Opinion: Human Rights are imperative for world peace

10, December 2018 marks the 70th year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). The United Nations Charter was signed in 1945 and was an on-going process until 1948. Since then, the international community has been conscious that every single person has rights and the State assumes responsibility to guarantee those rights. Though the State is not the fundamental source of these rights, it nevertheless has to ensure that its citizens are secured with these rights towards their protection and promotion.

The inhumane atrocities committed, before and after World War II, including the holocaust, colonialism, imperialism, apartheid, underdevelopment, poverty, refugees, non-recognition of the rights of women and children, served as a catalyst in creating a Human Rights (HR) framework. Eleanor Roosevelt, former First Lady and wife of former President of US Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), the only US President who was elected four times as President of US from 1933 to 1945, was the chair of the Human Rights Commission in the newly created Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the United Nations (UN) with 18 members. The drafters include PC Chang, a Diplomat and Scholar on Confucian Philosophy; Charles Malik, a Lebanese Philosophy professor and Rene Cassin, French Jurist, Law Professor and Judge. When the UDHR was adopted on 10, December 1948 there was no negative vote recorded save few abstentions. The UDHR then began to mould as a parameter setting standards of behaviour for countries. Every country that enters or entered the UN must subscribe to the UDHR, as it is neither a treaty nor a convention; on the other hand, it is recognised as a norm for countries in the UN.

The British political philosopher John Locke from the 17th Cectury located HR in the notion of ‘natural rights’, insisting that certain rights are ‘natural’ to individuals as human beings, since they are the ‘state of nature’, inherent even before the development of societies and the emergence of the State. In the sequence of ‘natural rights’, three major trends become prominent in the development and understanding of HR in the last seven decades.

The emphasis on political and civil rights immediately after the World War II is identified as first generation rights. The emergence of Russia and China after the war signalled a major departure in the rights debate from political-civil rights to socio-economic and cultural rights. The last three decades were a period of intense conflict over group or community rights. Every group claims its rightful place in the society such as the tribals, dalits, women, children, refugees, and migrants to name a few. Of late, certain voices are being heard entailing ‘women’s rights are human rights’ and ‘children’s rights are human rights’.

Once the UN set the standard of behaviour for countries in the form of UDHR, it further elaborated the political-civil and social-economic and cultural rights in the form of two covenants in the year 1966. The member countries of the UN then set standards to address and eliminate concerns that were ripping the world apart such as genocide, racism, torture, enforced disappearance, and disabilities. In addition, norms were also set to establish the rights of vulnerable groups such as women, children, refugees, and migrants.

Mentioned, thus far, were the core conventions, signed, and ratified by the member countries with an excellent reporting mechanism to the respective committees. Interestingly, China still considers socio-economic and cultural rights a priority over the civil and political rights, which are actually reasons for a cold-war divide. In stark contrast, the US considers political and civil rights as a priority over the socio-economic and cultural rights. Amidst the difference inpriorities, the fact remains that rights are indivisible and inalienable.

The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), eventually crystallised as an empowered body, was no longer a HR Commission under the ECOSOC of the UN. Instead, it earned its status as UNHRC, since 2006, which comes directly under the UN General Assembly. The Human Rights Council is an inter-governmental body within the UN system made up of 47 states responsible for the promotion and protection of all HR around the globe. In order to monitor the progress of HR activities, the UPR was instituted entailing a distinctive process, which involves a review of the HR records of all 193 UN Member States once every four years. The UPR is a State-driven process, under the auspices of the Human Rights Council that provides the opportunity for each State to declare what actions they have taken to improve the HR situation in their country and to fulfil their HR obligation.

As one of the main features of the Council, the design of the UPR intends to ensure equal treatment for every country when assessing their HR situations. The 193 countries are divided into four groups and in the year 2015, two rounds of HR situation in all the countries of the world has been completed along with the presentation made by every country under the UN system. India has submitted its third UPR report in May 2017 and received queries from more than 100 countries. Every country presents its HR track record and their reports are subjected to questioning by other countries. This process provides visibility to HR within the country and across many countries, where the civil society organisations are involved in the preparation of the national report. In fact, in October 2018, India was elected to the UNHRC with the highest votes, meriting the favour of 188 countries in the Asia Pacific category for a period of three years onwards of Jan 1, 2019.

Immense accomplishments are recorded in the 70 years of UDHR and the HR debate, validated by reports each country prepares and submits to the UNHRC. At the national level, mechanisms such as National Human Rights Commissions have been set up and in countries like India; there is the State Human Rights Commission, in some not all the states. National Level Commissions for women, children, dalits, tribal communities, and minorities have also been set up in some states and in certain cases State level commissions operate in parallel.

International HR organisations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch all work tirelessly to bring the HR violations to the notice of the States. Some countries have accepted and worked on it to improve the conditions and some have explicitly rejected such information. Nevertheless, the contribution by these NGOs to the understanding of HR has been enormous.

The way forward is challenging, as the countries have to strengthen the HR mechanism at the country level by reinvigorating the national level commission for HR and other sectoral commissions. Only by appointing capable and qualified persons, (men, women, and transgender), to these institutions can the standards of HR be expected to progress. Though the HR education is imparted sporadically, a systematic HR education will make citizens of any country come to understand and realise their rights. ‘Rights’ and ‘Duties’ are correlative and naturally by realising and exercising their rights they are destined to become dutiful citizens.

What is imperative, therefore, is a renewed commitment to HR in the days to come as a collective effort to manifest a conflict free world.