The Canberra Times
Thursday, 31 August, 2000
Ideals of liberalism lacking
THE JOINT statement by three ministers on the way the United
Nations deals with human-rights issues in Australia is an
over-reaction and wilful politicking and populism. It called for the UN
to respect the primary role of democratically elected governments
and the subordinate role of non-government bodies in reportage of
alleged human-rights abuses. Australia would not sign a new UN
protocol to eliminate discrimination against women. The statement
noted that while other countries were engaged in arbitrary arrests
and torture, Australia's problems were marginal and minor.
Maybe Australia's human-rights questions are marginal compared to
those of, say, Burma or half a dozen African hell-holes - all the more
reason not to be so precious and defensive. Australia should be a
leading democratic light, not fearful of having the highest standards
of human rights applied to it. Australia should not engage in the
business of comparative human rights. Human rights are universal
and absolute.
The Australian Government's squirming on slightly adverse findings
being made against us is unbecoming of a liberal democracy.
Xenophobic allusions to interference in Australia's internal affairs
and
appeals to UN committees to favour government reportage over the
reportage of non-government bodies is especially unhelpful. These
are the two very cries of undemocratic regimes. Malaysia and China,
for example, forever cry foul on the basis on inference in internal
affairs. They and other undemocratic regimes hamper or bar the
activities of non-government bodies, substituting the official
government view that all is well. The action by the Australian
Government this week means that every dictatorship can gain
succour from the Australian position that the Government view is to
be preferred and non-government bodies' views are to be ignored or
discounted.
This flies in the face of experience. Governments engage in by far
the most breaches of human rights in the world and to date under the
UN committee system no state has brought a complaint against
another state. It means that if UN committees are to identify
human-rights breaches they must rely on non-government bodies.
With a lesser or no role for non-government bodies, the UN's role in
exposing human-rights breaches will be lost. And there are few other
means of exposing rights breaches, let alone acting against them.
Rather than pointing to worse offenders (which is no excuse)
Australia should have met the UN criticism head on and moved to do
something about it. Instead Australia shamefully went on the
defensive.
That the statement was put out by Foreign Affairs Minister Alexander
Downer, Immigration and Reconciliation Minister Philip Ruddock, and
Attorney-General Daryl Williams, is especially sad. We have come to
expect Prime Minister John Howard to engage in policy by talk-back
radio. We have come to expect Workplace Relations Minister Peter
Reith to engage in the adversary government of guard dogs and
hyperbole and we expect the National Party to engage in government
by vested interest. Mr Ruddock used to be a voice of moderation. Mr
Downer, while not an intellectual giant, comes with a pedigree of
commitment to good government. Mr Williams was a man with a great
belief in the rule of law and the rights of the individual. Sadly all
have
now succumbed to Howard-style populism and fear of Pauline Hanson
with an appeal to some mythical battler instead of a more appropriate
adherence to principle and the ideals of liberalism.
--
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