The Sydney Morning Herald http://www.smh.com.au/news/9903/13/text/national11.html UN grills Coalition over racial complaints Date: 13/03/99 By DEBRA JOPSON and SIMON MANN Australia has been forced to explain its Aboriginal policies to a high-level United Nations committee which includes the eminent Dutch lawyer who devised globally respected guidelines saying nations must apologise for past wrongs. During a Geneva grilling over why Aborigines are complaining about its behaviour, a Federal Government representative faced Professor Theodoor van Boven, a member of the 18-member UN Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD). Australian human rights sources said Professor van Boven, whose principles are quoted in the Human Rights Commission's Bringing Them Home report as guidelines for dealing with the "stolen children", was likely to harden the committee's position. Another member, Professor Rudiger Wolfrum of Germany, has already said the situation in Australia has deteriorated since 1994 when the committee praised our performance. Ours is the first Western Government to be asked to explain its racial policies under CERD's early warning and urgent action procedures. "We want to know whether or not their amendments to the Native Title Act are in accord with their obligations under the race convention," the committee's rapporteur for Australia, Ms Gay McDougall, told ABC Radio. There are also questions about why the Government took 14 months to appoint a new Aboriginal Social Justice Commissioner after Mr Mick Dodson quit. His replacement, Dr Bill Jonas, has just been announced. The deputy general counsel from the Attorney-General's Department, Mr Robert Orr, a native title specialist, was due to argue before the committee that the Wik legislation was not discriminatory. The Attorney-General, Mr Williams, said in a statement yesterday that the Government took its international obligations seriously. Its co- operation with the UN was further evidence of "Australia's well deserved reputation for protecting and promoting the human rights of all people". The committee has been deluged with submissions, including the first that Amnesty International has ever lodged with the UN criticising Australia. Aboriginal leaders including Mr Mick Dodson, Mr Geoff Clark and Mr Les Malezer spent yesterday putting their views to an informal meeting of the committee. Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation (ANTAR) has told the committee that the Wik act breached four articles of an international treaty against race discrimination which Australia has signed. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) said the Wik changes had punished indigenous Australians and were without doubt "racially discriminatory", citing Aboriginal deaths in custody, health, housing, education, employment and criminal justice. This material is subject to copyright and any unauthorised use, copying or mirroring is prohibited. ************************************************************************* This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use." Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
