India’s relations with Myanmar fail to address human rights concerns in run up to elections

Amnesty International India

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http://www.amnesty.org/



Amnesty International calls on the Government of India as a regional leader, to use its influence to improve the human rights situation in Myanmar in advance of the upcoming elections.


With Myanmar’s first elections in two decades approaching, the three freedoms - of expression, association and peaceful assembly - essential for people to freely participate in the political process, are increasingly being denied. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is one of some 2,200 political prisoners in Myanmar. None of them will be able to participate in this year’s elections under new election laws - laws that the Indian government has failed to condemn.

The Government of India claims to follow a ‘constructive’ approach in promoting human rights

improvements in Myanmar. However, its response to the dire state of human rights in the country has been increasingly inadequate.


By disassociating itself from the recent critical resolution on Myanmar’s terrible human rights

record at the United Nations Human Rights Council, while issuing the anodyne call for elections to be ‘inclusive and broad based’, the Government of India has ignored the reality on the ground the resolution looked to address.


Political repression is also occurring against a backdrop of widespread and systematic violations of international human rights and humanitarian law by the Myanmar army in its campaign against ethnic minorities.
While India suspended most shipments of military hardware to Myanmar in late 2006, it is

reportedly considering a resumption of its arms sales. Its opposition to a global arms embargo on Myanmar makes its reluctance to support wider sanctions, supposedly based on the harm they would do to the wider population, disingenuous. Amnesty International calls on the Government of India to maintain its current suspension of military transfers to Myanmar.

Myanmar’s other neighbours have in some crucial instances taken a stronger stance than India. Singaporean Foreign Minister, George Yeo, in a statement after the ASEAN Summit on 9 April 2010, complained of the obstacles ASEAN faces in acting on Myanmar due to the stances of both India and China. In October 2007 during the popular protests against the Myanmar government, ASEAN - chaired then by Singapore - expressed “revulsion” at the brutal crackdown. India expressed only “concern”.

In May 2008 after the devastating Cyclone Nargis, many in the international community, including China and ASEAN, raised the Myanmar government’s failure to assist the 2.5 million survivors. India instead ‘saluted’ the people and government for their resilience and called for the aid process to be ‘apolitical’, ignoring the fact that Myanmar’s leaders had already politicised aid by blocking much-needed assistance.

India’s role in the “Group of Friends of the Secretary-General on Myanmar” at the UN is a small step in the right direction but much more is needed. To participate in the group but to be silent unilaterally at best weakens India’s ability to help effect positive change in Myanmar, and at worst sends a mixed message that could be interpreted as tacit endorsement of the human rights violations taking place.

The numerous human rights violations documented by Amnesty International and many others during periods of heightened political dissent in Myanmar indicate the need to focus on upholding human rights during the upcoming election period.

As the Myanmar elections approach Amnesty International urges the Government of India to

publicly call for the three freedoms - of expression, association and peaceful assembly - to be

guaranteed throughout the election period. This is the time to show true human rights leadership as befits a key regional player – and not the time for silence.

* Press Release - Courtesy Amnesty International

Fraud & Breach Of Trust

Amnesty International India

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Now the almost-forgotten Bhopal gas tragedy is back in the headlines. For most readers, it is history recalled. But, for the Bhopal survivors, it is tragedy relived. A brief recount of the killer gas explosion first. The tragedy struck at the sleeping city past midnight on December 2-3, 1984. A valve defect had diverted a ton of water into a storage tank of the factory that contained some 42 tons of poisonous gas known as Mythl IsoCynate (MIC). This resulted in a huge chemical implosion raising the heat to 200 Celsius. That instantly opened the tank, and emptied the 42 tons of toxic gas that exploded into the atmosphere. MIC is a deadly poison. If the MIC particles exceed 21 out of a billion in the atmosphere, that can injure, even choke, the lungs and cause death. Imagine some 42,000 kilograms of this poison are let into the air in one shot. The MIC-concentrated area will turn into a mass graveyard. This is precisely what happened in Bhopal.

Some 3,800 people, mostly dwellers in nearby slums, instantly choked to death after inhaling the poison; the toll rose to 10,000 in the next few days; some 15,000-20,000, who had inhaled less intense poison, died miserable deaths on the next two decades; and, some 5,00,000 people, almost half the population of Bhopal then, who inhaled the toxic gas, are living an impaired life of different grades (See ‘Bhopal Disaster and its aftermath: a review’ by Edward Broughton of Columbia University, Environmental Health issue dated May 10, 2005). Many of those living are just breathing dead bodies. On December 3, the dead bodies of humans and animals in thousands were seen strewn on the streets. But what followed the untold tragedy was an unmitigated disaster to the victims. Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL), a subsidiary of Union Carbide Corporation US (UCC), was operating the Bhopal factory. But, UCC disowned its subsidiary once the tragedy occurred, contending that the Bhopal works was that of UCIL, an Indian company; it also ‘fabricated scenarios’ of ‘sabotage’ by ‘unknown Sikh extremist groups’ and ‘disgruntled employees’. In the process ‘the ethical implications of the tragedy and its effect on the Bhopal people were largely ignored’ in the litigations (Broughton). In March 1985 the Indian government, by law, declared itself as the sole trustee of the victims in legal proceedings anywhere. Eventually the US courts, where cases had been first filed, pointed the litigants to the Indian courts — ‘to the detriment’ of the victims (Broughton).

As the sole trustee representing toxic gas victims, the government had first made a claim of $3.3 billion on UCC. The UCC counter-offered about a tenth of it, $350 millions. Suddenly, on UCC owning ‘moral responsibility’ for the tragedy, the sole trustee-government shockingly agreed to an unbelievable, measly compensation of $470 million against its claim of $3.3 billion. The Supreme Court of India mediated this claim, a pittance. Not just a sixth of government’s claim, it was less than five per cent of what UCC itself paid to similar victims in US. The day the settlement was sealed by the Supreme Court, Ram Jethmalani, veteran jurist, said that there was large-scale corruption in the deal. He charged that the government, which forcibly became the sole trustee for the victims, was guilty of criminal breach of trust against the victims. This breach of trust is the worst crime in the continuing story of betrayal of the poor victims from the word go.

Its sad to know that the own government is misleading the poor victims , inspite of understanding their pain the government itself is playing the double game in the mask of justice.

*( For Amnesty International's Demand Dignity Campaign )

SAVE THE INNOCENTS !

Amnesty International India

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"Child is the father of the man" or he is the future of tomorrow? But no more. With the growing exploitation and the way we are depriving him of his basic rights, the future seems dark and grim. Child labour is one of the worst forms of exploitation. It has been going on since long without being noticed. Asia has 61% of the world's child laborers. Despite the help offered by few organizations, it's largely taken for granted and no substantial effort has been put in this direction to overcome it and give the children of this world a betterchance.

Exploitation of children in commercial sex trade remains the worst form of child labour in Asia. UNICEF estimates that 1 million children are lured into sex trade in Asia every year, wherein 40% were sold by parents, 15% by their relatives. Traffickers of both children and adults feed largely on the desire of poor families and many young people for economic and personal advancement through migration for work. Thailand is the base for children trafficked from Laos, Cambodia, Burma, and China. The children work as prostitutes, household helpers, in factories, farms, fishing vessels, drug trafficking.

Bonded child labour is extensively rooted in socio-cultural and political structures in parts of South Asia. Bonded children are delivered in repayment of a loan who then work like slaves in agriculture, domestic work, brick kilns, glass industries, tanneries, gem polishing and many other manufacturing and marketing industries. Child abuse in name of domestic work is rampant in Asia. The young are exposed to hazards while doing heavy household work and are usual victims of verbal, physical, and sexual abuse and is most difficult to see as they are restrained within the privacy of our homes.

The rise in the incidences of internal armed conflicts in several Asian countries has resulted in even more exposure of children to armed groups as soldiers, spies, porters and helpers in camps, subjected to abusive treatments in Burma, Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Philippines and Nepal.

Ordinary people can also help fight for the cause by learning about the issue, help organizations that are raising awareness, providing direct help to individual children. It can be decreased by increased family incomes; education - impart skills to help them earn a living, family control - so that families are not burdened by children.


The ILO's International Programme for the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC) has explored many programs to help child laborers. Strong advocates of this approach are Boyden, Myers and Ling; Concerned for Working Children in Karnataka, India; many children's "unions" and "movements" and the Save the Children family of NGO. Helped in this effort by setting up credit schemes, supported education schemes, and got appropriate legislation on child labour implemented.

Let us also contribute in this direction so that no more children work on the streets. Let us all pledge to give them their childhood back, their lost innocence and smile. Let us give them education to light their hearts and this world to make it a better place to live in.

Empty Plate

Poverty is the state for the majority of the world’s people and nations. Why is this? Is it enough to blame poor people for their own predicament? Have they been lazy, made poor decisions, and been solely responsible for their plight? What about their governments? Have they pursued policies that actually harm successful development? Such causes of poverty and inequality are no doubt real. But deeper and more global causes of poverty are often less discussed.

Behind the increasing interconnectedness promised by globalization are global decisions, policies, and practices. These are typically influenced, driven, or formulated by the rich and powerful. These can be leaders of rich countries or other global actors such as multinational corporations, institutions, and influential people.

In the face of such enormous external influence, the governments of poor nations and their people are often powerless. As a result, in the global context, a few get wealthy while the majority struggle. Most of humanity lives on just a few dollars a day. Whether you live in the wealthiest nations in the world or the poorest, you will see high levels of inequality.

The poorest people will also have less access to health, education and other services. Problems of hunger, malnutrition and disease afflict the poorest in society. The poorest are also typically marginalized from society and have little representation or voice in public and political debates, making it even harder to escape poverty.

By contrast, the wealthier you are, the more likely you are to benefit from economic or political policies. The amount the world spends on military, financial bailouts and other areas that benefit the wealthy compared to the amount spent to address the daily crisis of poverty and related problems are often staggering. Cutbacks in health, education and other vital social services around the world have resulted from structural adjustment policies prescribed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank as conditions for loans and repayment. In addition, developing nation governments are required to open their economies to compete with each other and with more powerful and established industrialized nations. To attract investment, poor countries enter a spiraling race to the bottom to see who can provide lower standards, reduced wages and cheaper resources. This has increased poverty and inequality for most people. It also forms a backbone to what we today call globalization. As a result, it maintains the historic unequal rules of trade.

Around the world, in rich or poor nations, poverty has always been present.


In most nations today, inequality—the gap between the rich and the poor—is quite high and often widening.

The causes are numerous, including a lack of individual responsibility, bad government policy, exploitation by people and businesses with power and influence, or some combination of these and other factors.

Many feel that high levels of inequality will affect social cohesion and lead to problems such as increasing crime and violence which is true to some extend; When the poor ones will not have bread to eat and shelter to hide themselves then they are likely to choose the illegal path.

Inequality is often a measure of relative poverty. Absolute poverty, however, is also a concern. World Bank figures for world poverty reveals a higher number of people live in poverty than previously thought.

For example, the new poverty line is defined as living on the equivalent of $1.25 a day. With that measure based on latest data available (2005), 1.4 billion people live on or below that line.

Furthermore, almost half the world—over three billion people—live on less than $2.50 a day and at least 80% of humanity lives on less than $10 a day: Over 24,000 children die every day around the world out of malnutrition , lack of proper care etc.

 
Though the steps are being taken to eradicate this issue but still there is yet to do a lot in this context. For example in our country many policies and projects are being made to overcome this issue but the main problem is that the people who are actually in need of those services and policies are not getting the benefit out of it. The corruption is the root cause for this; the government officials take these “so called projects” as there money minting machines and try to take as much benefit from them as possible and in between all this the poor remains poor.


These entire examples shows us how lightly we are taking this burning issue, needless to say that without being serious and without being selfless this issue cannot be resolved.

Poverty or Death Of Human Rights ?

Amnesty International India


Poverty is the state for the majority of the world’s people and nations. Why is this? Is it enough to blame poor people for their own predicament? Have they been lazy, made poor decisions, and been solely responsible for their plight? What about their governments? Have they pursued policies that actually harm successful development? Such causes of poverty and inequality are no doubt real. But deeper and more global causes of poverty are often less discussed.


Behind the increasing interconnectedness promised by globalization are global decisions, policies, and practices. These are typically influenced, driven, or formulated by the rich and powerful. These can be leaders of rich countries or other global actors such as multinational corporations, institutions, and influential people.

In the face of such enormous external influence, the governments of poor nations and their people are often powerless. As a result, in the global context, a few get wealthy while the majority struggle. Most of humanity lives on just a few dollars a day. Whether you live in the wealthiest nations in the world or the poorest, you will see high levels of inequality.

The poorest people will also have less access to health, education and other services. Problems of hunger, malnutrition and disease afflict the poorest in society. The poorest are also typically marginalized from society and have little representation or voice in public and political debates, making it even harder to escape poverty.

By contrast, the wealthier you are, the more likely you are to benefit from economic or political policies. The amount the world spends on military, financial bailouts and other areas that benefit the wealthy compared to the amount spent to address the daily crisis of poverty and related problems are often staggering. Cutbacks in health, education and other vital social services around the world have resulted from structural adjustment policies prescribed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank as conditions for loans and repayment. In addition, developing nation governments are required to open their economies to compete with each other and with more powerful and established industrialized nations. To attract investment, poor countries enter a spiraling race to the bottom to see who can provide lower standards, reduced wages and cheaper resources. This has increased poverty and inequality for most people. It also forms a backbone to what we today call globalization. As a result, it maintains the historic unequal rules of trade.

Around the world, in rich or poor nations, poverty has always been present.

In most nations today, inequality—the gap between the rich and the poor—is quite high and often widening.

The causes are numerous, including a lack of individual responsibility, bad government policy, exploitation by people and businesses with power and influence, or some combination of these and other factors.

Many feel that high levels of inequality will affect social cohesion and lead to problems such as increasing crime and violence which is true to some extend; When the poor ones will not have bread to eat and shelter to hide themselves then they are likely to choose the illegal path.

Inequality is often a measure of relative poverty. Absolute poverty, however, is also a concern. World Bank figures for world poverty reveals a higher number of people live in poverty than previously thought.

For example, the new poverty line is defined as living on the equivalent of $1.25 a day. With that measure based on latest data available (2005), 1.4 billion people live on or below that line.

Furthermore, almost half the world—over three billion people—live on less than $2.50 ( Rs110.6/- ) a day and at least 80% of humanity lives on less than $10 ( Rs440/-) a day: Over 24,000 children die every day around the world out of malnutrition , lack of proper care etc.

Though the steps are being taken to eradicate this issue but still there is yet to do a lot in this context. For example in our country many policies and projects are being made to overcome this issue but the main problem is that the people who are actually in need of those services and policies are not getting the benefit out of it. The corruption is the root cause for this; the government officials take these “yojna’s” as there money minting machines and try to take as much benefit from them as possible and in between all this the poor remains poor.

These entire examples shows us how lightly we are taking this burning issue, needless to say that without being serious and without being selfless this issue cannot be resolved.

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Dignity....Not Slums Please...!

Amnesty International India

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I sometimes wonder how we people will fight from poverty in the present situation ! the picture is getting worst day by day. We are running without any clue with loads of planning & projects to fight poverty , to provide better shelter and better amenities to the poor ones but what is the outcome ? 25% of Indians live on less than a dollar a day and 70% live on less than two dollars a day. A more acceptable and bit accurate description of incomes in country is Purchase Power Parity (PPP), which is, pricing identical products and services as needed by the local population in different countries, thus establishing a new and a more equitable exchange rate. The foregoing is applicable mostly to tradable goods. The PPP will put India’s GDP at $3.7 Trillion. This will raise daily monies of 25% of Indians at the lowest rung of the society to seven dollars. The latter is still low .The forgoing is not the point; the point is that poverty is a major shame in India’s otherwise decent, scientifically advanced, peace loving and at times turbulent image. Poverty creates slums and slums breed hopelessness and crime. Hence it needs to be tackled as an integral part of economic development.


The key question that arises - will the current hype in economical development in India alter the landscape for the very poor?The answer is that, not much will change in next 20 to 25 years. The real impact will be felt later than twenty-five years. That is when 8% growth trajectory will take the PPP daily income of the very poor in India from seven dollars to forty dollars.

What actually causes SLUMS in the cities ? well let us look it this way....It is a vicious cycle of population growth, opportunities in the cities (leading to migration to the cities), poverty with low incomes, tendency to be closer to work hence occupying any land in the vicinity etc. The key reason out of all is the slow economic progress. After independence in 1947, commercial and industrial activity needed cheap labor in the cities. Plentiful was available in the rural area. They were encouraged to come to cities and work. People, who migrated to the cities and found work, brought their cousins and rest of the families to the cities. Unable to find housing and afford it, they decided to build their shelter closer to work. First, one shelter was built, then two and then two thousand and then ten thousand and on and on. Conniving governments provided electricity and drinking water. Politicians looked at the slums as vote bank. They organized these unauthorized dwellers into a political force; hence slums took a bit of a permanent shape. More slums developed as more population moved to the cities. By mid sixties Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, and all other large cities were dotted with slums.Very poor people live in slums. They are not the only one dwelling there. Fairly well to do people also reside there. They are either offspring of the slum dwellers that found education and an occupation. They have prospered but are unable to find affordable housing, hence have continued to stay in the shantytowns. Others are avoiding paying rent and property taxes. The latter is more often the case. It is not unusual that in the dirtiest of slums, where misery prevails that TV sets, refrigerators and radios are also blaring music. This is quite a contrast from the image which one gets in the media or from the opportunist politicians.India’s capital of Delhi has a million and a half out of fourteen million living in slums. Mumbai is worst with greater percentage living in slums. Other big urban centers have done no better. Newly built cities like Chandigarh and surrounding towns where shantytowns could have been avoided altogether have now slums. The forgoing is India’s shame despite huge progress

To avoid this, India’s economy has to remain at a high state of growth. Jobs created by the economic growth, hence higher incomes are key criteria for poverty reduction and slum elimination. The foregoing together with the current urban renewal in progress in the urban areas today will give cities in India a new look. Higher incomes will create a demand for in-expensive housing, which will have to be met with innovative use of land and building techniques. Government provided housing would be a great failure as it has been elsewhere in the world. Instead sufficient cash has to be placed in the people’s hands together with in-expensive land that people’s housing program become efficient and affordable. In addition slum living has to be made unattractive with land taxes and denial of social services. Slum colonies, which opt out of current hopelessness, should get a better deal in housing which replaces the slums. This followed with rapidly growing rural economy will kill migration. That will also reduce pressure on housing.No single policy has ever brought an end to poverty and slums. It is a concerted effort and better policies, which will end it. No country in the world has ever been able to end poverty and slums completely. That includes the richest nation of the world – USA. The point is that if economy progresses and special effort is made to uplift the poor, poverty and slums will be overtaken by better economic conditions of the people.


How much a poor will wait ?

An economic equilibrium has not been reached in the society yet, where enough money in people’s pocket will persuade them to vacate the slums. This won’t we reached for another 20 to 25 years. By about middle of this period with increased availability of housing and higher incomes, the growth in slum dwelling will be arrested. Decline will begin only when much higher incomes are reached (as stated above), provided India does not make the mistake of regularizing the slums/bustees with land tenure on tenable land and other amenities. That is a sure fire method to keep the slums going. People will always wait for free grant of land ownership even if these grants never materialize. Even the possibility of this ever happening in a distant future will keep the slum dwellers in the slums.


Big and Strong steps are required by the government to eradicate this and to provide a respectful life to the poors.....BEFORE ITS TOO LATE.........

*( For Amnesty International's Demand Dignity Campaign )