Regional human rights court needed for greater freedom

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Thu, 06/17/2010 10:32 AM

The Indonesian Press Council is eager for the establishment of a regional human rights court so that Indonesia can achieve greater freedom of speech and better protect journalists as rights watchdogs in a democratic nation.

“The Asia-Pacific is the only region that does not have a human rights court,” Bambang Harymurti, the deputy chief of the Indonesian Press Council, said on Tuesday.

“We should be ashamed because even Africa has such a court,” he said referring to the fact that some countries in Asia-Pacific, such as Indonesia, Japan and India, rank highest in terms of democracy.

“We can start by having countries that are ready to adopt the rights court,” he added. “Just like they have done in Africa,” he added.

Bambang said that it would be impossible to establish a regional human rights court that only included Southeast Asian nations.

“Of course, first it would have to be a consensus of all the ASEAN nations,” he said. “However, I don’t think that Singapore and Myanmar will agree to it,” he added.

According to Bambang, enlarging the circle of countries involved to include the Asia-Pacific would facilitate the establishment of a regional human rights court by putting more pressure on press freedom.

According to the 2009 World Press Freedom Survey, Indonesia ranks 101 among 175 countries for freedom of speech. “Meaning there are hundreds more countries that have greater freedom of press,” he added.

One of the highest ranking countries for freedom of press is the Netherlands which ranks seventh.

During a freedom of the press discussion on Tuesday in Jakarta, representatives of the Netherlands Supreme Court shared their experiences in achieving freedom of press with Indonesian media representatives and members of the Press Council.

“Indonesia and the Netherlands have the same articles on defamation and slander,” said G.J.M. Corstens, chairman of the Netherlands Supreme Court.

“However, we adopted the European Convention of Human Rights back in the 50s,” he added.

“The convention stresses the importance of the freedom of the press in Europe,” he added.

“So, even though we have the defamation and slander articles in the Dutch Criminal Code, the convention serves as a higher authority when it comes to press freedom,” he added.

“Journalists can be sued for defamation,” he said. “But, they can always lodge complaints with the human rights court,” he said.

J.B. Fleers, vice chairman of the Supreme Court, said that his country put great importance on press freedom.

“In the last 12 years, the Supreme Court has only handled two cases of civil lawsuits against journalists, which eventually were won by the press,” he added. (map)

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