Document - India must deliver on its repeated commitments to the Human
Rights Council

*AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL *

*PUBLIC STATEMENT *

AI Index: ASA 20/023/2012

1 June 2012

 *India must deliver on its repeated commitments to the Human Rights Council
*

On 24 May 2012, India’s human rights record came under renewed
international scrutiny during its second Universal Periodic Review (UPR) at
the UN Human Rights Council. Amnesty International welcomes the
recommendations made to India by the reviewing states, many of which
reflect concerns raised previously by the organization.

Amnesty International is disappointed, however, that despite India’s
assertion that it sees the UPR mechanism as one of “constructive
engagement,” the government did not immediately accept any of the
recommendations made, some of which were put forward in 2008 during India’s
first UPR. Amnesty International urges India to demonstrate by September
2012, a genuine resolve to deliver on its outstanding human rights
commitments and the UPR recommendations, when the report on India’s second
UPR is formally adopted at the 21st session of the Human Rights Council.

India must strengthen national safeguards against torture. During the
review, India received no less than 17 recommendations to ratify the
Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment
or Punishment (CAT). Having signed the CAT 15 years ago, India should now
ratify without further delay both the CAT and its Optional Protocol. India
stated, as it did during its first review in 2008, that it is in the
process of ratifying the CAT, and attributed the delay to the drafting of
the domestic Prevention of Torture Bill, which has been pending before
Parliament since May 2010.

The Prevention of Torture Bill falls short of the requirements of the CAT
in several respects, as previously detailed by Amnesty International, for
example with regard to the definition of torture and the inclusion of a
statute of limitations. During the review, India asserted that its
existing laws provide adequate protection against torture. Amnesty
International strongly contests this assertion.

Amnesty International urges India to act on recommendations to ratify the
International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced
Disappearance, which it signed five years ago.

India should also accept the recommendations that it sign and ratify the
Second Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights aiming at the abolition of the death penalty, establish an
official moratorium on the use of the death penalty, or abolish the death
penalty. No executions have been carried out in India since 2004, but
recent rejections of several mercy petitions of prisoners currently on
death row have increased fears that executions may resume. This would
constitute a major setback to the country’s alignment with the global trend
away from the use of the death penalty.

 Amnesty International welcomes the recommendations made that India repeal
or review the Armed Forces Special Powers Act 1958 (AFSPA), as also
recommended by a government-appointed panel six years ago following
widespread demands in north-eastern states and Jammu and Kashmir. During
the UPR, the Indian delegation failed to adequately address impunity under
the AFSPA, which grants security forces in specified areas of armed
insurgency powers to shoot to kill in situations where they are not
necessarily at imminent risk. The Indian Supreme Court recently ruled that
security personnel could not invoke the AFSPA to avoid prosecutions for
alleged human rights violations. However, under the AFSPA, prosecutions
cannot take place without approval by India’s federal government.

The Indian delegation did not respond to an advance question from Norway on
whether India would consider repeal of the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety
Act, 1978 (PSA), under which hundreds of persons suspected of involvement
in protests, political leaders and activists remain in detention without
charge or trial in Jammu and Kashmir. Amendments made to the PSA in 2012
have still not brought detention practices in Jammu and Kashmir fully into
line with India’s human rights obligations under international law.

Amnesty International therefore reiterates its call on the Government of
India to ensure that the Jammu and Kashmir authorities repeal the PSA, end
the practice of administrative detention in the state, and free all
detainees unless they are charged with a recognizable offence under the
state’s ordinary criminal law.

In September 2011, India issued a standing invitation to the UN Special
Procedures, and its facilitation of recent visits by the Special
Rapporteurs on human rights defenders, and extrajudicial, summary or
arbitrary executions, is welcome. As recommended during the UPR, Amnesty
International urges India without further delay, to address the backlog of
outstanding mission requests from other Special Procedures, and in
particular to facilitate visits by the Special Rapporteur on torture, whose
request to visit has been pending since 1993, and the Working Group on
Arbitrary Detention. Several states called on India to implement the
recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders
following her visit in January 2011 and to ensure that human rights
defenders are able to carry out their legitimate and peaceful activities
without fear of harassment and intimidation.

Amnesty International calls on India to demonstrate its “constructive
engagement” to the UPR at the Human Rights Council’s 21st Session in
September, and act swiftly to give effect to these recommendations.

  Further information on the second UPR of India can be found at:
HYPERLINK "http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/INSession13.aspx%20"
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/INSession13.aspx

Amnesty International, India: Accountability, impunity and obstacles to
access to justice, Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review, (Index
ASA/20/048/2011), November 2011: HYPERLINK "
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA20/048/2011/en"
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA20/048/2011/en

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