Myanmar not on ASEAN rights agency agenda

Its recommendations confirm that the human rights agency would be a toothless body with no power to rein in blatant violators such as Myanmar.

The report’s contents reveal the extent of ASEAN’s reluctance to hold any of its members accountable—or to shame them—for outright human rights violations such as the Myanmar junta’s recent crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in September that killed at least 15 people.

The international community has condemned the junta for its refusal to restore democracy and release Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader who has been under house arrest for 12 of the last 18 years.

ASEAN has also been criticised for not doing enough to pressure Myanmar’s military leaders. The human rights body, to comprise representatives from ASEAN countries, should draft a “long-term roadmap” for the promotion of human rights, according to the report prepared by a task force led by Singapore.

Such a body should also have “respect for national independence, sovereignty, equality, territorial integrity and national identity of all ASEAN member states,” it said.

The task force recommended that the human rights body should uphold ASEAN’s bedrock policy prohibiting member countries from interfering in one another’s domestic affairs—an edict Myanmar has often invoked to parry criticisms. The report says the rights body should oppose attempts by foreign countries to interfere in any Southeast Asian country’s human rights problems.

“The agency should be faithful to ASEAN and its common interests and oppose external influence attempting to interfere in the human rights issues of any ASEAN member state,” the task force said. It said the body should conduct consultations and a public campaign on rights promotion and consider drafting an ASEAN declaration on human rights.

The establishment of a human rights body had been the most contentious issue in the drafting of the ASEAN Charter because of strong opposition from Myanmar.

A Myanmar diplomat, Thaung Tun, said his country wanted the human rights body to become a “consultative mechanism” and that it should not “shame and blame” any ASEAN nation. UN envoy on Myanmar, Ibrahim Gambari, was to address the summit on Wednesday, but ASEAN members withdrew the invitation after the junta objected.

Still, he individually met with some leaders and said he was hopeful that Myanmar Prime Minister Thein Sein was sincere about efforts to restore democracy in the country ruled by the military since 1962.