Written statement
submitted by Transnational Radical Party, a
non-governmental organisation in general consultative
status
The fact that
democracy, development and respect for human rights
and fundamental freedoms are interdependent and
mutually reinforcing has been proclaimed numerous
times by various United Nations bodies. The last
year's session of the Commission on Human Rights also
recognised that "the Declaration on the Right to
Development constitutes an integral link between the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Vienna
Declaration and Programme of Action through its
elaboration of a holistic vision integrating
economic, social and cultural rights with civil and
political rights" and urged "all States to
eliminate all obstacles to development at all levels,
by pursuing the promotion and protection of economic,
social, cultural, civil and political rights and by
implementing comprehensive development programmes at
the national level, integrating these rights into
development activities, and by promoting effective
international co-operation" (CHR resolution
1998/72)
However, certain
States continue to deny fundamental human rights on
the grounds that these rights are incompatible with
the right to adequate economic and social
development. This position, which fails to understand
that promoting and protecting all human rights are a
necessary precondition to sustainable development, is
often based on excluding any participation of an
individual in the public life, thus contradicting the
affirmation of the Commission that "effective
popular participation is an essential component of
successful and lasting development" and that
"the human person is the central subject of
development and that development policy should
therefore make the human being the main participant
and beneficiary of development" (CHR resolution
1998/72).
The Transnational
Radical Party wishes to address this issue through
four examples: the recent economic and political
development in Vietnam, the collapse of North Koran
economy and China's development in Tibet, East
Turkestan and Inner Mongolia. In all these cases,
development schemes resting on the failure to honour
the fundamental rights and freedoms have not provided
an adequate and fair distribution of resources and
are economically and socially unsustainable. In other
words, one or all the three factors necessary for the
achievement of sustainable human development - the
government, civil society and enterprises - and
therefore also the dynamics between them failed to or
was not allowed to fulfil its function of enabling
the people to develop their potentials and to elevate
their standard of living.
Vietnam stagnates
already for many years in poverty and backwardness,
where the principal of democratic centralism and the
one-party totalitarian state system appears to have
favoured the development of corruption and have
represented a barrier to building prosperity in
Vietnam. Although the last year's unexpected release
of some of the Vietnam's best-known political
prisoners and the newly-installed Communist Party
leadership were promising steps, it seems they were
only a ploy to vent international pressure on Hanoi's
human rights practices, and to get more financial
aids for its ailing economy; In 1998, the arbitrary
detention in substandard prison camps continued,
press freedoms remained strictly curtailed,
independent associations and trade unions were not
allowed to operate, and little progress was made in
legal reform.
The Vietnam's farmers
continued to demonstrate their anger over rampant
corruption, punitive taxation, unfair rice prices,
land disputes and compulsory labour contributions to
national infrastructure projects. In March 1998, at
least nine local people were convicted for disturbing
public order during the January clashes in Dong Nai
province. In July, the People's Court in Thai Binh
sentenced more than thirty local people, whom the
government termed "extremists," to prison
terms for inciting people to disrupt public order
during uprisings in the province in November 1997. In
March an anti-corruption ordinance was passed that
contained provisions requiring officials to declare
their assets, but a draft law to facilitate the
filing of complaints by citizens against local
officials failed to pass in the National Assembly. In
an effort to control information about the regional
economic crisis and its impact on Vietnam, the
Ministry of Culture continued to implement a 1997
press edict that prohibited media coverage of the
banking system and instructed editors to tone down
critical economic coverage.
The Hanoi regime
continued its systematic elimination, harassment and
suppression of the voices demanding freedom of speech
and democratisation of the country. The repeated
attacks and house-arrests were undertaken against the
dissidents Ha Si Phu, Bui Minh Quoc, and Tieu Dao Bao
Cu and their families; in an effort to mute critics
within itself, the Vietnamese Communist Party has
expelled in the beginning of this year Tran Do,
retired general, after he repeatedly asked the
Party's leadership to make reforms, democratise the
country, hold free elections…; on January 6,
1999, the regime executed two men, Huynh Te Cam and
Tran Van Thuan, accused of plotting to topple the
communist regime. These are clear signals that the
authorities of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam not
only neglect their obligation to the two most
important International Covenants (ICESCR and ICCPR),
but also refuse to understand that only a policy of
deep political and economical reforms, granting fully
the establishment of the State of Law and opening of
the market economy and competition, can contribute to
the progressive solution of the grave situation of
this country.
North Korea has been
experiencing similar political and economical
development in the past decades. Its failed economic
and agricultural policies under the totalitarian
communist regime undoubtedly contributed decisively
to the tragic consequences of the natural disasters
of 1995-1997. The omnipresent famine, starvation and
energetic crisis has continued to deteriorate already
for 4 years. Industrial production is at a
standstill. Despite the gravity of the situation, in
which an estimated 30 per cent of children are
suffering from severe malnutrition and millions of
people are at risk, the North Korean authorities keep
their people extremely isolated and put restrictions
on visits to North Korea and on access to impartial
information preventing the assessment of the exact
scale of the spread of famine, as well as proper
monitoring of the food aid given. Some NGOs - the Red
Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières - and United
Nations agencies - notably UN Development Programme -
continue to provide a humanitarian aid and improve
agricultural productivity through concrete projects.
However, with a repeatedly demonstrated unwillingness
of the Pyongyang regime to start any serious
political and economic reforms, there are little
chances to improve substantially the situation.
China has signed the
ICESCR and the ICCPR. China has nonetheless taken the
position that the right of its citizens to adequate
food and shelter outweigh all other human rights. In
practice, however, China has failed to provide fair
or adequate resources for the people in its annexed
territories, in Tibet, East Turkestan and Inner
Mongolia. The failure is directly traceable to
China's failure to honour these peoples' fundamental
rights and freedoms. The case of Mr. Hada, founder of
the Southern Mongolian Democracy Alliance, who was
arrested in 1997 on a charge of separatism and
sentenced to 15 years imprisonment and deprived of
political rights for a period of 4 years, shows
clearly the destiny of numerous political opponents
who are recently serving their long sentences in
Chinese prisons. The development scheme in place in
these regions, moreover, shows every sign of being
unsustainable.
The development scheme
in Tibet, East Turkestan and Inner Mongolia rests on
two foundations: (1) decisions made by central
planners in Beijing; and (2) population transfer into
these regions of Chinese settlers. These two
foundations ensure that Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongols
do not participate in development decisions regarding
their homelands, and that the development is
benefiting primarily Chinese settlers, Chinese
investors, and Chinese authorities. One notable
example is the World Food Programme project for the
Lhasa River Valley, carried out without Tibetan
participation. Another is the Panam project, blocked
by the European Union because of the lack of Tibetan
participation.
In August 1998,
Xinhua, the official Chinese press service, announced
the completion of 60 development projects in Tibet,
among 62 projects that had been planned by Beijing.
Tibetans did not participate in the planning or
implementation of these projects. These projects,
moreover, were intended primarily "to enhance
foreign investment" in Tibet and were
concentrated in urban areas dominated by Chinese
settlers. Few reached the vast majority of Tibetans
who live in rural areas. In December 1998, Chinese
authorities announced additional preferential
policies to attract foreign investment in Tibet.
Tibetans, Uighurs and
Mongols suffer discrimination in employment by the
Chinese settlers and cadres who control most jobs.
The average yearly income of the Uighurs, Tibetans
and Mongols amount to about 1/4 to 1/3 of the income
of Chinese settlers. Inadequate and costly schools
for these peoples and Chinese language requirements
also prevent them from participating fully in their
country's economy. Another stark indicators are
education and health. In 1996, China acknowledged to
the Committee on the Rights of the Child that 33% of
Tibetan school-age children receive no education at
all compared to a mere 1.5% of Chinese children. In
addition, a 1996 study shows that, although the
height of Chinese children has increased over the
last twenty years, the height of Tibetan children is
actually declining, probably due to nutritional
deficiencies and generally inadequate health care.
The high cost of hospitals, moreover, makes all but
the most minimal health care out of reach of most
Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongols, resulting that almost
70 per cent of illnesses are fatal.
Chinese-controlled
economic development, therefore, is not providing
Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongols with an adequate or
fair measure of economic opportunity. Their inability
to participate in development decisions and
aggressive population transfer are aimed at
maintaining political control over the territories,
not at raising the standard of living of Tibetans,
Uighurs and Mongols as such.
The Transnational
Radical Party calls upon the Commission to request
that the open-ended working group on the right to
development (CHR Resolution 1998/72 and ECOSOC
Decision 1998/269) pays at its next meetings a
particular attention to the aspect of popular
participation on development, and that the working
group discusses and documents the particular ways in
which the failure or the denial to ensure the popular
participation impedes the achievement of sustainable
human development and the realisation of the right to
development.
