RIGHTS-UN: Campaign Against Torture Gains Boost after Pinochet

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 25 1999 (IPS) - As the UN system and world governments mark the plight of torture victims this Saturday, activists are pointing to Chilean Gen. Augusto Pinochet as an example of the success of the anti-torture campaign.

Ironically, Pinochet – whose 1973-90 dictatorship has been blamed by human rights groups for torturing thousands of opponents – is a symbol of hope to the campaigners commemorating Saturday as the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture.

“This Jun. 26, we feel some optimism, now that one of the worst of torturers – Augusto Pinochet – will be prosecuted,” said Inge Genefke, secretary-general of the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims.

Not only has the Chilean general and senator-for-life been in detention in Britain since last October while he awaits possible extradition to Spain on charges of torture and other crimes against humanity.

Pinochet’s chances for extradition to Spain are also based on a judgment, rendered by Britain’s Law Lords, that he could be found liable for atrocities dating from 1988 – when Britain joined the Convention Against Torture – onward.

The fact that a world leader could be extradited to stand trial for torture and conspiracy to torture is an “important precedent” of the Convention’s usefulness, argued Iain Lavine, UN representative of Amnesty International.

For human rights campaigners, the Pinochet arrest and Law Lords decision are major victories for the Convention, which entered into force in 1987 but still has been ratified by only 114 countries.

“The Convention Against Torture continues to be the least ratified of all international human rights treaties,” Lavine noted.

That is something which the United Nations is hoping to change. The UN General Assembly has declared Jun. 26 a day to support torture victims and uses the occasion to “urge all states to become parties to the UN Convention Against Torture.”

Torture has been opposed in all major human rights treaties, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, noted Elsa Stamatopoulou, head of the New York office of the UN High Commission for Human Rights.

But it was the Convention Against Torture which made torture an international crime – setting the stage, in effect, for Pinochet’s arrest and the inclusion of torture in the jurisdiction of the UN tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.

“Despite these gains, information that reaches the UN Commission on Human Rights indicates that torture continues to be used as a weapon of intimidation in wartime, and as a tool of governments who cannot rule with the confidence of their people,” UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said.

“A sense of impunity has prevailed,” he argued.

Stamatopoulou told reporters Friday that complaints about torture from some 70 countries have been brought to the attention of UN human rights bodies over the past year alone.

Lavine said Amnesty last year recorded allegations of torture by 125 governments, including 51 countries where mistreatment of prisoners in custody is believed to have resulted in deaths.

With progress in dealing with atrocities in Chile, Yugoslavia and Rwanda, human rights activists are now urging some 70 countries to sign on to the Convention Against Torture and thereby restrict impunity further.

In addition, some groups are pushing for more governments to fund the UN Voluntary Fund for Victims of Torture, which in turn provides money to programmes to rehabilitate torture victims worldwide.

The US government this year contributed three million dollars to the Fund, about three-fifths of its total budgetary expenses, but some say the total amount the Fund receives is not enough.

“While 114 countries have ratified the Convention Against Torture, the Fund receives support from fewer than 30 countries,” said John Salzberg, Washington representative of the Centre for Victims of Torture.

“I believe every state that ratified the Convention should give a contribution to the Fund, even if it is a minimal amount,” Salzberg proposed, adding that other industrialised nations should try to match the US contribution of three million dollars.

Annan joined that plea, and also reminded governments to ratify the statute – agreed to last year in Rome – to create the International Criminal Court. The Rome statute so far has been ratified by three nations.

“It is too late to prevent torture from accompanying us into the new century,” the secretary-general said. “But it is not too late to redouble our efforts to contain this menace.”