IMPHAL, December 1: The Civil Society Coalition on Human Rights in Manipur and the UN (CSCHR) has announce the submission of the Status of Human Rights in Manipur for consideration in the second round of Universal Periodic Review of the government of India in May 2012.
According to a release of the Civil Society Coalition on Human Rights in Manipur and the UN convenor, Laiphangbam Debabrata Roy, the member organisations of CSCHR include Centre for Organisation Research and Education (CORE); Civil Liberties and Human Rights Organisation (CLAHRO); Civil Liberties People Forum (CLPF); Committee on Human Rights (COHR), Manipur; Citizen’s Concern for Dams and Development (CCDD); Extrajudicial Executions Victim Families Association (EEVFAM), Manipur; Families of the Disappeared’s Association Manipur (FIDAM); Human Rights Alert (HRA); Human Rights Law Network, (HRNL) Manipur; Just Peace Foundation (JPF); Movement for People’s Right to Information (M-PRIM); North East Dialogue Forum (NEDF); Threaten Indigenous People’s Society (TIPS) and United People’s Front (UPF).
The release has further informed that the UPR is a new mechanism of the UN Human Rights Council established in 2006 to review the implementation of the international human rights obligations of each of the 193 member states of the UN by other member states.
“The first round of UPR was completed in 2011. India was reviewed on 10 April 2008, wherein the governments of UK, Germany and Canada raised the issue of Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, and 18 recommendations were issued to India by the Human Rights Council” it informed.
The second cycle of UPR is beginning in 2012. The Government of India will be reviewed again in the last week of May 2012. For this review the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) will place three documents for the review, the release added.
Further according to the release the documents are the report submitted by the government of India, the compilation of the records of UN human rights mechanism on India and the summary of stakeholders’ reports from NGOs and National Human Rights Institutions.
The CSCHR report is submitted to assist the office of the OHCHR to prepare the stakeholders’ report, it stated.
The submission of the CSCHR focussed on the trend of human rights violations of the government of India in Manipur since the first review of India’s human rights in 2008. The failure to implement the key recommendations from the UN was highlighted relevant to Manipur, the release added.
The prevalence of extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearance and torture, denial of indigenous peoples collective rights, increasing intrusion and alienation of indigenous peoples land and natural resources, denial of livelihood and survival resources through construction of Mega-dams, etc., negating the right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent were the focus of the report from CSCHR, the release added.