build solidarity and strengthen the solidarity between those who work for the promotion and protection of human rights in different contexts and at different levels of safety and security. I must also state here that being a human rights defender I know how important it is for my own feeling of security that I have a community of defenders around me towards whom I look for protection. These gatherings strengthen the prospects for creating networks of human rights defenders which are ultimately the best source of protection for all of us. I think in that context the work that Front Line is doing is extremely commendable. They are a young organisation but have been able to make a mark in the world today through the contacts and the friends that they have and the friendships that they have built throughout the world.

Before I say anything else I have to express my deepest regrets and sense of personal loss at the death of Sergio Vierra deMello who had given the office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, as the High Commissioner himself, a leadership that spelt the mainstreaming of human rights within the UN system. I think the incident which lead to his death is symbolic of the malaise that we experience today. And it reflects several aspects of that malaise. It puts a great deal of emphasis on what the role of the United Nations has to be in the establishment of peace and security in the world and how human rights have to be the basis on which this commitment has to be sustained. What happened in Baghdad some weeks ago gives us room for thought and for reflection but above all strengthens the commitment that those who serve the United Nations and perhaps will be able to find the ways and means of combating this menace in a manner in which the several objectives of the UN will be better served. I’ve been told today that there will be an opportunity for me and for everybody here to be able to exchange ideas and have a short discussion session after my statement. This will be a very valuable opportunity for me, not just to apprise you of my concerns but to be able to get more feedback from the human rights defenders community that enables me to better implement the mandate with which I have been interested.

First of all of course, in the context of this mandate on human rights defenders, the major human rights instrument is the declaration on human rights defenders which many of you sitting in this room today have contributed towards and have made it possible for the commitment towards the work of human rights defenders to be articulated in an international instrument of the United Nations. The most significant objective of the declaration that I see is that the declaration protects human rights activity. The focus of the declaration is not the protection of individuals or organisations, several other human rights instruments do that already. It is also not the major objective of the declaration to protect rights because other instruments do that. What the declaration in effect does is to reiterate those rights but in the context of the activity for the promotion and protection of those rights. I say this because this is an important understanding that one must have of the significance of the declaration especially from one aspect. Whereas international law and domestic laws allow reasonable restrictions to be imposed on rights, no reasonable restriction can be imposed on the activity to monitor and advocate for human rights even within the limitations within which those rights are available. So while there may be arguments that certain circumstances or situations allow the derogation of rights, there can be no argument to say that the activity for the promotion of rights, the activity for strengthening the notion of rights and the concepts of rights can at any time be suspended.

I would particularly like human rights defenders to pay attention to Article 1 of the declaration, which not only states that it is the primary responsibility of the states to guarantee that human rights activity and human rights defenders can conduct that activity with safety, but it makes it the primary responsibility of states to create political, social and economic conditions in which it is realistically and practically possible for people to realise those rights and benefit from the enjoyment of those rights. (Article 2 of declaration)

I would also draw your attention to Article 12 of the declaration, which very clearly entitles all those individuals and groups who are engaged in the peaceful activities for the promotion and protection of human rights to protest in a peaceful manner against the violation of rights. It makes also governments responsible to ensure that those engaging in any activity protesting violation of rights or in reaction to violation of rights which is peaceful, governments are obliged to make sure that they suffer no prejudice, either in the law or at practical levels through any kinds of policies or practices from engaging in this protest. In fact the declaration makes it the responsibility of the civil society to protect democracy, institutions of democracy and the processes which are essential to sustain the democratic dispensation. Any curtailment or obstruction to the activity of human rights defenders, in fact, amounts to violating the spirit of the declaration by putting up obstructions in the way of the civil society being able to perform its own responsibilities.

I would also like to talk about governments’ responsibility to create strong enough mechanisms and policies for accountability of human rights abuse. Where governments either violate human rights themselves or do not hold others accountable for human rights violation, governments are responsible for that violation. They are condoning human rights violation if they allow impunity to prevail. And impunity, in my mind, has become one of the most serious human rights issues in the world today, which affects the lives, the liberty and the safety of human rights defenders very directly.

I am not going to go into the kinds of violations that human rights defenders suffer from today, you know better than I do what you are experiencing in your different contexts, and it is from you that we learn what is happening around the world today. A part of my responsibilities is not just to wait to be told about what is happening in the context of the situation of human rights defenders the world over but to actively seek that information. I am well aware that human rights defenders are facing difficulties in carrying out their activities, not only in countries where democratic institutions are weak, but also, unfortunately, in many countries where there is no explicit or implicit undemocratic tendency attached to government. So let me make it very clear, that human rights violations are not just occurring in any one part of the world, or in any specific political context, human rights violations are occurring in every part of the world and is affecting the safety and security with which human rights defenders can conduct their activity. Of course there are certain different levels and different degrees to which they suffer and there are different differences in the constitutional and legal arrangements in different countries for which human rights abuse can be called to account. Nevertheless, I think it is very important for people to realise that human rights violation is not a specific trend in a certain type of social or national context, or are not occurring where governments have claimed support for human rights and commitment to human rights.

In the current situation, to which some of our friends in the morning have already pointed out, I think it would be fair to say that human rights defenders today are working in a political context which is not very sympathetic to their concerns. In the aftermath of the September 11th incident in New York, we do see tensions emerging between the obligation of the state to provide security and obligations of the state and international community to preserve, protect and promote human rights. It has fallen on the shoulders of human rights defenders to make it clear that peace and security are a part of human rights, and that they will not be promoted without human rights becoming the central tool for the promotion of peace and security. Any attempts at taking initiatives for establishing peace and security that undermine human rights or destroy human rights are only counter productive and I don’t think that I have to elaborate more on that. Several situations in the world today substantiate what I have said and this is also something that human rights defenders were the first to become aware of. The situation today presents several challenges for human rights defenders. On the one hand they are really struggling to keep human rights relevant to political struggles. They are really struggling to communicate as clearly as possible in this polarised environment the message of non-violence, the message of human rights. I say that this is a polarise environment because the discourse today is monopolised either by those who are threatening world peace and security through their terrorism, or by those who are countering terrorism through measures that damage human rights, that restrict the prospect for the strengthening of human rights and for the use of the human rights framework to ensure not security just in the context of a national security or the national security doctrine so to speak, but as human security. Measures that make the political climate uncertain in fact contribute more to insecurity within people. I think today the credibility of human rights work depends very much on the transparency, the accuracy and the responsibility with which human rights defenders conduct their activities. And this is another challenge, I think, that human rights defenders have to take seriously and have to make sure that they can contribute more and more to the strengthening of human rights and forcing the consciousness that human rights have to be observed in every political situation. And that they can do only if their own credibility is firmly established and for this credibility it is extremely important that they maintain transparency, accuracy and responsibility.

The UN also faces challenges today. The first challenge for the United Nations today is to preserve the success of the United Nations that it has achieved in bringing about international standards. It has taken us decades to get a consensus of some sort on these standards. Any kind of uncertainty and unambiguity at this stage will erode that success.

It is also a challenge today for the United Nations to make sure that no contradictions are created within its own system between its different objectives. And the work of human rights defenders and the contributions that they make and the ideals that they promote will be critical in informing the United Nations on the best means to adopt, and it will make it much easier for the United Nations to adopt those best means when human rights defenders and the civil society in general is successful in creating a world public opinion in favour of human rights, in favour of action and the mainstream role on human rights by the United Nations.

I would just very briefly speak about some of the more pressing concerns that I have and some of the observations that I have been able to arrive at in the context of the implementation of my mandate. I won’t go into the details, I will just mention them to you so that they become a part of the work that you do and you are able to in many ways think about these in terms of formulating strategies for the activities on human rights.

I find that the denial of economic, social and cultural rights today in many parts of the world, in fact in most parts of the world, is leading to the abuse of civil and political rights. This is a situation which brings home to us most strongly the indivisibility and interdependence of human rights. This situation has also added to the perpetrators of violations of human rights and of those who target human rights defenders. The corporate sector, including multi national concerns, have become a new actor in the violation of human rights of which we need to be very conscious.

I think that the most severely affected right today in the current political climate is the right to protest. Freedom of assembly, being a very important part of this right, is most severely curtailed in many countries of the world on the basis of security or anti-terrorism measures. Freedom of expression is likewise, curtailed for these reasons. Many defenders have already pointed out, in the course of this conference, that the freedom of association has come under a great deal of stress. Governments have used national security and counter terrorism as a reason to disallow functioning of human rights organisations, to disallow meetings and gatherings of these organisations and in this way have affected the freedom of association in many countries.

I will end by saying that the most directly targeted today are pro-democracy activists and those engaged in peaceful struggle for the of self determination. It is these human rights defenders who deserve the utmost support. A support that is given with commitment and with confidence and a support which is not diluted by defensive *****. The basic function of the United Nations is to establish peace, to give security, but the United Nations Charter very clearly speaks about the right to self determination. The United Nations Charter and all instruments very clearly speak about democracy, as being a necessary condition for the promotion and protection of human rights.

So let me end by saying we do very important and valuable work, we have no need to be defensive about it. We must promote and protect human rights and resist trends that threaten the prospects for the strengthening of human rights regardless of the quarters from which this thread comes. We must find the capacity and the strength and the most wise strategies to confront the challenges that we as human rights defenders face today.

Thank you very much.