Amnesty in Salisbury & South Wiltshire
Promoting human rights from Salisbury UK
We are pleased to announce that a lawyer who has been active in defending the attacks on churches, has been released although the reasons for his release are unknown. It is good news however. Many lawyers have been harassed or detained in China under the current crackdown.
Full details from the Amnesty factsheet:
November 2015
This is the title of a report produced by Amnesty International concerning the use of torture in China. It was only last month that China’s president received a red carpet treatment on his visit to Britain with smiles all round. The subject of human rights was taboo and was not to be mentioned during the course of his visit. The aim was to boost trade and to secure deals such as the nuclear power plant investment.
Human rights infringements are a major issue for China and there is always the hope that there will be a steady improvement over time. Indeed, it is a favourite argument by politicians that engagement – whether through trade, culture, sport or otherwise – is the best way to effect improvements in countries still practising torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading punishments.
Only it doesn’t seem to be working in places like Saudi Arabia or China despite the huge effort put into engagement with their leaders. Amnesty has just published No End in Sight which shows that if anything, it is getting worse. Despite having signed up to UN Charter against torture, it is still widely practised in all its medieval brutality.
The rot seems to start in police stations and the system of securing confessions acts as an incentive to extract one, by force if necessary. The methods are extremely unpleasant and the least graphic (though no lest brutal) is the ‘tiger bench’ illustrated left.
The report explains the weak nature of the justice system which means no meaningful enquiries are made and that lawyers are themselves coerced or threatened if they try too hard to stop it.
It is alarming that this major nation, which is a member of the Security Council and is thus in a position to influence a lot of what happens in the world, should be steadily getting worse not better as far as human rights are concerned. It is disappointing that the opportunity to express our concerns was apparently not taken during President Xi’s visit.
Sources
The Independent;
The Guardian;
Amnesty report
This week saw the visit to this country of President Xi Jinping with a 
huge amount of ceremony and including a meeting with the Queen. His visit was surrounded with considerable controversy concerning the human rights record in China.
Our government stood accused of suppressing concerns about human rights because they want us to do more business with China and because the Chinese do not like questions being asked about their activities. They view this as interfering with the internal affairs of their country.
Human rights in China are truly dire and may even have got worse since President Xi came to power. The essential deal in China is that the communists stay in power and in return, they deliver growth and prosperity to their people who have little say over how the country is run. To maintain this system, there is little in the way of free speech, the internet is closely controlled, minorities – including religious minorities – are hounded and arrested, torture is common and more Chinese are executed than the rest of the world put together.
Chen Guangcheng – who was a prisoner of conscience with Amnesty and on whose behalf, the local group campaigned – fled China following his house arrest and now lives in America. He is personally well acquainted with the human rights situation in that country. In an article in the Independent he says:
There is no doubt human rights have worsened in his home country in the decade since President Hu Jintao’s state visit and believes that the UK must publicly criticise the regime if it wants to improve human rights in China.
I don’t think all this trade and business should be carried out as the UK sacrifices human rights in exchange for these deals.
Amnesty has noted that during a nationwide crackdown, 248 lawyers and activists were detained in the summer of whom 29 are still in custody. Then there is the continuing story of Tibet where freedom for Tibetans is a long-lost dream.
Our media is constantly predicting the time when the Chinese economy will overtake the USA to become the largest in the world. Projections are frequent but have recently taken a knock with the acute fall in the Chinese stock markets and devaluation of their currency. But the essential question is: can the Chinese Communist Party’s trick of providing continuous growth whilst maintaining a monopoly on power be maintained for ever? This question is important because it points to the fact that the Chinese needs the West as much as we need them. We provide them with a market for their goods. They need our technologies and our expertise. They will increasingly need our consumer goods. They want to be able to trade the remnimbi in London. They want greater access to the European market.
This is why the craven approach by our government to the Chinese is so misguided. The Chinese Ambassador has claimed that mentioning human rights would be ‘offensive’ to China. But all the people who suffer in China from house arrests; deprivation of liberties; forced sterilisations; executions of loved ones after brief trials; loss of religious freedom and no freedom to look at the internet, might also feel ‘offended’ that the man at the top of the country responsible for all this repression and cruelty, is being fawned over and given the red carpet treatment in London without any of our leaders uttering a word about these goings on. The only thing that seems to matter is the business and investment.
It seems clear that the Chinese were seriously worried about the protests which might have marred his visit here. A large and apparently orchestrated series of demonstrations organised by the embassy largely drowned out the few protests which manage to break through.
And what of our local MP Mr John Glen? In the Salisbury Journal (October 22) we read:
[…] The UK takes its human rights obligations very seriously. I do not believe for one moment that having a mutually beneficial commercial relationship prevents us from speaking frankly about issues of concern.
In fact, close relationships around economic, political and security interests have a track record of enhancing our ability to positively influence governments helping to promote democratic reform and raise human rights standards
As we noted in an earlier blog in connection with Saudi Arabia, we have enjoyed ‘close relationships’ with them for some decades but there is no let up in the tidal wave of torture, beheadings, floggings and amputations being carried on there. It is simply wishful thinking to claim close economic relationships enhances our ability to help promote democratic reform.
The whole point of the controversy around President’s Xi visit is that human rights concerns are not being mentioned. To say also that commercial relationships should ‘not prevent us from speaking frankly about issues of concern’ – one can only reply quite so! They fact that there was no frank speaking seems to have escaped Mr Glen’s notice.
And is Mr Glen suggesting that signing these various contracts will ‘promote democratic reform and raise human rights standards [in China]?’ In which case he must be almost the only person to believe this. The communist party has no intention of relinquishing power and signing a few deals in London will not alter that fact one iota. Indeed, looking at the The Global Times, the communist party newspaper in China, reveals no mention of human rights or freedoms in their report of President Xi’s visit. Anyone who saw the BBC’s Panorama programme on 19 October would be left in no doubt that the prospects for freedom and democracy in China under this president are exceedingly remote.
Trade and investment are of course important but not at the expense of all else. There is something unsettling about our willingness to grovel to the Chinese for the sake of money. Perhaps at long last we are learning the true meaning of ‘to kowtow’.
Sources
The Independent; Salisbury Journal; The Global Times; The Guardian; Human Rights Watch
The monthly death penalty report is available here thanks to Lesley for compiling it. A great deal of interest in the subject in the past month especially the executions in Indonesia. The use of hair evidence by the FBI in America – which has led to a number of people being executed or dying on death row – has now been discredited. Another interesting development is the criticism by the French President Francois Hollande of the use of the death penalty in Saudi Arabia. Like the UK, France has big arms sales contracts with the kingdom but unlike the UK, feels free to criticise them for their barbaric public beheadings. The Willie Manning case is also featured.
The media has devoted considerable space to the #executions of five people in #Indonesia. It has been on the main news and in all of the main papers in the UK to a greater or lesser extent. There is a general sense of outrage that the execution and the manner of its doing – that is by firing squad – are barbaric. One would be forgiven for thinking that Indonesia is the only place where people are being executed.
It isn’t. We must not forget that China continues to execute more than the rest of the world put together although the precise number is not known because it is a state secret. Executions continue at a faster rate than previously in Iran. Public beheadings still continue in Saudi Arabia. And in the southern states of USA, many are executed after spending years and years on death row. Pakistan has been busy too. The list is a long one.
Amnesty is opposed to the death penalty in all cases. We should be outraged wherever it happens not just in one country such as Indonesia. If you feel outraged at the use of this penalty, why don’t you join us and write letters or send emails? Follow this site or the Amnesty site for urgent actions.
It has been revealed in the last week or so that FBI analysis of hair samples is seriously flawed and that as
many as 32 people have been sentenced to death based on this evidence, of whom 14 have been executed or have died in prison . The problem has arisen because of sloppy work by FBI examiners who have made claims about the ability to identify people from hair samples that are scientifically unsound. It is, according to the Washington Post, possibly the largest forensic science scandal in America’s history. Another 1,200 cases remain to be investigated.
Our view of the American justice system is strongly influenced by programmes like CSI and NCIS where clean cut, young, handsome and amazingly certain forensic examiners solve cases by clever scientific means. Stories often centre (or should we say ‘center’ for our American readers) around one of them poring over a crime scene and finding a tiny piece of evidence. Then back to the lab where they announce that said tiny piece of evidence is crucial in identifying the killer. Forensic scientist and police officers dash about the place and sure enough, find the killer who has a matching piece of evidence tying him to the scene. There seldom seems to be any doubt in what they say and we are left at the end of the episode with the right man or woman ‘going down’.
The problem is that not all science is like that. There is not always that degree of certainty, merely probabilities. When it comes to condemning a person to death – the ultimate penalty from which there is no retreat – then it is necessary to be certain. The problem is made worse because defendants who are poor are not able to employ lawyers able to challenge the evidence properly. Some lawyers may be doing their first capital trial and have little relevant experience.
You might think that having admitted a major flaw in the evidence given by FBI experts, speedy reviews would be underway to put matters right. Well no, not in every state there isn’t. Appeal courts often refuse to look at newly discovered evidence because claims of actual innocence are never grounds for habeas corpus relief.
The USA is the only country in the Americas with the death penalty and the southern states are the keenest users of it. As we have commented before, it may seem unfair that we frequently highlight the use of the death penalty in the States: China is the worlds biggest user of the death penalty, the precise number is unknown because it is a state secret, but it runs into thousands. Iran is close behind. The difference is that the States is the de facto leader of the free world. But there is a point here that China is a closed society which severely limits access to the internet and curtails a free press. America by contrast is a more open society and newspapers like the Washington Post are able to publish this information. So we can read about it and comment on what we see.
Amnesty is opposed to the use of the death penalty in all circumstances. It is the ultimate cruel and degrading punishment. It is not a deterrent and there is plenty of evidence to show that it acts against the poor and those least able to defend themselves. That one of the main methods of condemning people is flawed is yet another plank in the argument to end the use of this penalty in the USA.
Sources:
Washington Post: 18 April
Guardian: 23 April
Wikipedia
Social Science Research Network The Shifted Paradigm: Forensic Science’s Overdue Evolution from Magic to Law. William Tucker Carrington, University of Mississippi and M Chis Fabricant, Innocence Project Inc.
This is the monthly report on the use of the death penalty around the world thanks to Lesley for compiling it. A particularly grim month and of course there are no statistics for China which stills leads the world in the use of the penalty.
#northkorea
Sony Picture’s film The Interview, which was not screened due to the alleged hacking attack by North Korea, attracted considerable publicity at the end of last year. It represented a flagrant attempt by North Korea – if indeed they are the culprits – to silence the screening of a film about the fictional attempt to assassinate the leader of that country, Kim Jong-un.
Amnesty International has released The Other Interview which features the story of Park Ji-hyu who fled starvation in North Korea and was then trafficked into China and sold as a slave to a farmer. She was reported to the Chinese authorities as a defector and was forcibly returned to North Korea. She was sent to one of their hellish prison camps where she faced starvation and torture. She eventually managed to escape.
Amnesty International’s UK Director Kate Allen said ‘Sony has every right to make a comedy about North Korea. We should all be worried when blackmail, threats to cinemas, and the hacking of private data are being used to censor and silence.
‘In reality, many people in North Korea are subjected to an existence beyond nightmares. The population is ruled by fear with a network of prison camps a constant spectre for those who dare step out of line.
‘Thousands of people in the camps are worked to death, starved to death [or] beaten to death. Some are sent there just for knowing someone who has fallen out of favour.
‘Amnesty is releasing The Other Interview so that people all over the world can hear first-hand how people in North Korea are suffering appallingly at the hands of Kim Jong-un and his officials.
‘They don’t want you to see it which is precisely why you should.’
A preview can be seen on YouTube. We do not know if this film will be shown in Salisbury but we will see if we can arrange a viewing somewhere.
This is being written while the dreadful events are playing out in France following the assassination of journalists and cartoonists in the offices of Charlie Hebdo magazine in Paris. This is another attempt – this time by violent means – to silence criticism and the particular kind of satire that this magazine goes in for.
The Salisbury group’s North Korean YouTube video clip can be see here.
December 2014
This was the title of a piece in the Journal section of the Guardian newspaper on 4 December by Eric Posner who is a professor at the University of Chicago Law School. This is a thoughtful piece, not written by some demagogue, but by someone with a background in the subject and who has made significant contributions to the debate on the issue of human rights. The points he makes are cogent and need addressing seriously. The arguments he puts forward seem to come from his book The Twilight of International Human Rights Law (Oxford University Press, 2014).
His article starts with a review of the history of the subject, especially since 1948, with the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the UN which he correctly points out is not a treaty in the usual sense. He might have added the European Convention of Human Rights came into being at about the same time and for broadly the same reasons.
The essential problem from the beginning he says was the different outlook by the key players when writing the UNDHR. America had in mind their constitution which was largely based on ‘political’ rights which have developed under their constitution. Even so, they did not want racial equality to be included: the effects we see today with the recent shooting in the USA of two black people by police and the lack of a legal follow through. The then Soviet Union wanted more social rights and the need to provide jobs – hence a right to work. The colonial powers – chiefly Britain and France – did not want the emancipation of their colonies to be included within it. Hence the result was a partial framework not a coherent, legally binding treaty.
His argument is based on the following main points:
This is only a flavour of his arguments but the essential point remains that six human rights treaties have been signed by over 150 countries around the world yet torture is still widespread, free speech is absent from many parts of the world (for example Russia where many journalists have been murdered), and democracy is a tenuous concept in countries like China – witness the recent events in Hong Kong where the communists only want their people to be on the ballot list. Western countries are guilty of hubris and ‘forcing other countries to adopt western institutions, modes of governance, dispute resolutions systems and rights.’
It is indeed a gloomy picture. His proposal is for human rights practitioners to follow the example of development economists who he says are changing from their top-down, coercive approaches and adopting more pragmatic ones better aligned to the countries own ways of doing things. These arguments appear weak however since the west still imposes western style conditions on its funding and support for developing countries. They are required to open up their markets and to privatise their industries, usually to their financial detriment. Elsewhere from the Guardian article he has argued for open borders as far as migration is concerned – not something likely to make him popular for a European audience or even some US states.
So we must look at the failings he spells out and examine how true they are.
Firstly, the ambiguity he speaks of seems a weak reason why some rights are so cavalierly ignored. One is tempted to ask ‘what is there not to understand?’ about such issues as torture or lack of due legal process. These are not sophisticated or complex issues that countries are wrestling with. Inflicting violence on individuals, in all its various forms, is abhorrent and since nearly all the countries of the world have signed up not to use it, it is odd to argue that there is some conceptual blockage to its continued use.
On the subject of torture, the suggestion that it is used by police forces because they are frustrated by the judicial process is also shaky. Torture is never effective since people say anything to get it to stop. It brutalises both the torturer and the tortured. People are unlikely to wish to engage with police forces if they fear what might happen to them.
The ‘top down’ argument and that western governments seek to impose their morals on the west has merit. On the other hand, this thinking has evolved from over a thousand years of strife, wars, revolutions and upheaval and, however imperfectly, has resulted in prosperity for these countries. As a way of doing things they seem worth sharing with less well developed countries. Doing it sensitively is of course desirable.
He discusses how China is admired today and the fact that they have opted for economic development in return for a lack of political freedom. There is a kind of Faustian pact: we will provide the shopping malls if you allow us to carry on as a one-party state. But for how long will this last? Events in Hong Kong seem to demonstrate that for some Chinese, the ‘human right’ of being able to chose one’s leaders is quite strong. It is that which worries the leaders in Beijing. It is not that there is a lack of understanding of the human rights issues involved, it is a straightforward desire to hold on to power. It is not a struggle to understand the concepts or the treaties.
Finally, professor Posner seems to overlook the influence of social media and travel. Individuals are now able to exchange information in all sorts of forms at the press of a button. Even in China, which works hard to shut out the web, information gets through and of course millions of Chinese travel the world. So the diffusion of these ideas and aspirations are not just through treaties and international agreements. There is pressure from the ground up for better standards. People are aware of poor treatment and corruption and recognise it to be wrong, not necessarily because of a clause in a UN treaty but because they know it to be so. This ‘bottom-up’ pressure is a significant force and the article does not give it sufficient credence.
On the one hand it is possible to be pessimistic about the lack of progress over the last six or seven decades, but there have been improvements. Imperfect though it has proved to be, the Arab Spring for example, sent a shockwave through a range of undemocratic nations in north Africa and a key issue was human rights. At base it is an issue about power and who has it. However imperfectly, human rights express that power and give more of it to ordinary people. It is that aspect which those who hold power do not like, not some puzzlement over the precise meaning of the UN Declaration or European Convention of Human Rights.
Amnesty in Salisbury & South Wiltshire 