Human rights

Aung San Suu Kyii has finally broken her silence to the human tragedy in her country that has been unfolding over decades but now seems to be reaching a nadir with the Myanmar government justifying their actions against the Rohingyas as a war against terrorism. It has reached a scale that the UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein has called “a textbook case of ethnic cleansing”. In what has now become a familiar refrain, Suu Kyii said that Myanmar is a fragile democracy beset with many issues that threatens its very existence and that the Rohingyan issue is just one of them.  UN Secretary General António Guterres at the UN General Assembly stated: “We are all shocked by the dramatic escalation of sectarian tensions in Myanmar’s Rakhine State. A vicious cycle of persecution, discrimination, radicalization and violent repression has led more than 400,000 desperate people to flee, putting regional stability at risk.” Like Suu Kyii, ASEAN has been unwittingly thrust into the spotlight on where it stands on human rights, particularly when it is being violated on a large scale in one of its own. ASEAN might take refuge in its adherence to its principle of non-interference in internal affairs to justify its deafening silence. As chair of ASEAN, this year, President Duterte who has his own critics on his human rights record, finds himself in an awkward situation of speaking for ASEAN. He has not done so as such but in a recent speech he has criticized Suu Kyii but from the prism of his own deadly drug war. The numbers he says pales in comparison to what is happening in Myanmar.

Human rights everywhere seems to be taking a backseat to what are perceived to be the “greater good” of the nation. It is enough to make my father, Carlos P. Romulo, turn in his grave. His life-long advocacy has been the universality of human rights. In 1947, he worked closely with Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt who chaired and finalized the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948. As Secretary of Foreign Affairs, he spoke on the occasion of the 20th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration.

He said: “This last stated purpose of the United Nations appears the more revolutionary when it is recalled that in all recorded history, the rights of man had never been recognized outside the context or beyond the confines of the society or the State of which he is a part. Now, by the terms of Articles 55 and 56 of the Charter, all Member States pledged themselves “to take joint and separate action in cooperation with the Organization” in order to promote “universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion.”

In other words, human rights had become the object of international concern and the individual the subject of international law. Never again could any State validly declare that whatever it may choose to do with its own citizens is its own private affair and that the world community, however outraged it may be, has no right to intervene. From that time onward, no State could with impunity violate or deny the rights of its own citizens without arousing the conscience of mankind and inviting condemnation and possible sanctions by the international community.” Our Constitution created the Commission on Human Rights as an independent body for that purpose. So it behooves many, including this writer, why the House would question its mandate and amend the Constitution by the power of the purse string.

Hall of shame

Aung San Suu Kyii, the Noble Peace Prize Laureate was once my personal icon. To my regret, now she should be condemned to the Hall of Shame. There are other Nobel laureates that should also be included but to me she “takes the cake” for betraying my own personal belief in her.

I am constrained to also include the members of the Philippine House of Representatives who voted for the P1,000 budget for the Commission on Human Rights. It demonstrates their immaturity and blatant disregard for the Constitution’s mandate. It is a national embarrassment!