EXPERTS ON FOOD, EXTREME POVERTY, TOXIC WASTES, AND EDUCATION PRESENT FINDINGS TO COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS

Commission on Human Rights
58th session
4 April 2002
Morning



Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina also Speaks


Experts presented reports this morning to the Commission on Human Rights on the topics of the right to food, the problems posed by extreme poverty, the patterns and consequences of the illicit movement and dumping of toxic wastes, and the right to education.

The Commission also heard an address from the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Jean Ziegler, Special Rapporteur on the right to food, said global wealth and resources existed to provide food for everyone, but 100,000 people nonetheless died daily from hunger or malnutrition. He accused the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization of giving economic liberalization and privatization priority over human suffering, thus "cancelling out" the humanitarian work of United Nations agencies. He also criticized economic embargoes imposed against Cuba, Iraq, and occupied Palestine.

Anne-Marie Lizin, Independent Expert on extreme poverty, described work undertaken, including the distribution of questionnaires on the subject in Bolivia and the development of 11 recommendations applicable to all countries affected by extreme poverty. Free access to justice was among the recommendations, she said. Ms. Lizin said poverty-eradication programmes of the World Bank did not appear to match the needs expressed by groups most vulnerable to extreme poverty.

Fatma Zohra Ouhachi-Vesely, Special Rapporteur on the adverse affects of the illicit movement and dumping of toxic and dangerous products and wastes, told the Commission there was a clear link between the illicit movement of these dangerous products and poverty. Developing countries had been targeted as dumping sites since they did not know the content of such wastes and did not have the capacity to stop incoming shipments, she said, and zones where the most poor and marginalized people lived suffered greatly from the health and environmental consequences of such transfers and dumping.

Katarina Tomasevski, Special Rapporteur on the right to education, said the right to education had to be made more visible, that human-rights aspects should be applied to it, that discrimination in access to education had to be exposed and reduced, and that more cooperation and information on education and problems related to it were needed from the countries she contacted in the course of her work.

Milovan Blagojevic, Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina, told the Commission that while progress had been made in human rights matters, efforts were being hindered by the country's poor economic situation. He explained that many refugees and displaced persons had returned to their homes following the Balkan conflict of the 1990s, but some 590,000 refugees abroad and 550,000 internally displaced persons were still waiting to do so, and that 25,000 Serb refugees from Croatia and 15,000 refugees from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia likewise were still being accommodated in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mr. Blagojevic said the country was struggling to cope with serious problems of trafficking in human beings and illegal migration.

Speaking during the morning session in response to the reports presented were representatives of Niger, Benin, Bolivia, Turkey, and the United States.

The Commission continued the rest of the morning meeting in private to discuss the violation of human rights in specific country situations under its 1503 procedure. It will continue with this debate in private session at 3 p.m. but may return to public debate over the course of the afternoon.


Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

Under this agenda item the Commission had its attention drawn to several documents in advance of the general debate on the agenda item.

There is a report of Jean Ziegler, the Special Rapporteur on the right to food (E/CN.4/2002/58), which notes that every year 36 million people die directly or indirectly from hunger or nutritional deficiencies. The report contends that international aid projects should respect key principles of neutrality, impartiality and the pursuit of strictly humanitarian objectives; that the new round of World Trade Organization negotiations should make it imperative that human rights are brought into the debate on trade; that States should establish and implement national legislation on the right to food and recognize the justiciability of the right; and that there is "schizophrenia" within the United Nations system in that its social justice and human rights agencies recognize the right to food but the Bretton Wood Institutions, along with the United States and the World Trade Organization, oppose in practice the right to food.

An addendum (E/CN.4/2002/58 Add.1) which reviews a mission undertaken to Niger, concludes that the Government is doing what it can with the resources available, and recommends, among other things, that urgent attention be given to increasing food security and reducing the vulnerability of the population to famine; that impunity be ended for violations of the rights to food and water; that the country's Food Crisis Unit and National Committee for Early Warning and Crisis Management be made fully independent to ensure their effectiveness; and that discrimination against women be ended, as it contributes to food insecurity.

There is a report by Fatma Zohra Ouhachi-Vesely, the Special Rapporteur on the adverse effects of the illicit movement and dumping of toxic and dangerous products and wastes on the enjoyment of human rights (E/CN.4/2002/61), which includes sections on the activities of the Special Rapporteur, observations, comments and information submitted, new cases, follow-up cases and cooperation with human rights treaty-bodies. The report concludes that international conventions sometimes contain lacunae which prevent effective action to combat clandestine transfers, and to prosecute and punish traffickers and corrupt dealers. They also sometimes omit any reference to victims, who are refused access to information and have no or few means of recourse. Some international instruments are not ratified by a large number of States and are not always effectively implemented. The need to combat impunity and to provide victims with effective remedies, together with just and equitable redress is highlighted in the report. The Special Rapporteur stresses the importance of field missions as an irreplaceable means of learning about the experience of a particular country or region, discussing with the national authorities mandate-related questions, and specific cases concerning them, gathering information first hand and meeting representatives of civil society.

There is a report of Katarina Tomasevski, the Special Rapporteur on the right to education (E/CN.4/2002/60), which notes among positive developments increasing commitments to free primary education and their reinforcement through the allocation of funds freed through debt relief. The report contends that reaffirmation of the right to education is necessary to counter continuously decreasing aid flows and the risk that progressive liberalization of trade in education will undermine progress; and it explains that the Special Rapporteur has focused on creating rights-based indicators on the subject of education, has developed analytical guideposts for monitoring the extent to which the right to education is realized, and has focused on the effects of economic exclusion, especially during a time of worldwide recession, on realization of the right to education.

An addendum (E/CN.4/2002/60 Add.1) reports on a 24 September to 10 October 2001 mission to the United States by the Special Rapporteur and remarks among other things that child poverty remains a serious impediment to education there, that gender issues are an important factor, and that local autonomy over education, coupled with disparate financing and lack of equal rights guarantees from location to location "set a difficult stage for realization of the right to education".

A second addendum (E/CN.4/2002/60 Add.2) summarizes a 3 to 10 February 2002 mission to Turkey and remarks among other things that recent expansion of compulsory education from five to eight years will require greater budgetary allocations -- in her recommendation up to 6 per cent of GNP -- along with a long-term strategy to enhance the status of teachers, as the number of teachers will have to be increased rapidly; the Special Rapporteur recommends full recognition of teachers= trade-union rights, increased attention to reducing discrimination in education, especially as applied to girls, and provision of mother-tongue instruction to minority groups.

A report by Anne-Marie Lizin, the Independent Expert on extreme poverty (E/CN.4/2002/55) was not available in English.


Statements

JEAN ZIEGLER, Special Rapporteur on the right to food, introducing his report (E/CN.4/2002/58) to the Commission, said that transcontinental financial capital reigned over the globe against the interests of the majority of its inhabitants. For the first time in history, humanity enjoyed an abundance of goods that exceeded by several thousand times the basic needs of human beings. And yet, every day about 100,000 people died of hunger and 815 million were chronically and seriously undernourished. Every seven seconds, a child under 10 died of hunger.

Mr. Ziegler said the Bretton Woods institutions, especially the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), cancelled out by their extreme liberalization and privatization policies work carried out by UN special agencies in favour of the most marginalized people. The right to food was opposed by the so-called Washington Consensus of the international financial institutions. The structural adjustment programmes imposed by the IMF had had a negative impact on the nutritional and social situations in many countries. The Ministerial Conference held by the WTO in Doha in 2001 had decided to open a trade negotiation cycle in which the right to food and other economic rights were not taken into consideration.

Mr. Ziegler said the unilateral economic blockade imposed against Cuba by the United States did not respect the right to food of the Cuban population. The same held true of the international economic embargo imposed on Iraq by the Security Council. The blockade imposed by the Israeli authorities on the occupied Palestinian territories also impeded access to food and water for the Palestinian population.

In conclusion, Mr. Ziegler said his report recommended among other things that parties involved in armed conflict must respect the right of the civil populations and prisoners to food. This right must be recognized as an integral part of international humanitarian law. International trade must also respect this right. The current position of the WTO was unacceptable.

ANNE-MARIE LIZIN, Independent Expert on extreme poverty, presenting her fourth annual report to the Commission, said questionnaires had been developed to assist States, financial institutions and non-governmental organizations dealing with poverty eradication. She had carried out studies in Bolivia and Benin. In Bolivia, questionnaires were distributed to all sectors of society, including the indigenous population and other vulnerable groups with the view to assessing their needs. According to a survey undertaken among young persons in La Paz, most wished for greater access to education and for greater opportunities to practice a profession. In Benin, where extreme poverty was widespread, five ethnic groups had succeeded in creating a structure in which they communicated with each other in efforts to establish a programme against poverty. A group of elderly women had created a small-scale economic structure that would allow them to survive. Ms. Lizin said she made 11 recommendations in her report which could be applicable to all countries affected by extreme poverty.

There was a wide disparity between the requests she had received from vulnerable groups and the poverty eradication programmes of the World Bank, Ms. Lizin said. The structural adjustment programmes imposed by financial institutions did not correspond to the needs of most vulnerable groups; and there should be a closer relationship between such programmes and State structures, local traditions, and prevailing levels of education. The World Bank should elaborate its programmes starting from a list of socio-economic rights that a State could autonomously implement.

FATMA ZOHRA OUHACHI-VESELY, Special Rapporteur on the adverse affects of the illicit movement and dumping of toxic and dangerous products and wastes, introducing her report (E/CN.4/2002/61), said she had been one of the first of the Special Rapporteurs to submit her report and she could not understand that it was still not available in all working languages of the United Nations. A promised addendum had not appeared, which was supposed to contain the responses of the States. She was not ready to account for her mission to the United States since the documentation received had been blocked for security reasons and had been subjected to Anthrax controls. Therefore information was missing. She had, on the other hand, been able to communicate with the US Department of State and appreciated the cooperation extended. The report offered only new information and needed to be read with previous reports in mind. Previous problems accounted for were still valid.

Several countries had reported on activities to prevent adverse effects of toxic and dangerous products, including Venezuela and the Netherlands. Ms. Ouhachi-Vesely related a tragic incident in Haiti that had resulted in the deaths of several children who had consumed anti-freeze, and expressed her frustration with the impunity enjoyed by multinational corporations and the miserable indemnity payments given to the families of the victims. There was definitely a level of racism in their approach to victims in developing countries. This had to end and impunity could not be accepted. There was a clear link between illicit movement of these dangerous products and poverty. Developing countries had been targeted as dumping sites since they did not know the content of the waste and did not have the capacity to stop incoming shipments. Zones where the most poor and marginalized people lived had suffered greatly from the consequences of illicit movement and dumping of toxic waste.

KATARINA TOMASEVSKI, Special Rapporteur on the right to education, introducing her report E/CN.4/2002/60 and Adds. 1 and 2) said she regretted the lack of interactive dialogue between Special Rapporteurs and members of the Commission. It would be virtually impossible to introduce her report in such a limited time and she would therefore focus on the most important aspects of her work. The key thing was to enhancing the visibility of the right to education. The Commission's initiative in focusing on the right to education initially had raised the question: what could the human rights approach contribute? It had been important to prove that the human rights profession had something to contribute to education. Human rights input into the matter was increasing and opening the way for human rights mainstreaming.

The shift to rights-based education had made exclusions from education visible, Ms. Tomasevski said. Education statistics often did not capture discriminatory exclusion, and thus human rights input was urgently needed. The focus on the elimination of discrimination enabled the highlighting of the changes needed to adjust education to human rights requirements. Her report revealed the need to create rights-based education statistics in all countries as well as at the global level. This would constitute a key challenge for mainstreaming human rights. She appealed to members of the Commission to assist her in her work by providing information she requested so that data could be analyzed. The support of the Commission was also needed to enable her to carry out country missions. She had not been allowed, for example, to carry out a mission to Ethiopia.

MILOVAN BLAGOJEVIC, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina, said his country was in transition from a socialist to a market economy and in such a transition, the establishment of a human rights framework was not only a goal but a tool for achieving better lives for the country's citizens. The new governing democratic coalition of Bosnia and Herzegovina, composed of democratic and reform oriented parties, attached great importance to compliance with international human rights obligations. However, the poor economic situation was an impediment to progress and its heaviest impact fell on the most vulnerable, such as women heads of household, the elderly, Roma, and various minority returnees.

Important achievements had been realized last year in the implementation of the Dayton Peace Agreement relating to the return of refugees and internally displaced persons to their pre-war homes, Mr. Blagojevic said. There were still around 590,000 refugees abroad; some 200,000 were still waiting for their property claims to be resolved, while at the same time around 550,000 internally displaced persons were waiting for a final solution to their displaced status. On the other hand, there were about 25,000 Serb refugees from Croatia and some 15,000 refugees from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia who were still accommodated in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

During the past year, significant activities had been undertaken to respond, in a comprehensive manner, to contemporary forms of slavery such as trafficking in human beings, Mr. Blagojevic said. Bosnia and Herzogovina had become extremely vulnerable to trafficking in persons. The country had adopted a national action plan to prevent trafficking, to protect and provide assistance to the victims, and to upgrade the existing legal framework to enable prosecution of the perpetrators of such crimes. The Government had also undertaken serious efforts to fight illegal migration. Overall, much work remained to be done to protect and promote human rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

ADAMOU SEYDOU (Niger) said the Special Rapporteur on the right to food had had access to all the information he required in order to discharge his mandate during his visit to Niger. The report had noted an encouraging fact -- that social, economic and cultural rights were being popularized in the country, despite a setback in the rights of women because of a certain rise in religious fundamentalism. In reality, however, there was no setback in the rights of women in Niger. Furthermore, there was no Islamic phenomenon in Niger. Eighty per cent of the population was Muslim and practiced tolerant Islam. The Special Rapporteur also called for full independence of the National Commission on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedom.

Members of the National Committee for Early Warning and Crisis Management were appointed by Presidential Decree after being selected by the following organizations: the High Council of Magistrates, human rights organizations, women's associations, doctors= associations, trade unions, lawyers' associations, the Association of Tribal Chiefs, the Nigerian Red Cross, the private press, and the Law Faculty. Political authorities did not interfere with the selection of members of the Committee. To ensure the Committee's independence, a special budget had been allocated to it.

ELOI LAOUROU (Benin) congratulated the Special Rapporteur for her report on human rights and extreme poverty. This expert had gone to Benin as part of her work and had been able to work in cooperation with the Government and with complete freedom. As had been said earlier, cooperation with national structures had been important. Two basic points were of particular interest in the report -- the social dimension in structural adjustment programmes and the organization and participation of the population in decentralization of power. Significant efforts had been made in this area in Benin, and the Rapporteur's observations would be taken into account.

The Government did take the participation of the population into account in the eradication of poverty. Organization in the field was advanced. With regard to micro-credit there were attempts to improve the institutional framework to ensure that the population could benefit from such development programmes. On page 36 in the report a figure had been given which the Special Rapporteur needed to explain, concerning the cost of operations of civil society in Benin and the burden on the budget. Trafficking in children, which had frequently been referred to, was a deviation from the traditional practice of solidarity between families in Benin. This was a perverted practice and the Government had taken several steps to halt it. In its efforts to improve the condition of the population, Benin was spending one-third of its budget on social and health matters. Further support was needed from the international community.

RICARDO ALBA VALDERRAMA (Bolivia) said Bolivia welcomed the report and the recommendations presented by the Independent Expert on extreme poverty, and the methods she suggested for combatting extreme poverty. Bolivia had high indices of poverty, and the Expert had developed a mechanism through which Bolivia could tackle its problems and design a national policy. The national plan of action of Bolivia included substitutions for the growing of illicit drugs and emphasized the fight against drug-trafficking. Already, results had been achieved. The fight against the illicit growing of coca growing and the export of narcotic products was among the priorities of the Government.

Bolivia was firmly committed to fighting both drug-trafficking and poverty, and for that purpose it needed the support and cooperation of the international community.

MURAT SUNGAR (Turkey) said the Turkish Government had decided to invite the Special Rapporteur on the right to education to visit Turkey. While Turkey had cooperated fully with the Special Rapporteur, some other Governments were reluctant to do so. The work of the Special Rapporteur had led Turkey to believe that maybe those countries which refused to cooperate had a point -- the report created serious doubts as to its objectivity. It seemed that the Special Rapporteur had reached conclusions even before visiting Turkey and had overstepped her mandate. Such an approach harmed the credibility of human rights mechanisms and did not serve the cause of human rights. It was hoped that this report would not set a precedent.

SIMON HENSHAW (the United States) said inaccurate statements had been made by the Special Rapporteur on the right to food concerning Cuba. The United States had in fact legalized food sales to Cuba. Cuba had bought $ 70 million worth of food from United States. It had also been the largest foreign source of humanitarian aid to Cuba since 1992. Cuba was the only Latin American country that produced less rice today than in 1957. This was not a result of the embargo but of Cuba's failed economic system.


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