I thank the Chairman and members of the committee. It is a great honour for us personally to make this presentation, but it is also a very welcome opportunity for Amnesty International to address the committee, particularly as we have just published our annual report. It is an opportune time for us to reflect on the current state of human rights protection internationally, especially in light of the ongoing war on terror and the responses to this in the legislation combating terrorism.
Governments and armed groups have launched a war on global values in which they have been destroying the rights of ordinary people. Violence by all sorts of armed groups, including paramilitary groups, has been increasing. Governments have been also increasing their violations. In the past year or so, we have probably witnessed the most sustained attack on human rights and humanitarian law since this body of law was codified in the middle of the last century. There is growing international mistrust, fear and division, which is resulting in a greater polarisation of the world. Callous and cruel attacks by groups like al-Qaeda are posing a real threat to the security of people internationally. They are also causing a great deal of fear and paranoia around the world. Amnesty International condemns all terrorist attacks by these various groups, which are undoubtedly serious crimes in domestic criminal law, but some of them also constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity. It is clear that paramilitary groups are violating international law.
There has been an increasingly worrying trend in the past year or so in the nature of terrorist attacks, particularly the attacks that have been carried out against the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross, ICRC. The most egregious example, which we can all remember, was the attack in August 2003 in Baghdad which killed the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Sergio Vieira de Mello. All of these attacks are human rights violations but they are also a great deal more than that; they represent a threat to the very fibre of international humanitarian law and international justice because, since the inception of the UN charter, the UN was considered a neutral body. The International Committee of the Red Cross was also a neutral arbiter that intervened in a non-partisan way in the field of conflict to protect the rights of all. The fact that, in the past year, these organisations have been targeted is a new threat to international law and justice. However, there are other threats to international law, justice and human rights.
The whole framework of international law has been also undermined by the absence of multilateral action in response to all areas of human rights violations. International law has been destroyed in some areas by the unilateral action of individual governments, particularly in response to the increase in global terrorism. Some governments have declared this so-called war on terrorism as part of their international security strategy. It is necessary that in so doing, states must ensure they do not undermine human rights. Unfortunately, it could be argued that some of the legal developments in the past year have undermined human rights protection. States are under an obligation to ensure the protection of the human rights of all people within their jurisdictions. They must protect people from crime, but they must also treat people properly if they are investigating accusations of crime and trying to determine who is criminally responsible. It is important that security concerns are not allowed to override human rights; that security does not hold sway over the right to a fair trial or the right to freedom of expression. A balance must be struck and underlying it all must be the basic principle that human rights are universal, otherwise states will lose their moral direction and sacrifice all of the advances that have been made on human rights in the pursuit of security. It is necessary that we reflect on this and try not to lose sight of the importance of human rights at this time.
A great deal of the security agenda holding sway at the moment does not have much moral principle attached to it. It would be impossible not to comment on the actions of the US Administration at this time, which has been leading the so-called war on terror and has violated a great deal of human rights, domestically. In the past year or so it has also turned a blind eye to many abuses that were perpetrated overseas in the field because it determined, by virtue of its own policy, that its security considerations were more important than human rights. Amnesty International's annual report details unlawful killings of civilians by coalition troops, not just troops from the US but also from other coalition forces in Iraq. The report also outlines the mistreatment of detainees in Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan and other areas.
We cannot quantify the problem in some areas because the trend has been for detention to be carried out in secret and for detainees not to have access to legal representation. In many cases, it is not even known if people are in detention or where they are. Governments have begun to jeopardise the rights of those they have been detaining. The war on terror has encouraged many new human rights abuses. It is important to reflect on those but also to acknowledge that, as well as current human rights abuses and the sort of new problems we are looking at, there are also ongoing human rights abuses throughout the world, a great deal of which result from internal conflict, including places like Chechnya, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, Nepal and Israel. There are so many different ongoing conflicts that there is an incipient danger that western security concerns may lead to a blind eye being turned to human rights abuses in some of these conflict zones if it is considered appropriate to forward the interests of a security agenda. Human rights violations must be addressed, regardless of where they occur. When responding to terrorism, all issues, including security and human rights, must be intertwined and considered together.
There have been many developments in combating terrorism in the European Union, many of which have taken place very quickly in response to the American notion that those who are not with America are against it. While the European Union naturally wanted to stand with the United States, it introduced a great deal of legislation very quickly, which is dangerous. Documents such as the European security strategy, the declaration on combating terrorism and others do not have any human rights provisions, or even mention human rights. None of the legal instruments that have entered into force, for example, the European arrest warrant, includes adequate human rights provisions.
The danger in Europe is that the lowest common denominator will become the governing body of law. The new extradition arrangements allow individuals to be transferred between states based on the prevailing law in a given state. This presumes a large degree of mutual trust between states and raises many potential legal problems because the policies concerned are based on political decisions. The whole security framework, as set out in the European Union, is political and has no significant legal basis and no human rights framework. This is extremely worrying.
It is not that the European Union has ignored human rights which are mentioned on a few occasions in the security strategy. The new appointee in the area of anti-terrorism, Mr. De Vries from the Netherlands, recently stated he wanted Europe to embrace human rights in developing security. Europe, he said, must be careful not to fall into a trap set by terrorists by ensuring we did not reduce our attachments to public freedoms. By undermining human rights we would, he stated, be playing to what the terrorists would like. It is important that this is borne in mind.
I will now say something positive. How might we respond to all of these concerns about human rights being undermined? Several positive developments have taken place in the past year, one of which was the ending of immunity. More and more states are starting to put people on trial for human rights abuses and violations of international humanitarian law and the laws of war. The International Criminal Court appointed a prosecutor in the past year and has commenced its work. The body for enforcement of international criminal law is, therefore, developing, albeit very slowly. In addition, several cases relating to the detention regime for those held in Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere and the rights' provisions available to them have slowly been making their way towards the United States Supreme Court and the House of Lords in the United Kingdom. These are small, positive developments.
How else might we address these matters? We could do so through the development and human security frameworks which are aspects of a whole theoretical debate that has been evolving globally, including in Ireland, in recent years. Mr. Chris Patten, the European Commissioner for External Affairs, delivered some very thought provoking speeches in the past year. The essence of his ideas is that one cannot have peace without development and vice versa. In addressing the panoply of human rights he stated one could not focus solely on civil and political rights, freedom of expression and so forth, with which we have traditionally concerned ourselves. Instead, we must address freedom from disease, poverty and want to try to find how the deprivation of these rights is bound up and undermining global security, as is clearly the case.
Chris Patten also noted the failed states around the world and their ongoing conflicts. He observed that the dark side of globalisation was responsible for many of their failures. We have environmental degradation, the growth of the AIDS problem, terrorism and international crime. All of these problems were, he said, part of a continuum embracing security and development. He pointed out that there were many causes for the disastrous conditions in which so many people in the world found themselves but much of the problem was due to a lack of economic and social development. Clearly, therefore, there is a moral argument for mainstreaming development issues and economic, social and cultural rights into any debate on security and human rights. The scale of the problem is very significant and it is in all our interests and undoubtedly in the interest of self-preservation to try to do something to stem terrorism.
States have framed too much legislation too quickly and should be tackling other issues. They should address development and examine the role of multilateral institutions, fair trade and so forth. Moreover, we need to ensure there is coherence, consistency and complementarity across all areas of foreign policy and in all international governmental organisations, whether the European Union, United Nations, Council of Europe, or at national government level, that human rights are mainstreamed throughout all areas of economic and security competence and that all of these matters advance together. We could then do something about protecting human rights and upholding their universality.
States have obligations in these areas. A large body of international law is in place for the protection of human rights. If we are to succeed in countering terrorism, it will be necessary to co-operate in ensuring enhanced development and human rights protection in parallel with promoting legal criminal responses to terrorism. Everything revolves around the important role of international human rights law and the need to ensure it remains at the forefront of any counter-terrorism responses.
