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| Right activists barred from ASEAN leader talks |
| Warta |
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WASPADA ONLINE HUA HIN, THAILAND - Southeast Asian leaders were embroiled in a new row over human rights Friday (Oct. 23) after they excluded five out of ten activists from rare face-to-face talks at a summit in Thailand. The controversy threatened to mar the launch later in the day of a new regional rights body by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) at the group's annual summit in Thailand. Leaders of the 10-member bloc were set to meet so-called civil society representatives on Friday morning but rejected nominees from Myanmar, Cambodia,Laos, Philippines and Singapore at the last minute, rights groups said. "This is an outrageous development. It is a rejection of civil society and of the democratic process by which they were selected," said Debbie Stothard of the ASEAN People's Forum, which nominated the activists. "Five of the 10 civil society representatives selected by the ASEAN People's Forum have been rejected. The remaining five have been told that they will not be allowed to speak at the interface," Stothard told AFP. "This really does not bode well. The irony is that ASEAN governments have committed themselves under their new charter to a 'people-centred' organisation but this is a radical undermining of that." Myanmar and Singapore had offered government-sponsored replacements to the civil society members, Stothard said. In Myanmar's case, this would be a former chief of police representing a Myanmar anti-narcotics association. Indonesia's activist Yuyun Wahyuningrum said she and the representatives of Thailand and Malaysia, who were still allowed at the meeting, had decided not to attend in protest over ASEAN's "broken promises". "Civil society is insulted by being treated this way. We call on ASEAN governments to take the ASEAN charter seriously," she said. "As a civil society we feel ASEAN is not respecting us. They rejected our candidates. They only want to listen to their own voice," added Malaysia's representative Moon Hui Tah, from the human rights organisation SUARAM. Sinapan Samydorai, head of the Singapore civil rights group Think Centre,said he was only informed at 11:00 pm (1600 GMT) on Thursday about being barred -- a move he described as "really shameful". The snub came just hours before ASEAN leaders were set to launch the bloc's first ever human rights body, in an attempt to address criticisms that it is too soft on abusers such as military-ruled Myanmar. In February, Myanmar and Cambodia both blocked civil society representatives from their countries from attending a similar meeting at an earlier summit in Hua Hin. ASEAN's guiding principle of non-interference in members' affairs throughout its 42-year history has often landed it in hot water with the international community. (wol22/ann) |
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