ASEAN rights body to be launched October

INQUIRER.net, By Veronica Uy, 19:15:00 03/27/2009

MANILA, Philippines—The ASEAN Human Rights Body (AHRB) will be launched this October after the terms of reference for its creation is finished by July, Ambassador Rosario Manalo, head of the high-level panel preparing the document, told reporters Friday.

The enabling TOR has already been presented to the foreign ministers of member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and is being revised following their proposals. The creation of the body has been controversial due to the sorry situation of human rights in some ASEAN member-states, particularly Myanmar.

While the TOR contains the purposes, principles of the body, mandates, and functions, defining it as consultative and integral to ASEAN and specifying that each member-state send a representative, Manalo said the body is “evolving” and would not have investigative powers, “not for the moment.”

Eventually, she said, the ASEAN Human Rights Body may develop into such a body. “It is not just there is no political will, there is no capacity to create a court presently. We are still getting acquainted with the idea of human rights. We are beginning to confront human rights issues and internalizing them in our own societies. The TOR is allowing for more evolutionary space,” she said.

Manalo said members of the panel are also preparing the programs of the regional body for the next five years, focusing on both promotion and protection of human rights.

She said they are also meeting next week in Cambodia to finalize funding of the body to support its operations and activities.

Initially, she said, the member-states will be required to give equivalent annual compulsory contributions, but those who can give more—within and outside ASEAN—will be more than welcome.

In the next five years, this TOR that would create the body would be reviewed.

Manalo said the body would not be retroactive, but “prospective.”

Earlier, Ambassador Alistair MacDonald of the European Commission said he is happy with the developments in the creation of the regional body. He said this is a big step from the original idea of simply creating a human rights mechanism within ASEAN.

ASEAN groups together Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Related Article:

No probe powers for ASEAN rights body yet