ASEAN inconsistent on rights

ASEAN inconsistent on rights

By Arief Budiman

SALATIGA, Central Java (JP): One of the most publicized
controversies in the 29th ASEAN Ministerial Meeting (AMM) and the
ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) taking place these days in Jakarta is
the official acceptance of Myanmar as an observer. According to
procedure, this is the step before it can be admitted as full
member.

The controversy flared when the western industrial countries
objected to the acceptance of Myanmar as a prospective member of
this regional organization. This is due to the bad human rights
record of this country. Manuel Marin, the vice-president of the
European Union has made it clear that taking Myanmar as a full
member could jeopardize the Union's plan to deepen its
relationship with ASEAN. The European Union's 15 countries have
already reduced diplomatic contact with Myanmar following the
death of Leo Nichols, an honorary consul for four European
countries, in the custody of the Myanmar military regime. In
Bangkok, Myanmarese and Thai students protested against Myanmar's
admittance as observer in ASEAN.

Why is the issue of human rights so important? Is it only
important to the industrial west where economic standards are
high and the political system is sophisticated, while the ASEAN
countries have not achieved this stage yet?

If we look at the history of human rights, we will realize
that human rights concern everyone who wants to live in a
civilized society. According to political philosophers such as
John Locke, Thomas Hobbes or Montesquieu, in the dawn of human
history, man lived in a "natural society." In this society, there
was no public law. The existing law was the law of nature in
which, according to Hobbes, everybody was constantly at war with
everybody else.

To improve the situation, people agreed to give their
sovereignty to a higher body called the state. With the birth of
the state, "political society" was created, replacing "natural
society". Law and order, stability and security were then
provided by the state.

However, the absolute power of the state also gave the state
the option to abuse this power. To prevent this, John Locke then
started to talk about the duty of the state to protect the basic
rights of man, the rights to life, freedom and property. This is
the area in which the state has no power. Thus what is now known
as the "civil society" was born. The state was still powerful,
but not without limits. Locke's notion on these basic rights of
man became the basis of the present human rights concept.

Thus, human rights are the weapons of the citizenry, weak vis-
a-vis the state, to defend themselves against the abuse of power
by the state. The human rights struggle is in many instances
related to the democracy struggle -- they are usually two sides
of the same coin.

When the process of globalization comes, it increases not only
cooperation among states, but also among civil societies. Human
rights and democracy struggles have become globalized and
therefore more effective. Human rights violations and democracy
suppression in South Africa (before Mandela), China (Tienanmen)
and Bosnia, to give a few examples, were protested by people all
over the world. The birth of international organizations such as
Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch is the manifestation
of this internationalization of civil societies.

In countries all over the world, people whose rights have been
abused by the state expect people from other countries to launch
solidarity campaigns to help them. This is clearly the hope of
many of those fighting for human rights and democracy in Myanmar.
After Aung San Suu Kyi won the election several years ago, the
results were rejected by the military regime in order to cling on
to power.

This was followed by arbitrary arrests and even the killing of
some democracy activists (the 1988 massacres) of the country.
However, led by their famous leader, who won the Peace Noble
Prize, the struggle did not end. The strength of Aung San Suu Kyi
has come from the support of the international community. Without
this international support, it is very unlikely the non-violent
struggle of Aung San Suu Kyi could have been brought into the
present stage.

Now the questions: Is it not our duty, as a civilized people
and nation, to help this struggle for democracy of a people who
already expressed their will in a general election? Or do we
prefer to support the military who took power against the will of
the majority of the Myanmar people? We, Indonesians, have to
remember that we were helped by the people of other countries
during our struggle for independence between 1945 and 1949.

Defending ASEAN's position, Indonesian Foreign Minister Ali
Alatas was quoted as saying that Myanmar did not create any
problems for its neighbors. Therefore, the political problems
related to the violation of human rights and suppression of
democracy are considered domestic affairs of the country, in
which ASEAN did not want to meddle.

In commenting on this statement, let us reflect on this. If
during our independence struggle, a leader of a foreign country
had said that this struggle was the internal affair of the Dutch
and its colony, I would imagine that our feelings would have been
hurt.

This may be why Indonesia has always been sensitive, helping
democracy struggles and protesting human rights violations in
other countries. Many ASEAN countries including Indonesia were
very concerned with the massacre of innocent people in Bosnia,
although it did not directly bother ASEAN countries.

This is of course a very understandable attitude, because as
former colonies, many ASEAN countries have experienced the
bitterness of being oppressed by our colonial masters. We can
feel the suffering of the people, we can't just close our eyes
and say it is the internal matter of the respective country.
True, in Myanmar things are not as bad as in Bosnia. However, in
principle what happened in both countries is the same: appalling
human rights violations and suppression of democracy.

So, when Minister Ali Alatas talked about human rights
violations in Myanmar as the country's internal problem, we can
clearly see the inconsistency of ASEAN in dealing with the
oppression of democracy and human rights in different countries.
About Bosnia, ASEAN showed great concern. However, ASEAN has
different standards in dealing with human rights violations in
Myanmar.

In my opinion, if ASEAN still wants to admit Myanmar as a
member, with "constructive engagement" as an alternative to
hostile confrontation, an official statement concerning human
rights violation on human rights in Myanmar has to be issued.

Otherwise, ASEAN will be recorded in history as an association
of state bureaucrats, not of peoples who share the same problems
in their respective countries in dealing with human rights and
democracy. This may be the real reason why they are not able to
criticize what is happening in Myanmar.

The writer is a sociologist and researcher based in Salatiga.