COMMITTEE ON ELIMINATION OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION DISCUSSES SITUATION IN PARAGUAY, SOUTH AFRICA AND UKRAINE WITH NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS

The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination this morning heard from civil society representatives about the situation of racial discrimination in Paraguay, South Africa and Ukraine, ahead of the Committee’s review of the reports of these countries this week.

Lebanon will also have its report considered by the Committee this week, but there were no non-governmental organizations present to talk about the situation there.

A civil society organization from Paraguay spoke about structural discrimination against indigenous people and communities, underlining that the obstacles to eliminating poverty and social exclusion were rooted in the economic system based on monocultural agriculture, notably soya, and livestock rearing. Land was therefore concentrated in the hands of latifundistas, leaving indigenous people without proper access to land for their sustenance. Paraguay was the only country in the region without a proper definition of racial discrimination; the law against all forms of discrimination had been rejected after seven years of discussions in the Parliament, while the legislation on free, prior and informed consent was not yet in place.

South Africa was still grappling with race and, with its affirmative action system going too far, it had become so ensnared in race that redress had gotten lost, a non-governmental organization said. The government ideology of racial representivity and its mathematical approach to race affected all spheres of society, but did not carefully deal with racial classification. It was not building bridges between the underlying racial tensions but was rather feeding them, and its racial ideology was constructing a future based on race.

Non-governmental organizations from Ukraine welcomed the recent changes and the adoption of anti-discrimination laws, and expressed concern about the lack of a mechanism to protect the rights of national minorities. The problem of xenophobia, hate speech and hate crimes persisted, but authorities continued to regard hate crimes as “hooligan action”. Grave violations of the rights of ethnic minorities were taking place in the Russia-annexed Crimea and Russian-backed self-proclaimed republics in the east of Ukraine, with the situation of Crimean Tatars being particularly dramatic. The situation of the Romani population remained difficult, with persistent traditional discrimination against them and widespread stereotypes and biases.

Speaking in the discussion were representatives of Tierra Viva from Paraguay, Solidarity Trade Union from South Africa, as well as representatives of three civil society organizations from Ukraine: Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, Right to Protection and Roma Human Rights Ukraine.

Live webcast of country reviews is available at http://www.treatybodywebcast.org.

The Committee will reconvene this afternoon at 3 p.m., to start its consideration of the combined fourth to sixth periodic report of Paraguay (CERD/C/PRY/4-6).

Statement on Paraguay

Tierra Viva, representing 70 indigenous communities, expressed concern about structural discrimination against indigenous people and communities. The obstacles to eliminating poverty and social exclusion among indigenous people were rooted in the economic system of the country, which was based on monocultural agriculture, notably soya, and livestock, which required a huge concentration of land in the hands of latifundistas. Paraguay was one of the countries with the highest inequality in land distribution in the world. Paraguay was the only country in the region without a proper definition of racial discrimination and the law against all forms of discrimination had been rejected after seven years of discussions in the Parliament. Paraguay was also the country with the highest number of rulings by the Inter-American Court for Human Rights related to indigenous issues. The legislation on free, prior and informed consent was not yet in place, while human rights defenders defending core rights of indigenous people were actively prosecuted by the authorities.

Another representative expressed concern about the unequal distribution of land. Lack of access to land was the root cause of poverty among indigenous people and communities. Other issues raised with the Committee included the poor state of health and education among indigenous people.

Discussion on Paraguay

A Committee Expert asked about situations in which human rights defenders active on indigenous issues had been killed. The National Congress for Indigenous People had taken place in March 2016: were all indigenous people and all those who participated in social life in the country represented? Was the indigenous movement in Paraguay united or were there currents?

Other Experts asked about the status of the draft protocol on free, prior and informed consent, the role of indigenous communities in the process, and whether this would be sufficient to fully implement the provisions of the International Labour Organization Convention 169; indigenous courts and how they fit – if they existed – in the official court system; and the situation of the Ayoreo people who were still living in the forest and who were forced to change their way of life because of deforestation.

Responding to Experts’ questions, Tierra Viva said that the National Congress for Indigenous People had not included all indigenous people and communities. There was no clear and robust policy which would ensure the participation or consent of indigenous people, while the draft protocol on free, prior and informed consent had not been discussed with indigenous people and civil society organizations. It was important to stress that the International Labour Organization Convention 169 was a law in the country and in fact it was a constitutional law, but the public policies to effectively implement it were not in place. In 2015, a major concession had been given, without any attempt to hold consultations with indigenous people whatsoever. The Government was increasingly issuing concessions for livestock rearing or oil exploration in areas where Ayoreo lived, causing a major disruption to their way of life; all the concessions were being issued without any consultations with indigenous people and communities. The representative of the non-governmental organization stressed that, as far as indigenous people and indigenous issues were concerned, State statistics were not reliable.

In another round of questions, Experts asked about the relationship with the Office of the Ombudsman, whether there was an institution that protected the people from racism and racial discrimination, and the status of the Indigenous Health Bill. They also inquired about key obstacles in the implementation of the decisions by the Inter-American Court for Human Rights.

Responding, representatives of civil society organizations said that public policies seemed to be adopting a handout approach rather than empowering indigenous people to change their situation. The work of the Office of the Ombudsmen was not sufficient to protect the interests of indigenous people, and the Ombudsman had also outlived his mandate. The Criminal Code did not provide sufficient protection from racial discrimination, and the anti-discrimination legislation had been rejected in 2014 because the State refused to use the term “discrimination” and used the term “violation of the right to equality” instead. Indigenous people represented 1.9 per cent of the population in Paraguay, with 107,000 individuals grouped in five linguistic families and 19 different indigenous peoples, most of them living in the Chaco region or the so-called Western Region.

Statement on South Africa

Solidarity Trade Union said that South Africa was still grappling with race and said that its report presented an affirmative action system that had gone too far and had become so ensnared in race that redress had gotten lost. It was a system in which races were permanently institutionalized in various silos. The non-governmental organization presented two cases to illustrate the point, including the case of Renate Barnard, an employee of the South African Police Service who had been denied promotion for nine years, and who had finally lost in the Constitutional Court on the basis of what in legal terms was known as the Barnard principle which stated that if one group was overrepresented, it would not constitute unfair discrimination if an individual from that group was not promoted. The government ideology of racial representivity and its mathematical approach to race affected all spheres of society, but it did not carefully deal with racial classification. It was not building bridges between the underlying racial tensions but was rather feeding them, and its racial ideology was constructing a future based on race.

Discussion on South Africa

A Committee Expert asked whether civil society organizations in South Africa were consulted in the drafting of the State party’s report, about the contribution of the non-governmental organization to the ongoing discussion concerning hate speech, about the view on the apartheid system and what had been done to eradicate this system and build a democratic State, and about the proposals on the future of South Africa.

Another Expert asked about socio-economic gaps between various groups and whether they had narrowed or widened, and the alternatives to affirmative action in order to achieve equality, particularly in the light of huge gaps between the white minority and black majority.

Responding, the representative of Solidarity Trade Union said that it had not been consulted in the drafting of the State party’s report. South Africa was a constitutional democracy and it was important to create case law, so the non-governmental organization was active in this regard. There was still a lot of race conflict in South Africa, but also progress was being made in reaching solutions. Apartheid was a deep system which had led to pain for generations; there was still a long way to go. A concern was that democracy in South Africa was developing into majority democracy and that the room for minorities was narrowing, including for minorities which suffered under the apartheid. Huge disparities remained, despite the growing back middle class. For example, 75 per cent of schools in the country were dysfunctional and most were in previously disadvantaged areas. South Africa must look into the input-based affirmative action and empower people not only to use the system to force the figures, as the current affirmative action programme was doing.

Asked about Special Equality Tribunals, a civil society organization representative said that those had been created by legislation, including by the Labour Law, while the Human Rights Commission was tasked with looking into issues of hate speech and racism, for example. In order to really get the attention of the ruling party, it was necessary to litigate on those issues. The Government was firmly committed to special measures, but the fear was that they were going too far and the aim was to find the right balance without creating imbalances.

Statements on Ukraine

Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group welcomed the recent changes and the adoption of the anti-discrimination laws, and said that the law on ethnic minorities continued to distinguish between “ethnic Ukrainians” and “those who chose to identify themselves as Ukrainians”, which was discriminatory. The law also lacked the definition on national and cultural autonomy or other ways to identify a minority group, which indicated a lack of mechanism to protect the rights of national minorities. The problems of xenophobia, hate speech and hate crimes remained a problem, especially against African students, Jews and persons originating from the Caucasus. Corpus Azov members often expressed extreme-right ideas and demonstrated neo-Nazi symbols, but this was generally accepted by the authorities. The nationalist rhetoric was often used against minorities by the officials from parties, most cases of anti-Semitism remained unpunished and hate-crimes were mostly regarded to be “hooligan action”. The biggest challenge for human rights in general and minority rights was the Russian annexation of Crimea and Russian-backed self-proclaimed republics in the east of Ukraine, where grave violations of rights of ethnic minorities were taking place. Especially dramatic was the situation of Crimean Tatars and vulnerable non-protected groups in the areas of armed conflict. The situation of the Romani population remained difficult, with persistent traditional discrimination against them and widespread stereotypes and biases.

Right to Protection said that the protection of the rights of refugees, migrants and other persons in need of international protection were rarely conceptualized in Ukraine, which had acceded to main international human rights treaties, including those related to refugees, and stateless persons. The standards pertaining to the protection of non-nationals arising from those treaties were not being implemented, and laws were not in place, and those structural deficiencies led to human rights violations. In 2014/2015, more than 1,000 Syrians had been pushed back from Ukrainian borders.

Roma Human Rights Ukraine welcomed the adoption by Ukraine of the Roma Strategy and Plan of Action and said that almost one out of five Roma did not have the necessary education, while higher education was attained by only one per cent, which made it difficult for Roma to find official employment. Discrimination against Roma students and their parents existed, leading to a high rate of drop outs even before children completed primary education. It was important to allocate adequate resources for the education of Roma children, to ensure ease of access to identity documents for Roma and understand how many were still without such documents. The implementation of the Strategy was not effective because of lack of resources, and because of the impact of the process of decentralization that Ukraine was undergoing currently.

Discussion on Ukraine

A Committee Expert said that many laws had been passed in 2014, such as on Crimean Tatars, and had been passed with Crimea and eastern Ukraine in mind, and asked the civil society organizations about the article 161 of Criminal Code and the difficulty to have an offence under this article proved, the details about court cases and sentences in those cases, and the suggestions to alleviate predicament of Roma who had to flee occupied areas.

ANASTASIA CRICKLEY, Committee Chairperson, asked for further information about the support for Crimean Tatars, and about the designation of Roma as a national minority in the Roma Integration Strategy 2020.

Responding, the representatives of non-governmental organizations said that the meaning of “citizens” in article 161 of the Criminal Code needed to be changed and brought in conformity with international obligations. Previously, the policy towards Crimean Tatars was not to allow their concentration in one territory, in order to avoid that they became a majority in certain areas; as a result, the population was dispersed, and the objective today was to support their concentration in order to ensure their political representation. The decentralization process also did not take into account the interests of national minorities living in regions, and nothing was being done to ensure dialogue between the minority and majority. This was also a problem in Kherson region where many of the Crimean Tatars who had fled Crimea had taken refuge; the talk of some sort of autonomy for Crimean Tatars similar to what they had in Crimea was not seen favourably by the population.

Ukraine had ticked many boxes in terms of passing new legislation, but efforts to ensure their implementation were not sufficient. For example, the anti-discrimination law, passed in 2011 and amended in 2014, was a very good piece of legislation, but nothing was in place to ensure its effective implementation. People did not know about the law, the definition of discrimination or complaint mechanisms, and in fact they were using wrong mechanisms to file their complaints. Long-standing problems that Roma experienced were aggravated by the armed conflict; in some instances, because they lacked identity documents, they could not even escape the fighting as they did not have identity papers to show at checkpoints. In Ukraine, Roma were the national minority.


For use of the information media; not an official record

CERD16/016E