A new testament of Bhutan human rights violations

A new testament of Bhutan human rights violations

December 04, 2009

Bhutan is presenting its first human rights report to the Universal Periodic Report Review Committee of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva today at 1400 hours local time.

Despite gross human rights violations, including eviction of over 100,000 citizens and other 80,000 restricted from using their voting rights during the first general elections, Bhutan has made its modest effort to present itself as clean in rights abuses.

To draw attention of the international community on human rights violations in Bhutan, which still continues today, and denouncing the fabricated human rights report presented at the HRC, rights activists have published a new testament incorporating rights violations since 1990 and particularly after the so called democratic changes.

Written by I. P. Adhikari, president of Association of Press Freedom Activists (APFA) Bhutan, and Raju Thapa, Director of Human Rights Without Frontiers, Nepal, the book provides vivid glimpse of the gross human rights violations in a country where gross national happiness is talked at all times.

The book, entitled ‘Human Rights and Justice in Bhutan’, covers incidents beginning 1990s suppression to political changes and scenario thereafter.

The book counters the claims made by RGOB in its report prepared for HRC. The book includes substantive details of human rights violations and state failure to adhere by its legal obligation to protect rights of its citizens. Some of the noted instances of human rights violations include delay in repatriation of the Bhutanese refugees, restricting voting rights to 80,000 Nepali-speaking population still living in the country and thousands of monks, failure of the government to set up human rights mechanism, absence of any human rights organizations in the field, denial to right to education to thousands of children as parents failed to no objection certificate, discrimination in providing security clearance that is vital in obtaining business license and other government facilities and failure of the state on birth registration of the children born after 1990 (Bhutan ratified CRC in 1991), failure of the state for domestication of the state laws according to CEDAW (Bhutan ratified CEDAW in 1981).

ENDS

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