UN encourages Fiji to withdraw reservations

Transcript

The United Nations is encouraging Fiji to withdraw its reservations to the UN Convention Against Torture.

Fiji has become the 159th country to ratify the treaty but like many nations it has placed some caveats.

Catherine Phuong faw-ng of the UN's Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Pacific says it's encouraging Fiji has gone the final step as many countries in the Pacific are still to do so.

But she says as Fiji's Constitution does not define torture, its reservation on Article 1 should be withdrawn.

She told Don Wiseman she's also concerned about Fiji's reservation on Article 14 of the treaty.

CATHERINE PHUONG: Article 14 deals with the right to obtain redress and to fair and adequate compensation. New Zealand has exactly the same reservation, it's not unique. But at the same time the committee against torture, which monitors the implementation of the convention, has strongly encouraged states to withdraw reservations to article 14 because this is a very important right. Fiji has also entered reservations to article 20, 21 and 22, and that's about the competence of the committee against torture to conduct confidential inquiries, to look at the communications by individuals, and from other states. Now, again, it's not unusual and Fiji is entitled to not accept the competence of the committee against torture but again, you know, we would encourage Fiji to withdraw those reservations. We understand from the government that they are already looking into this and that they might even consider withdrawing these reservations in the coming year. So we are looking forward to working with the government of Fiji in this regard.

DON WISEMAN:  It does sound a little like a ratification you have when you're not having a ratification.

CP: I don't think so. I think the convention covers a lot of state obligations with regard to the prohibition of torture and Fiji has accepted all of these obligations by ratifying the convention. For us, it's quite an important step that Fiji has ratified the convention, and as you know, many countries in the Pacific haven't actually taken that step.

DW: Yes, yes very many of them. An unusually long list, isn't it?

CP: I would say that, generally, the ratification right of human rights treaties in the Pacific is quite low in comparison to other regions of the world. So this is not specific to the convention against torture. Most Pacific states will have ratified the convention on the rights of the child, and the convention on the elimination of discrimination against women, but it is true that they haven't ratified many of the other human rights treaties. And, the convention against torture has been widely ratified around the world because it is so important, but it is true that in the Pacific there's still a number of states that haven't ratified this convention. I think there's probably a couple of explanations for this; the first one is that a number of governments are not always fully aware of all the human rights conventions and what obligations are involved, and the second explanation is probably that there is a perception that by ratifying additional human rights treaties it would increase the burden of reporting. And what we're trying to argue is that ratifying these conventions is not only important for the protection of human rights, but it also allows states to benefit from the technical advice from the committee. So we hope that Fiji from now on will benefit from that advice.