Speech in Behalf of Unified European Left (UEL) in The Parliamentary Assembly of The Council of Europe (PACE), on The situation

of human rights defenders in Council of Europe member States, by Erturul Krk, Jun. 27, 2012
We fully agree with the Draft Resolution and express our gratefulness to the rapporteur, Ms. Mailis REPS. However we would like to discuss a crucial point in the explanatory memorandum by the rapporteur regarding the definition of human rights defender and propose the assembly to stick to a relatively broader interpretation of human rights and human rights defenders. Very justifiably the rapporteur after pointing to the fact that there is no established legal definition of human rights defender cites a UN General Assembly document to proceed to a general agreement on the issue that human rights defenders are those who individually and together with others, act to promote and protect human rights. This is of course literally admissible. However when proceeding from abstract definitions to concrete country cases we see that COE countries where the rights of the human rights defenders had been confronted - occasionally or on a more regular basis - with obstacles or a hostile environment, are limited to particulary Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, the Russian Federation, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine. I, relying on abundant personal experiences admit that this is the case in Turkey. However if we reconsider the term human rights within the context of International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) we will recognize that other COE countries too are not exempt from such violations. The ICESCR is part of the International Bill of Human Rights, along with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights(ICCPR), including the latter's first and second Optional Protocols. Thus in reference to these documents those who work for the right of all peoples to self-determination; for the right to work under "just and favourable conditions", with the right to form and join trade unions, right to social security; for the right to family life, including paid parental leave and the protection of children; for the right to an adequate standard of living, including adequate food, clothing and housing, and the "continuous improvement of living conditions; for the right to health, specifically "the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health"; for the right to education, including free universal primary education, generally available secondary education and equally accessible higher education; for the right to participation in cultural life, too should be included among the human rights defenders who individually and together with others, act to promote and protect human rights. This should particularly be the case in the view of the three reports we adopted in the morning session all of which underlined the increased threats against social and political rights across Europe in a period of crisis. Further we can say that greater threats are pending for the rights of the people and rights defenders in the relatively more developed areas of Europe. Therefore we should be prepared to protect the rights and rights defenders across Europe, notwithstanding the degree of economic development of any given country.