AFTERNOON


HR/SC/99/12
12 August 1999



The Subcommission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights continued discussion this afternoon of economic, social and cultural rights, hearing more than a dozen non-governmental organizations (NGOs) stress, among other things, the importance of the rights to education and development, especially for the world’s poorer nations.

Several NGOs pointed out that transnational corporations (TNCs) often profited from natural resources in developing countries while sharing little of their profits with the inhabitants of the host countries. A representative of the NGO Indian Movement "Tupaj Amaru" said that more than one-third of global capital was held in the hands of foreign investors who were guided by profit instead of morals and ethics. He said an international system was needed to regulate the activities of TNCs.

Another NGO, Liberation, said that in situations where sub-State actors had taken over a territory, international law held those actors responsible for human rights there. It was only logical to hold private, non-governmental actors such as TNCs similarly accountable when they were in effective control of one or all of the factors impinging upon human rights in a territory, Liberation contended.

Speaking on the right to education, the International Federation of Social Workers said it was becoming clear that nations whose populations were educated and skilled progressed, while those who were not lagged behind, even if those countries were rich in natural resources.

Subcommission Expert Teimuraz O. Ramishvili spoke of the importance of teaching respect for human rights and suggested a Subcommission study on how human rights were taught in different countries and regions throughout the world, with particular emphasis put on nations whose inhabitants were of different religions and ethnicities.

Also addressing the meeting were Subcommission Expert Rajenda Kalidas Wimala Goonesekere and Alternate Expert Antoanella Iulia Motoc.

Representatives of the following NGOs spoke: Pax Romana (in a joint statement with International Federation of Rural Adult Catholic Movements); African Commission of Health and Human Rights Promoters; International Confederation of Free Trade Unions; International Organization for the Development of Freedom of Education; Women's International Democratic Federation; Association Tunisienne Pour L'Auto-Développement et la Solidarité; Indian Movement "Tupaj Amaru"; Service, Justice and Peace in Latin America; International Federation of Social Workers; International Educational Development; Foodfirst Information and Action Network; Union of Arab Jurists; Liberation; World Muslim Congress; World Federation of Democratic Youth; Lutheran World Federation; Centre Europe - Tiers Monde; International Islamic Federation of Student Organizations; Survival International Ltd.; and International Institute for Peace.

The Subcommission will reconvene at 10 a.m. Friday, 13 August, to continue its deliberations on economic, social and cultural rights, and, if time allows, to begin debate on the implementation of human rights with regard to women.

Statements

JOHN SAUTTER, of Pax Romana (in a joint statement with the International Federation of Rural Adult Catholic Movements), said that with the increasingly felt negative impact of economic globalization, it was becoming crucial to develop mechanisms to control and regulate globalization’s accelerated processes to make them adhere to universally accepted international human-rights standards so as to ensure the full realization of economic, social and cultural rights.

The Subcommission should play a pivotal role in meeting the biggest challenge -- the formulation of a normative and regulatory human-rights framework and its implementation mechanism.

KASHINATH PANDITA, of African Commission of Health and Human Right Promoters, said security always took precedence over development. There should be a moratorium on the import, export and manufacture of light weapons. These weapons were proliferating enormously all over the world. In Africa and Asia, development had been hindered by these weapons. In the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, development was stagnant because normal life had been destabilized by terrorist activities. Bridges, schools, and clinics had been wantonly destroyed. The handicraft and tourist industry had been dealt a devasting blow.

The international community needed to understand the consequences of the traffic in light weapons. A moratorium on these weapons was necessary, along with a comprehensive plan of action for its implementation.

ANNA BOINDI BIRD, of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, said that after the setbacks of the past few years, the prospects for world economic recovery were fragile. Even if the United States experienced continued growth, a larger perspective showed deep recession in several Asian countries and in the Commonwealth of Independent States, deteriorating conditions in Latin America, and less than expected growth in Africa and Europe. This was why the ICFTU had sent a vigorous call to Governments, which were required to pursue a better concerted action to promote recovery, and international institutions, such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, to build a much stronger social dimension into the process of international market integration. In the aftermath of the crises, both IMF and WB seemed to have started a rethinking of the financial system. But the steps taken until now had been too timid and ineffective.

The ongoing preparations for the World Trade Organization ministerial meeting in Seattle showed that labour standards could be used as political gimmicks more than for a serious discussion of the issue. It was to be hoped that there would be forward movement and that credible negotiations on trade and core labour standards could start.

ALFRED FERNANDEZ, of International Organization for the Development of Freedom of Education, said education was a central right for the development of human beings. It was crucial to the growth of human potential, and it was necessary for human empowerment. Education was at the core of the reason for living and it gave meaning to the human condition.

A discussion of education should not just be a discussion about finances; quality was central to the matter. UNESCO, for example, had called for "quality education for all."

AIDA AVELLA, of Women's International Democratic Federation, said neo-laissez-faire policy had stifled peoples. Earnings had been concentrated in very few hands. Neo-liberalism had destroyed any alternative that did not follow its market-driven logic. This culture of subjugation meant that globalization was in the hands of the elite.

In the report before the Subcommission on transnational corporations, it was revealed that standards of living had declined in recent decades in many regions of the world. Education, health, wages and salaries had suffered declines.

MONCEF BALTI, of Association Tunisienne Pour L'auto-Developpment & La Solidarite - Atlas said the international community must act together to eliminate poverty. All were called upon to include the problem of poverty under the discussion of employment. The support of NGOs to the poor in developing countries was timid. Economic, social and cultural rights had not yet received necessary attention. Vulnerable and poor groups should be the subject of all societies who were concerned with lasting stability.

A Tunisian poverty and development bank (la Banque Tunisienne de Solidarite - BTS) had granted a number of loans to people, many of them poor and many of them women. The results were encouraging. School-attendance rates, household income and life expectancy had gone up.

LAZARO PARY, of Indian Movement “Tupaj Amaru”, said the major challenge of the next millennium was to deal with the effects transnational corporations (TNCs) had on economic and social rights. The absolute law of unbridled competition had brought about the unequal development of the world economy. More than one-third of global capital was held in the hands of foreign investors. With the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the large monopolies of the world had set out to conquer and colonize the regions of the great Siberian north, which might contain valuable oil reserves.

There was a lack of international regulation of TNCs. The pressing need to adopt rules of behaviour for TNCs had come about because these corporations had no morals or ethics. States where TNCs did business had lost control of their economies -- they could not legally claim authority over branches of foreign companies set up in their jurisdictions.

HUGO AGUILAR, of Service, Justice and Peace in Latin America, said social, cultural and economic rights had been violated and that had led to marginalization and poverty. It was clear that indigenous people were the poorest people in the world -- today there was a clear link between indigenous and poor.

Almost half of the indigenous people in Mexico were illiterate. More than half did not have electric light, and fourth-fifths of their children had high rates of malnutrition. Government programmes had not reached these people.

ELLEN MOURAVIEFF-APOSTAL, of the International Federation of Social Workers, said the right to education was enshrined in such basic human-rights instruments as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and others. The IFSW would like to argue that at this point in history, the right to education was not only a right, but also an imperative. The future of people and of humanity depended to a great extent on the education and training capacity of educational institutions, intergovernmental bodies and non-governmental organizations. This seemed even more relevant today than five years ago.

Technology had made giant strides, and the danger of a permanently dual society composed of citizens who were educated and others who were ignorant and possessed nothing had never been more threatening. It was also becoming increasingly clear that nations whose populations were educated and skilled progressed, while others whose populations were insufficiently educated and trained lagged behind despite, in a number of cases, their valuable natural resources.

KAREN PARKER, of International Educational Development/Humanitarian Law Project, said there was a direct relationship between the realization of economic, social and cultural rights and the imposition of economic sanctions. Civilian populations must not be considered the enemy when considering the imposition of sanctions. International human-rights bodies had the right to comment on sanctions regimes.

Economic sanctions in Iraq continued. The reason for these sanctions was to hide from the world the effects that weaponry containing depleted uranium had had in Iraq. Also in Iraq, diseases such as hoof and mouth disease, previously controlled, were now rampant due to lack of vaccines. The Subcommission needed to call for a lifting of the sanctions there. The consideration of the subject of sanctions and their effects on human rights needed to be continued.

MICHAEL WINDFUHR, of the Foodfirst Information and Action Network, said the Subcommission’s original study on hunger in 1987 had been of tremendous importance. It had been influential in the entire right-to-food concept. NGOs working in the field were pleased with the update submitted to the Subcommission.

Foodfirst asked the Subcommission to support the discussion process between the Food and Agriculture Organization and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. There should be another Expert seminar on the right to adequate food.

ANTOANELLA IULIA MOTOC, Alternate Expert, said it was once thought that economic, social and cultural rights had no future because Communist societies had paid attention to them. But that had proved false. The link between Communism and the realization of these rights did not exist.

Communism was seen as a State without a market, so post-Communism was seen as a market without regulations. After ten years of debate on this, there was still greater poverty, and poverty had led to an upsurge in ideologies. These ideologies had resurfaced because individuals no longer had to fear State reprisal when expressing their opinions.

ELIAS KHOURI, of Union of Arab Jurists, said economic, social and cultural rights were a cornerstone of human rights. Those rights needed to be strengthened by improving relevant standards. This was a collective responsibility of the international community, not just the responsibility of Governments. The UN Charter rejected the use of threat or force in international relations, but matters had taken a different direction. Economic, social and cultural rights had been marginalized by issues of globalization. Social gains had been lost; poverty was the rule rather than the exception. Huge multinational companies were powerful empires, and many nations had been fragmented to serve those companies.

In the Middle East, no significant development had occurred. Human rights were violated internally and externally. The embargo against Iraq constituted an act of aggression and violated the right to life, the right to food, and the right to self-determination. In Iraq, children had been deprived of their right to education, their dignity and the right to realize their potentials. The embargo was unjust and must be lifted to alleviate the suffering of the people of Iraq.

RANAVIR SINGH, of Liberation, said Liberation was concerned over the growing influence of transnationals and their effect on the rights of minorities, on indigenous peoples and on human rights generally. Traditionally, human-rights discourse had been envisaged between the individual or the group and the State, with the assumption that the State had control over various factors which impinged on human rights, such as labour conditions, environmental factors, nutritional needs, and educational systems. In situations where sub-State actors had taken over a territory, international law had recognized those actors as responsible for human rights situations there. It would seem logical to hold private, non-governmental actors similarly accountable when they were in effective control of one or all of the factors impinging upon human rights.

In some areas of the world, private corporations were effectively in control of major human-rights issues, with the State in control only in name, de jure rather than de facto. It was futile to hold State parties accountable in such circumstances as they could not make any positive difference, even of a piecemeal nature. However, if a private corporation was to be held responsible, under what regime could this be done? The answer under traditional international law would be under the law of the host State. However, in the circumstances referred to, the State was not now in control.

TEIMURAZ O. RAMISHVILI, Subcommission Expert, said it was important to study the practices and traditions of groups of States and types of States, and their human-rights traditions. Whether it was in elementary school or in higher learning, it seemed that in today’s world, it was important to teach human rights, and the Subcommission should study the practices now in effect.

Particular focus should be placed on studying States with different religions and ethnicities. It was to be hoped that there would be a substantive report on the right to education next year. Such a study would make it impossible for the High Commissioner not to spread word of the importance of teaching human rights.

ALTAF H. QADRI, of World Muslim Congress, said economic, social and cultural rights were fundamental, universal rights. Progress and self-betterment could not come about unless people were masters of their own destinies. When considering economic development, the question of solidarity and cooperation for the realization of these rights was forgotten.

The right to education was a human right of the first order. It was a critical act to withhold education from people. In Kashmir, the economy had been destroyed by occupation forces; schools were occupied and destroyed. The social fabric of the land was scarred. Problems were not solved through supposed economic regeneration schemes, which were a diversionary tactic to avoid substantive social and political issues that were at the core of the problem of Kashmir.

MOHAMMAD AHSAN, of World Federation of Democratic Youth, said the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action had recognized the realization of the economic, social and cultural rights as well as the right to development as essential human rights which the state and society were required to concede to every individual. It was understood that security and safety had been accepted by almost all nations as a pre-condition for the enjoyment of the economic, social and cultural rights and the right to development. This naturally gave rise to the question of security as a matter of priority over development.

It was widely believed that development was possible only in a democratic, pluralistic, tolerant and just society. In particular, equality of all citizens before the law of the land was an important factor in promoting a sustainable culture of peace and harmonious co-existence between different groups in a given society.

PETER PROVE, of Lutheran World Federation, said the work of the Subcommission on transnational corporations represented the high road within the UN system on matters of economic globalization. However, more work needed to be done. Any new study must keep at its core the current work of Experts and keep at its core the rights of marginalized communities, rather than the many other aspects of globalization.

A new round of liberalization negotiations was expected at the WTO. Any such new round of negotiations needed to be approached cautiously. This was especially true in areas of investment and services; a prior careful analysis of the human-rights impacts of existing liberalization measures was necessary. A new round of WTO negotiations would also run counter to increased reflection and self-criticism within institutions such as the World Bank. The Subcommission was well placed to sound a note of caution.

MALIK OZDEN, of Centre Europe - Tiers Monde, said 90 per cent of the debt of the poorest countries would be written off, according to a decision at the recent G-7 conference. That was a sleight-of-hand trick. Even after these alleviation measures, the countries concerned would still be handing over half of their budgets to cover foreign debt.

As for the right to drinking water and sanitation, it was regrettable that the Commission on Human Rights had refused to appoint a Special Rapporteur on the issue. The decision was surprising because by the Year 2025, more than 3 billion people would suffer water shortages. Many conflicts had their origins in water shortages.

RAJENDA KALIDAS WIMALA GOONESEKERE, Subcommission Expert, said the time was right to focus on social and economic rights. A facade of democracy could result when these rights were ignored. NGOs, lawyers and universities were invited to play a positive role. This was relevant in his home country, Sri Lanka, where curricula did not focus on international human-rights instruments, especially those concerning social and economic rights.

A new approach to law as a tool of social justice was needed. Universities had begun this new approach, but these institutions needed international support to help train new lawyers. Governments were not in a position to understand the damages multinational corporations could cause in societies.

GHULAM-NABI FAI, of International Islamic Federation of Student Organizations, said half of the world’s 6 billion people lived on US$3 a day or less. The disparity between the richest 20 percent and the poorest 20 percent in the world had reached alarming proportions during the last 30 years.

The lack of an enabling environment at the national and international levels had contributed to a failure of the international community to assure the realization of the right to development both as an individual and as a collective right. It was hoped that the international-responsibility aspect would be given a central focus in the discussions of the Working Group on the Right to Development next month. It was also hoped that the Working Group would examine the implementation of the Right to Development by all States.

LEONIE TANGGAHAM, of Survival International, said a basic tenet of the right to development of indigenous people was that they should be involved in decisions concerning their own development. A draft bill recently had been proposed that would carve the Indonesian province of West Papua into three provinces. The people of West Papua had not been consulted. According to officials in Jakarta, the objective of this division was to improve the welfare of West Papuans. However, the people of West Papua had not been consulted about this proposal and they had protested it many times.

For many years, the people of West Papua had charged Jakarta with stealing the province's vast mineral, gas and timber wealth without returning money or jobs to the impoverished region. A new law on autonomy had been proposed which would increase the amount of wealth returned to regions where it was earned. This could be a positive development, but regional officials were to be the ones to administer this income; only a small number of these officials were indigenous people from West Papua. The right to development was vital to a balanced human-rights programme. The people affected must be informed and called on to participate.

R. K. JOSHI, of International Institute for Peace, said the world order consisted of a few privileged States endowed with peace and prosperity and a large number of marginalized States of the third world plagued by warfare, civil strife, unrest, unstable governance, economic stagnancy and environmental decay. Under such situations, the great danger was that there would be increased dependence of Third World countries on the rich nations, and increased foreign exploitation of developing countries’ resources and labour.

As free trade grew, there was great pressure on these marginalized States to open up their economies further to foreign investment. Some of the most promising sectors of their economies were bought up by TNCs. Foreign goods flooded in and destroyed domestic businesses, increasing unemployment and poverty. Export-oriented development in itself could not enhance the development of a region. Under this regime, the upper and middle classes might benefit, but the bulk of population could be harmed and ignored.

CORRECTION

Paragraph two of page 4 of press release HR/SC/99/8 of 10 August 1999 should read as follows:

SEVINDJ BAGIROV, of the Azerbaijan Women and Development Centre, said there had been the massive trauma of Kosovo where people were slaughtered because of their different cultures. Tent cities were seen on television screens. The Centre was thankful that the world community had taken the necessary measures.

Many Azerbaijani refugees were living in tents, having been driven out of their homes by Armenia. To grow accustomed to evil was to approve of it. It was the common task of the international community to ensure maximum value for the existence of mankind, and that would not be possible without the concept of co-existence, and co-existence would not be possible without respect for each individual. Nationalism and xenophobia were realities throughout the world. The Azerbaijan Women and Development Centre suggested the organization of a UN Conference on Education and the creation of an international research institute specializing in languages to create a common awareness that all people had common roots.