On 8 August 2007, after more than 36 hours in detention, Chinese authorities released Ms. Melanie Raoul, Mr. Sam Price, Ms. Leslie Kaup, Mr. Nupur Modi, Ms. Duane Martinez and Mr. Pete Speller, members of Students for a Free Tibet, a worldwide movement campaigning for Tibetan independence. The six activists, who are citizens of the United Kingdom, the United States America and Canada, were detained on August 7, 2007 for displaying the above-mentioned banner as an act of protest on the eve of the one year countdown to the 2008 Beijing Olympics [1].
After being interrogated individually at a police station, the six were transferred to a second one, where they were kept together in a room for 36 hours, during which time authorities imposed limitations on their freedom of movement, confining each of them to a chair and prohibiting them from lying down. In addition, official interrogators reportedly threatened the detainees with lengthy terms of imprisonment. Interrogation sessions were conducted constantly throughout the period of detention and authorities denied proper sleep to the detainees, only allowing 15 minutes rest at a time before interrogations would recommence.
The Observatory denounces the incommunicado detention of Ms. Melanie Raoul, Mr. Sam Price, Ms. Leslie Kaup, Mr. Nupur Modi, Ms. Duane Martinez and Mr. Pete Speller as well as the refusal of the Chinese authorities to confirm that they were detained when sought by the relevant embassies and to allow them access to consular assistance. Indeed, despite the best efforts of the embassies of Canada, the United States of America and the United Kingdom in Beijing, embassy officials were unable to contact the detainees in order to ascertain their status. The Observatory recalls that the denial of consular assistance is a clear breach of article 30 6(1)(b) of the Vienna Convention on Consular Protection of 1963, to which the People’s Republic of China is party, and which requires that detained foreign nationals be informed of their right to communicate with consular officials “without delay”. The treatment of the activists further violates the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners and goes against the accepted norms of good practice and principles in the treatment of those in detention.
The Observatory also expresses its concerns over the acts of psychological intimidation which took place in the framework of the detention of the six activists, and considers these events as one more evidence of the ongoing harassment against human rights defenders in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) [2].
The Observatory wishes to recall that the Chinese Constitution was amended in 2004 to include that “the State respects and safeguards human rights” and that in April 2006, the PRC stated that the amendment to the Constitution was aiming at “defining the position of human rights in the overall national development strategy” in a document presented to support its candidacy to the Human Rights Council’s first election. In addition, as a member of the Human Rights Council, the PRC shall uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights.
Therefore, the Observatory urges the Chinese authorities to show greater involvement in the defence of human rights, and in particular to:
– conduct a fair and impartial investigation into the above-mentioned allegations of ill-treatment;
– conform in all circumstances with the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, adopted by the UN General Assembly on December 9, 1998, which provides that “everyone has the right, individually and in association with others, to promote and to strive for the protection and realisation of human rights and fundamental freedoms at the national and international levels” (Article 1) and that “everyone has the right, individually and in association with others, [...] to meet or assemble peacefully” (Article 5(a));
– put an end to acts of harassment against all human rights defenders operating in the country;
– ensure in all circumstances respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms in accordance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights instruments ratified by the People’s Republic of China.