By Shreya Shah
Human Rights Watch, a New York-based nonprofit, recently issued its 2013 report on human-rights violations around the world. Here is some of what the report had to say about countries in our region:
The report chided India for its “significant human rights problems,” blaming the poor implementation of laws, corruption and lack of accountability.
The report mentions that the government has still not revoked the “The Armed Forces Special Powers Act,” which “permits soldiers to commit serious human rights violations with effective impunity,” it says.
Under the act, no officer can be prosecuted without the sanction of the central government in areas that the government has declared as “disturbed,” such as Kashmir or states in the northeast. The act also gives the armed forces power to arrest without a warrant on the suspicion that a person is about to commit a criminal act and to use force, even if it results in death, if they think it is necessary to maintain law and order.
On the Maoist insurgency, the report notes that civil society activists remain at risk from both the government and insurgents. The report places the death toll in 2012 from Maoist-related violence at 257 and says that 98 of those who died were civilians.
The report also said that authorities in Assam were unable to prevent the riots between indigenous Bodo tribes and Muslim migrant settlers that killed at least 97 people and displaced over 450,000 “despite information about increasing tensions between the communities.”
In a section on free speech, the report mentions the government’s new Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) which state that a site that hosts offensive content will have to remove it within 36 hours of a complaint against it.
The report raises the concern that because the “criteria for prohibited content are ambiguous,” they are “frequently used to stifle criticism of the government.
The report lists child labor, malnourishment, vulnerability to sex trafficking, homelessness, forced labor, drug abuse and crime, and insufficient access to health care and education for children as other human-rights concerns.
But the report congratulates the government for the passing the Right to Education Act, under which 25% of seats in all schools have to be reserved for underprivileged children. It also mentioned a new law against child labor and a law to protect children from sexual abuse.
Human Rights Watch called the hanging of Ajmal Kasab, one of the terrorists responsible for the 2008 Mumbai attacks, a “step back.”
In Nepal, a political stalemate, along with weak governance, corruption and impunity, contributed to ongoing political instability, and problems with law and order, the report says.
The government has failed to address wartime crimes, the report says, and has promoted government officials and security force personnel suspected of human rights abuse.
The report says the government forcefully evicted 800 people along the Bagmati River and plans to evict 12,000 more in Kathmandu for an urban development project, without “adequate and sustainable alternate housing.”
The report took issue with a government ban on women under the age of 30 traveling to Gulf countries to work. The ban was imposed because of reported cases of abuse of Nepali migrants to Malaysia and the Gulf.
But the report noted that the ban might force women to migrate illegally increasing risk of exploitation, given that the funds from jobs in those countries are crucial to Nepal’s economy: The money from Nepalese who migrate abroad makes 20% of Nepal’s gross domestic product.
The report blames corruption for the poor monitoring of Nepalese migrants.
The report mentions trafficking of young girls, rape and sexual assault, domestic violence, and dowry-related violence as serious concerns in the country.
It is still difficult for women to secure proof for citizenship, “especially when male family members refuse to assist them or are unavailable to do so,” the report notes. And “without proof of citizenship, Nepali women cannot assert their rights to marital property, inheritance, or land,” it adds.
In gender identity, Nepal has made progress. The 2011 census allowed citizens to identify themselves as “third gender,” and so do all citizenship documents.
Attacks on civilians by militant groups, growing electricity shortages, rising food and fuel prices, continuing political dominance of the military, and persecution of religious minorities are some of the main problems outlined in the report.
A serious problem in the country is violence against women and girls which includes rape, “honor” killings, acid attacks, domestic violence, intimidation and threats against women and girls who go are out in public and forced marriage.
Minorities are denied human rights, the report says. For instance, threats against the local Christian community forced some 400 families to flee their homes, the report says.
The report also estimates that 325 members of the Shia Muslim population were killed last year, and that militant groups forced the demolition of mosques of the Ahmadi religious community in Lahore, and vandalized Ahmadi graves across Punjab province.
Community-based activists, students, teachers and more than 100 schools were targeted by militants, the report says, giving the example of Malala Yousafzai, the girl who was shot in the head by the Taliban for advocating the right to education.
Moreover, a “climate of fear impeded media coverage of the state security forces and militant groups,” the report says. It states at least eight journalists were killed in Pakistan last year.
Suicide bombings, armed attacks, and killings by the Taliban, al Qaeda, and groups such as the Haqqani Network and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, targeting politicians, journalists, religious minorities, and government security personnel continued in 2012, the report says.
Unfair trials and detentions by the Pakistani armed forces in the course of counter terrorism operations also continued.
The commission listed a clampdown on freedom of speech and a lack of accountability of war-time abuse as the biggest problems in the country.
The report says Sri Lanka has not moved closer to bringing people accused of war crimes to justice. It says there has been no news of special army
courts of inquiry that were supposed to be established in 2012 to look into allegations of war crimes, or of the need to restore the independence of the police and remove them from the purview of the Ministry of Defense.
The government shut at least five news websites critical of the government in 2012, and threatened a number of journalists and media organizations on the charge of “propagating false and unethical news on Sri Lanka.”
Tens of thousands of people who have been released from military detention centers “still live with host families or in temporary accommodation, and several thousand are not able to return home because their home areas have not been de-mined.”
Human-rights violations worsened in 2012, with the government narrowing “political and civil society space” and shielding “abusive security forces from accountability,” the report says.
There were disappearances of opposition members and political activists, the report says. And authorities failed to investigate security forces responsible for extrajudicial killings or torture, it says.
Workers in Bangladesh who face poor working conditions, low wages, and excessive working hours are prevented from organizing effectively because of government repression and collusion with factory owners, according to the report.
The report blames the poor implementation of present laws and “archaic and discriminatory family laws” for a host of problems including “rape, dowry-related assaults, and other forms of domestic violence, acid attacks, and illegal punishments in the name of fatwas or religious decrees and sexual harassment.”
After sectarian violence in neighboring Burma in June, the Bangladesh government labeled Rohingya refugees “intruders” and “criminals” and insisted “that it had no obligation to provide them sanctuary,” the report says. The government also curtailed the activities of nongovernmental organizations operating in pre-existing Rohingya refugee camps in Chittagong.
The report is concerned about a draft law aimed at regulating foreign donations to Bangladeshi NGOs, because it appears to sever funds for organizations publicly criticizing the government.
Most human rights violations arose because of the conflict between international forces, the Afghan army and the Taliban. The Human Rights Watch report puts the civilian toll at 3,099, of which 1,145 were killed and the rest injured.
Heightened possibilities of a civil war along geographic and ethnic lines following withdrawal of international security forces is a major concern, the report says.
It blames the government for allowing “well-known warlords, human rights abusers, corrupt politicians, and businesspeople to operate with impunity, further eroding its public support.”
The report is skeptical of Afghanistan’s willingness to better the condition of women in the country. It recounts a list of abuses from treating women fleeing domestic abuse and forced marriage as criminals to calling for segregating women and girls in education and employment.
“As of spring 2012, 400 women and girls were in prison and juvenile detention for the ‘moral crimes’ of running away from home or sex outside marriage,” the report says.
The report also mentions that the Taliban continues to attack schools and recruit children for its operations.
Progress made to ensure a free media and free political environment was under threat in 2012, the report says. In April, a reporter was detained for broadcasting a show critical of the Kabul mayor and a foreign journalist was accused of being a spy, the report says. A new media policy, which would tighten government control of media, was also proposed last year.
Follow India Real Time on Twitter @indiarealtime.