WORLD STUDENT CHRISTIAN FEDERATION-ASIA PACIFIC
REGION
Human Rights and Solidarity Workshop 2000
Concept Paper
1. Background
The Militarization of politics and
society is the most pressing problems confronting the developing countries in
Asia. Militarization keeps a growing
number of people under arms, increases military expenditures, threatens the
life and security of people and results in human rights violations and denial
of justice and peace to the people. In
Asia which takes more than half of the world population, most of the countries
are under military(or authoritarian) regimes.
The military values have dominated over people’s life so long,
oppressing all kinds of socio-political progressive movements and human rights
struggles.
In East Asia, for instance in South
Korea, there had always been human rights violations by military authorities
until 1992 when the military government was replaced by civilian
government. The rights of speech,
assembly, expression and even the right of religious activity were violated by
the military governments. The Korean
people are still suffering from the military legacy even though they
accomplished the political democracy in 1997.
In South East Asia, particularly in
Indonesia, the country has witnessed the flagrant denial of human rights since
1965 when Gen. Suharto took the power.
Under his regime, the Indonesian military coordinated slaughter about
500,000 to one million people suspected of being members of the Communist Party
of Indonesia. In 1992, The Amnesty
International reported that the former members of PKI and their relatives
continue to be subjected to human rights violations. Extrajudicial executions, arbitrary arrests, imprisonment,
torture and disappearance have continued to be practiced by the military
authorities in dealing with political dissent or other perceived threats to
national security. And since the
Indonesian invasion of East Timor in 1975, thousands of East Timor people are
believed to have been killed or disappeared.
The human rights situation of Indonesia even after Suharto’s step down
seems to remain fundamentally unchanged.
There are already signs of furious confrontations between the military,
the Golkar ruling party and other opposition parties since the June 1999
election. It was reported that there
were arbitrary arrests and 212 cases of detention, 54 cases of arbitrary
execution, involuntary and enforced disappearances, intimidation, torture and
ill-treatment, rape and sexual abuse and
forced evacuation by the military.
In Myanmar, when the Gen. Saw Maung led
military coup in 1988, it followed pro-democracy demonstration immediately;
thousands of people were shot and killed by the military. The State Law and Order Restoration Council
was formed by military and they announced new election in 1990. Despite continuing arrests and restrictions
on freedom of opposition party members, the National League for Democracy,
under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi, won the election. However, the SLORC government did not hand
over the power to the NLD and continued the harsh rule over the people. Thousands of opponents of governments were
detained without trial, and journalists, writers and intellectuals were
imprisoned. Particularly the education
system was devastated as hundreds of students have been killed or arrested by
the military since 1988.
Especially in South East Asian region,
the rapacity of trans-national firms whose greed for bigger profits has blinded
governments to the sufferings of many
people. People’s resistance and opposition are being cast off through the state instruments. Development
aggression executed by Government in
partnership with the TNCs has discarded the people rights. For example, in the Philippines, the military operation is being given way to
the foreign firms. Overshadowing these "development" projects are the
pattern devised in the military manual of
"Clearing, Hold, Consolidate and Develop" - “Clear” the area from residents and
civilians including resistance forces, “Hold” the area against resistance
forces, “Consolidate” and begin the “Development” for foreign firms. In
guise of anti-insurgency campaign, bombing operation are physically and economically
displacing thousands of civilians and forcing peasants and indigenous people
out of their ancestral lands.
In South Asia, the situation is similar
to the South East Asia region. For example, the confrontations in the Kashmir
region between Pakistan and India has justified the militarization that
destroys the source of livelihood of people and forced them to leave their
communities.
As Asia Human Rights Commission in Hong
Kong reports that anti-government civilians such as students, opposition party
leaders, workers and farmers are often being detained at military district
command headquarters, safe-houses, command post, detachments, and many other
places which are not legally recognized detention centers. Some victims are
detained temporarily and subsequently released and were obliged to report
periodically to the military authorities.
Some detainees who were subjected to torture disappeared, their
whereabouts unknown, while others were brought to trial in an attempt to
demonstrate that the local authorities comply with the law. Some detainees were not brought to trial and
are subjected to inhuman treatment and extra-judicial executions.
In conclusion, without tackling the issue
of militarization seriously, the protection of human rights and establishment
of democracy in Asian countries might be totally impossible.
Given the timeliness of addressing the
issues related to militarization and human rights violation, and its relevance
to students(e.g., students are among
human rights victims in the most Asian countries under the military or
authoritarian governments, and students are playing important role in
responding to this issue), the WSCF-AP region decided to initiate this
project.
2. Objectives
General
Objectives
: To enable the selected number of student
leaders of SCM understand the bitter reality of
militarization, its effects
and relevance to them as students.
Specific
Objectives:
Enable the participants to articulate the situation of the
people and victims affected by militarization
Provide the participants with opportunity to witness
situation of the victims affected ( e.g. victims of torture, illegal detention,
disappearance, harassment, displaced communities etc.)
Provide the participants the skills in conducting fact
finding or investigative mission, solidarity activity to specific areas of concern
Enable the participants to identify critical aspects of
possible solidarity networking, investigative mission, fact finding mission
Encourage the participants to organize groups in the campus
to support the victims by the militarization
Encourage member
movements to initiate solidarity
activity on the national level in order to response to the human rights violations caused by the
militarization
Facilitate the internship for exchange, coordination, and
joint solidarity action between different movements
3.
Tentative
schedule
September 17 – arrival in Jakarta PGI
guest house, opening worship
18 – workshop orientation, keynote presentation,
exposure orientation
19 – exposure
20 – exposure
21 – country reports, Bible study
22 – action plan, closing worship
23 – departure