special report

Bali has always been a multi-religious bastion of tranquility, stability and peace in the turbulent Indonesian archipelago. It was in this Hindu-predominated island that one of the great founding and basic documents of Asean, namely the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia was signed by Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand on Feb 24, 1976.

Some 25 years later on July 12 and 13, 2001, Bali hosted another historic conference where people of different colours, faiths, creeds and ideologies met to discourse and reflect on the universal principles and practices of human rights.

It was the 4th Asem Informal Seminar on Human Rights. The first, second and third Asem Informal Seminars on Human Rights were held in Lund, Sweden (1997), Beijing, China (1999) and Paris, France (2000).

This year's seminar was opened in Denpasar by Dr N Hassan Wirajuda who is the Director-General for Political Affairs of the Indonesian Department of Foreign Affairs. It was attended by 71 invited participants from Asia and Europe*, including the President of the International Court of Justice, Gilbert Guilaume, and a commissioner of the National Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (Suhakam), Anuar Zainal Abidin .

The other two participants from Malaysia were Foreign Ministry representative Tajul Aman Mohammad who is the Assistant Secretary of the Multilateral Political Affairs Division of Wisma Putra, and this writer.

Liberal strands

Gilbert Guilaume delivered his keynote speech entitled 'The International Court of Justice and Human Rights', stating that the Court, as 'the principal judicial organ of the United Nations, is endowed with universal general jurisdiction to hear disputes between States' and 'it therefore has jurisdiction to adjudicate upon problems involving respect for human rights in peacetime as well as during armed conflicts'.

However, Guilaume also noted that the Court can only hear cases with the consent of the States concerned, and 'it is indeed rare to find a State willing to accept a challenge to its conduct involving human rights' and 'it is equally rare to find one State complaining before the Court of another's conduct in this area'.

Despite the limitations, the judgements and opinions expressed by the International Court of Justice (popularly known as the World Court) has been influential in the development of human rights thinking in the United Nations.

After the Guilaume's presentation three sessions focusing on three specialised areas of human rights followed. The first one was titled 'Freedom of Conscience and Religion', while the second and third were 'Democratisation, Conflict Resolution and Human Rights' and 'Rights and Obligations in the Promotion of Social Welfare' respectively.

Vitit Muntarbhorn, a professor of law of Thailand's Chulalongkorn University, argued for the urgent need of "more concrete dialogues between all religions and spiritual movements, especially their leaders, and between such movements and State authorities to promote cross-cultural understanding'.

The Thai professor of law also suggested that 'more support' be given to 'the liberal strands' of all religions and spiritual movements 'to counter the tide of extremism'.

Consciously pushed

Another speaker on the topic M J Morange who is a professor of International Law at the University of Paris II, detailed the historical development of the concept of freedom of religion in the Western world, and argued that freedom of religion also includes the freedom of not believing in any religion, and should be extended to freedom of conscience, ideas and opinions.

The second topic, namely 'Democratisation, Conflict Resolution and Human Rights' was the most interesting and exciting one as it was regarded by many participants as highly relevant in Asia, especially Indonesia, today.

And one of the speakers was none other than a former chairman of the Indonesian Human Rights Commission and the Cabinet Secretary of Indonesia, Marzuki Darusman who is himself a well-known and highly-respected human rights lawyer in Indonesia.

In his paper titled 'Human Rights and Democratic Transition', Marzuki Darusman observed that 'democracy does not necessarily protect human rights' and 'democratically-elected governments can and do violate human rights'. And he described this state of affairs as 'unfortunately true'.

However, he also suggests that 'the State should be counter-balanced by a strong civil society' as 'human rights will neither be implemented nor be restored by itself, but it has to be consciously pushed and upheld as a matter of continuous nurturing of a democratic culture'.

Following Marzuki Darusman, a professor of human rights law at the National University of Ireland, William A Schabas argued that 'past approaches (to human rights violations), by which those responsible for heinous abuses went unpunished and unaccounted for, their crimes passed over and ignored, did not serve to promote improvements in democracy and human rights'.

Income insecurity

No less stimulating was the third topic on the socio-economic aspects of human rights. Guan Jinghe of the Department of International Cooperation, Ministry of Labour and Social Security, People's Republic of China (PRC) argued that 'rights and obligations in the promotion of social welfare is very important in the context of globalisation and social reform' and that 'globalisation, either alone or in combination with structural adjustment policies pursued in most developing countries, often exposes societies to greater income insecurity'.

She said, "Today, a large majority of the workforce in developing countries, is still battling under difficult circumstances characterised by few job opportunities, poor wages, low productivity and inadequate social protection."

"In a globalizing world, where people are increasingly exposed to a global economic risks, there is growing consciousness of the fact that a broad-based national social protection policy can provide a strong buffer against many of the negative social effects of crises," she said.

"It is obvious that not all societies can afford the same level of social security. Yet, it is inhuman anywhere to live and work in permanent insecurity threatening the material security and health of individuals or families," she added.

Guan further elaborated the measures and programmes implemented by the government of the PRC to alleviate poverty, absolute as well as relative.

She was followed by a professor of political sciences of the Stockholm University in Sweden, Daniel Tarschys who is also a former secretary-general of the Council of Europe.

Tarschys shared the experiences of social welfare development in Europe, and argued that social policy occupies a 'central position as a defining element in the European political model'.

He said, " In advocating a greater attention to human rights at home and throughout the world, Europe will certainly continue to emphasise the social dimension".

Productive ideas

After the presentation of seven papers, participants joined three working groups to further discuss the ideas and positions raised by the speakers.

Although no common position or definitive conclusions were made, the dialogue brought together many Asians and Europeans who are concerned with human rights. Above all, the seminar generated a pool of useful and productive ideas for the advancement of human rights in the 21st century.

The seminar's participants were from Austria, Brunei, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Netherlands, the Philippines, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, United Kingdom and Vietnam.

JAMES WONG WING ON, is a former Member of Parliament (1990-1995) and a former columnist for the Sin Chew Jit Poh Chinese daily. He read political science and economics at the Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. While in Sin Chew , he and a team of journalists won the top awards of Malaysian Press Institute (MPI) for 1998 and 1999.