The first episode of the Women, Peace & Rights Podcast.
Host: Rita Manchanda, Women's Regional Network (WRN) Board Member.
Guest: Mary Lawlor, United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders.
1. Will the death of Fr Stan Swamy, a Jesuit priest in India be treated as a death in custody?
2. Will Facebook and other social media platforms provide safe spaces for Women Human Rights Defenders in Pakistan?
3. Women Human Rights Defenders in Afghanistan, who the Taliban sees as transgressing all the norms of a good woman, how can we protect them? How can anyone protect them?
4. How can we protect frontline health workers during COVID19?
5. How to create the space to negotiate and talk to governments?
www.womensregionalnetwork.org/podcast
The first episode of the Women, Peace & Rights Podcast.
Host: Rita Manchanda, Women's Regional Network (WRN) Board Member.
Guest: Mary Lawlor, United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders.
1. Will the death of Fr Stan Swamy, a Jesuit priest in India be treated as a death in custody?
2. Will Facebook and other social media platforms provide safe spaces for Women Human Rights Defenders in Pakistan?
3. Women Human Rights Defenders in Afghanistan, who the Taliban sees as transgressing all the norms of a good woman, how can we protect them? How can anyone protect them?
4. How can we protect frontline health workers during COVID19?
5. How to create the space to negotiate and talk to governments?
www.womensregionalnetwork.org/podcast
Rita: Good Evening and welcome to the Women, Peace and Rights Podcast, produced by the Women’s Regional Network (WRN). WRN is a regional network that amplifies voices of conflict affected women in order to address the interlinked issues of peace, justice, governance and security. The network spans the lead countries of South Asia- Afghanistan, Pakistan,India and Sri Lanka- and also has links with the fraternal WRN network in East Africa. I am Rita Manchanda, a member of the WRN Board and I am delighted to host the first episode of the Women, Peace and Rights Podcast. Today, I welcome Mary Lawlor, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders.
Mary comes with an impressive pedigree. She was the Founder and Director of Front Line Defenders. She has earlier been the Director of the Irish section of Amnesty International and currently is the Adjunct Professor at the Trinity College of Business.
Rita Manchanda: Mary, Welcome again.
Mary Lawlor: Thank you very much.
Rita: Thank you. Today, we are actually having this conversation at an extremely difficult time when South Asia, particularly, India is at a pall of gloom because of the death in custody, as we call it, of Father Stan Swamy, an outstanding human rights defender, who despite being 82 years old, suffering from Parkinson's disease, arrested under false charges, denied bail, kept in custody for over 8 months and exposed to COVID risk, he died. He died when they were still considering his bail. Of course, this hangs, a real, I mean in a sense, the sword of Damocles on other human rights defenders, political prisoners, who are under similar conditions in overcrowded prisons in India as well as in many other parts of South Asia. With that as a backdrop, would you say that there are particularities of the South Asian condition in terms of the scope, the nature, the sources of threats that human rights defenders face? I know that in terms of killings, South Asia actually flashes out of the map because you had, this year, 17 killings of human rights defenders, well that is in 2020, five in India, two in Pakistan, and if I look at India from 2015 to 2020, including this year, that is 2021, that's 58. I don't know whether you would include Stan Swamy's death as well and make that figure 59.
Mary Lawlor: Yeah, well, as you know I did my report on killings and the death threats that can precede them to the UN Human Rights Council last March. We see all over the world, including Asia, killings, particularly in the most vulnerable of people, and in the context of business in human rights, particularly where people are killed as a direct result or an indirect result of the impact that companies are having on land, indigenous people and environmental rights and in this connection, I think it is fair to say that it's a growing area including in South Asia. As you said, for example, the Philippines is a country where there have been many many killings. We have seen killings in 64 member states of the UN. Since 2015, 1,323 human rights defenders have been killed and that's a third of all UN member states. I found that very shocking. Every year, we see over 300, so, I mean killings is the ultimate red line that no government should cross, and when you talk about Stan Swamy, I got involved in Stan Swamy's case just as soon as he was detained. In fact, I wrote communications, the formal letters that you write as Special Rapporteur to the government of India. I also followed up with a meeting with the Indian ambassador regarding some cases in India and specifically talking about Stan Swamy and I really was so sad that he had been treated so unfairly despite his great age and his health conditions and the possibility of Covid. So, yes, I consider his death in custody, he was still in custody, I mean, yes, he was removed to a hospital and he was going to be having a bail hearing. But, he basically died because he was held in custody by the Indian government under spurious charges and as a result of which he died. So, yes, I would call it the next best thing, you know, death in detention. Death in custody is, while we can't say that it's a direct killing, it is a result of the state's inaction.
So, when we talk about, for example, women human rights defenders, we see a lot of commonality across South Asia in the targeting of women human rights defenders. It's not just South Asia, all over the world, you see the gender-based threats, the sexualized smears, the challenges of patriarchy. I was talking, for example, to a woman human rights defender in Iraq the other day and she was actually explaining to me, the difficulties of even finding a safe place, as she pointed out, she can't go to a hotel or a friend's house, in the same way as man who is a human rights defender can. I also talked in Russia to some women human rights defenders, one of whom was running a shelter for women who were victims of domestic violence or who were being forced into honor marriages, forced marriages, sorry. The shelter had been attacked, the police raided it and she herself had to leave for a while because of death threats. Now, there are hundreds of human rights defenders killed every year and the majority of the killings take place in Latin America, but, that's because of the whole extractive industry going on there and of course, if we look at threats online then we often find that human rights defenders in South Asia, are threatened online, they are smeared online and this kind of sets up an environment where the threats can move offline and then, they can become attacks and then the physical attacks, can in some cases lead to, as you know, full well disappearance and killings.
Rita Manchanda: Talking about threats, in fact, which appear online, recently, in March, following the Aurat March that's the Women's March in Lahore on International Women's Day, a group of women who raised a slogan saying our body, our rights, were threatened and doctored videos were put up on Facebook and as a result they were charged with blasphemy. In the social media space, they were threatened, they of course, they apologized, not only apologized, they demonstrated that it was a doctored video but of course, it makes no difference. They are still under threat. Now, under these conditions, what kind of conversation can you have, with say Facebook and with other such social media platforms to provide for safe spaces or to provide some kind of more immediate response?
Mary Lawlor: Ya, we have seen not only in Pakistan, as you pointed out, but in India, and in Afghanistan. I mean, the killings in Afghanistan, at the moment of women human rights defenders and journalists who are human rights defenders is appalling. When you get to the threats on Facebook, this is something that I have had several conversations with Facebook about. They have a new advisory, a human rights board, which is actually made up of some good people and they have also put in place a human rights policy which is a start and it does mention human rights defenders. However, their business model isn't one that supports the removal and transparency of threats against human rights defenders. So what I say to them is that they have to be very transparent about the way they work. We have to know how it is that they work. They need people in each country that understands the context, the cultural context, in each country. So, for example, in the Philippines, where human rights defenders are red-tagged, if somebody in a Facebook content person, in a Facebook place, somewhere say in my country, who knows nothing about the Philippines, they wouldn't see that as a threat, whereas we know that if you are red-tagged in the Philippines as a human rights defender, it sets you up in very serious danger. So, I try and say to them, they have to have someone in each country who has an understanding of the context in which the threats are occurring and somebody who understands the culture and they need to have somebody that is accessible to a human rights defender so that when a human rights defender is smeared online, or as you say, in the case of Pakistan when the march happened, you know, and stuff was put on Facebook, that they can immediately get in touch with whoever their contact in Facebook for that country is, who should remove immediately, the content of the piece that has been put up on Facebook, and really they should block somebody who is doing that kind of thing permanently.
Rita Manchanda: In Afghanistan, the large number of women human rights defenders, I am glad that you included journalists among them, who have been threatened and attacked and who continue to be under attack, particularly women who face a deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and already you are seeing a flood of people that are flowing across the border. What can you suggest in terms of creating safe zones or protection for women in Afghanistan, women human rights defenders who the Taliban sees as transgressing all the norms of a good woman, how can we protect them? How can anyone protect them?
Mary Lawlor: Ya, this is really really really difficult. I have spoken to women human rights defenders on three occasions from Afghanistan and the stories are all the same. It's about the intense fear that they are living with, it's about the fact that there is no protection for them. Even Shaharzad, you know who is the Chair of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, she says that she wakes up every morning and the first thing she thinks of is will her people be safe today. As we know, two of her colleagues from the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission were killed last year on their way to work, including one young woman who was only 24. The year before that, in a different part of Afghanistan, one of the other Afghan colleague from the Commission was killed. This is a government appointed body and yes, the government is in the process of developing some sort of protection. But, what we are hearing from the defenders is that they need some kind of safe houses, they need safe houses immediately in various places all around the country and they need visas to be able to flee temporarily. The problem is that we are losing a whole generation of really good human rights defenders from Afghanistan because it is just too unsafe for them and they are just trying to leave. So, we had a side event the other day, the Special Rapporteour on Counter-Terrorism, Fionnuala Ní Aoláin and myself, and we had both the Afghan government and the Norwegian government because the Norwegian government is the penholder on Afghanistan at the Security Council. We also had some human rights defenders from Afghanistan and the outcome of it was that we are trying to push for a proper independent investigation into what is happening, that the UN would go and do a proper investigation and make some recommendations. But, as you said, it is really really difficult. But, you know, within the tools that I have at my disposal, it's all about putting pressure on the government and other states to try and do something significant and worthwhile in connection with Afghanistan. So, we have a joint statement that is being signed by a lot of other Rapporteurs and we are hoping that the Council will move it to the Security Council and that in time there will be more pressure. That's really all that I am fortunately, I am able to do. It's about creating as much pressure as you can.
Rita Manchanda: No conversation today can take place without turning to Covid. How has covid impacted and challenged your work in terms of protecting human rights defenders and particularly now the expanded definition of human rights defenders which today include health workers, frontline health workers. How can you protect them? What impact are you considering?
Mary Lawlor: First of all, certainly, I have always in my time both before I came to the mandate, included health workers as human rights defenders, if they have been targeted and I know, for example, of many nurses and doctors who have been targeted for their work around the world. So, obviously, Covid put a new spotlight on the activities of people who work in health, doctors and nurses and care assistants. They really put themselves at a huge risk in their care for others. But, because of Covid, that has become more prominently recognized and I have done reports and written about how medics and journalists trying to tell the truth about the statistics of Covid or about government failures in the pandemic have been targeted, that's been very clear around the world. You see the targeting of people who are trying to expose government deficiencies or lack of information about how to cope with Covid or statistics that are incorrect. If you look at, for example, Zara Alvares, in the Philippines, last year, she was killed in August and she received messages harassing her after she distributed rice to members of her community during Covid. That's shocking, that somebody would be killed because of their humanitarian action, for the human rights of others. Others have been forced to stay in one place when at home and particularly, this gives rise to, you know, it affects their work and their safety. They can't leave dangerous vicinities and often they are sitting targets and in patriarchal societies where families don't approve of the work of women human rights defenders, it makes them more at risk, from both outside and inside. So, obviously, we have been urging and it was one of the things that I was trying to get the Indian government to do, to release Stan from prison because of the risk of Covid. So, we have a lot of Rapporteurs and High Commissioners, a lot has been said about human rights defenders and others needing to be released due to the risks posed by Covid and I know poor old father Stan isn't the only person to die in jail since I took up the mandate. At the moment, I am working on long-term cases of the human rights defenders who have been given 10 years or more in sentences all around the world. This is shocking. First of all, it shouldn't happen. Second, the risk of them now at the moment with covid has definitely increased. So, I mean the reality is that the human rights defenders should be released and that governments should start to see them as allies and not as enemies. I mean, they are trying to build sustainable and just societies based on the rule of law but they are such a threat to governments. They are seen as such a threat to oppressive governments.
Rita Manchanda: I wish they would listen. Well, talking about governments responding, you have been writing to the Indian government, you have written to, I am sure, several other governments. How do you negotiate? How do you strategize with governments which regard you to, because you work for human rights defenders and their protection, their dignity, they regard you as hostile too? So, how do you create the space to negotiate, to talk to them? To make that difference?
Mary Lawlor: Well, I think the added value that I can do now is to be a bridge between human rights defenders and governments. I mean, oppressive governments will speak to me because it's part of their cooperation with the UN, and so I try and engage with all governments, even the most difficult one's, especially in fact, the most difficult ones and you know walking away isn't an option because for me, you know, what's the line between calling them out without self-censoring on the persecution that they are doing to human rights defenders and at the same time being able to go back and have them talk to so that they don't cut you off and that's a very difficult line. So far, there was one government that threatened to cut me off, but to be honest, after a while they re-engaged, I kept at them and they re-engaged. I think persistence, politeness and I stressed that if they do anything good at all, I will acknowledge it because I do think that everyone bashes governments and rightly so when they are committing atrocities, states are responsible for unfair trials or for attacks on human rights defenders, they should be called out. But, if they do something good, if they actually release somebody or if they there is a positive improvement in something, I will acknowledge that publicly. I will still go back and remind them of all the other things but I would still want to acknowledge what they do. Now, the one thing I think that we should all bear in mind and it has become so clear to me since I took up the mandate is, and we all know it, but just to reinforce, governments hate their reputation being undermined. They really do. I have had government's approach me about communications and press releases and ask me to remove something or the other, or include something or the other, and the whole purpose of them trying to do this is to improve whatever I have written, so they don't come across so badly. Now, I mean, I am not going to be influenced by that but you can see the lengths to which they will go in order to protect their recommendations and I really think that the media has a huge role to play in this. That is why, journalists are targeted so much too because they are exposing the truths about the atrocities that governments are perpetrating on human rights defenders or exposing, as we said earlier, Covid deficiencies or exposing corruption or, you know, the treatment of women, or something like that. I think that, you know, that's what they hate the most, for me to send them a communication that can be public in two months time and that can be buried in the UN database somewhere till nobody can even find it. I don't think that they are so worried about that. But, I think they are really worried about the press and certainly, the diplomats in Geneva, obviously they have to represent their country's political and strategic interests, but I really think that it's the press releases that they hate most of all. So anything that draws attention and creates a spotlight on the abuses of states is a good thing in my view.
Rita Manchanda: Thank you very much for joining us and I do hope that the positive note on which you end will actually be something that will bring us greater hope.
Mary Lawlor: Thank you very much for having me.
Rita Manchanda: Thank you very much for listening to this episode of the Women, Peace and Rights Podcast. We look forward to your comments and feedback. Please visit our website womensregionalnetwork.org and connect with us through Twitter at WRNNews.