Human Rights and Democracy - Official Documents

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Elections Presidential and parliamentary elections took place on 26 January and 8 April respectively. Independent election monitors concluded that the results were valid, but highlighted a number of concerns about the conduct of the campaigns and the high incidence of pre-election violence. Reporters Without Borders and local election monitoring bodies estimated that 95– 99% of state media election coverage was supportive of the president or critical of his opponent, Sarath Fonseka. Domestic election monitoring bodies also reported nearly 800 incidents of pre-election violence, of which half were classified as “serious”. This included five murders, five attempted murders and over 100 assaults, despite the two main parties having made public appeals to their supporters to refrain from violence. The parliamentary elections were monitored by three domestic groups – People’s Action for Free and Fair Elections; the Centre for Monitoring Election Violence; and the Campaign for Free and Fair Elections. The Sri Lankan election commissioner turned down the EU’s request to send an election monitoring mission. We helped to fund election monitors during both elections and encouraged all sides to ensure free, fair and peaceful elections. We also funded the Campaign for Free and Fair Elections to monitor the voter registration of displaced civilians in the north before the presidential election. This highlighted obstacles that our High Commission was able to raise with the government, some of which were subsequently addressed by the Elections Commission. However, only 22,000 internally displaced persons registered to vote in elections and up to 40% of people from the north were reported to have lacked valid forms of identity to enable their participation in elections. Despite the high national turnout of 61% in the presidential election, this dropped to less than 30% in the north and east where communities were still being resettled. Access to justice Sri Lanka has a highly developed judicial system, which faces many challenges. At the end of the year, the Sri Lankan government reported a judicial backlog of 283
approximately 65,000 cases. As a consequence, there were a high number of prisoners who had been on remand for a relatively long period. The Sri Lankan government committed additional funds at the end of 2010 to clear this backlog. Our High Commission funded a local civil society organisation to support the Sri Lankan Ministry of Justice’s running of mediation boards at local level throughout 2010. These boards provided an alternative method of resolving minor local disagreements without requiring complainants to go through an expensive legal process. Some 60% of cases referred to the mediation boards were resolved successfully. Sri Lanka’s Emergency Regulations and Prevention of Terrorism Act allow for limited detention of terrorist suspects without charge. A large number of suspected members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam have been detained without charge for periods considerably longer than those allowed by law. In addition, no clear legal framework has been established for former Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam fighters who were detained at the end of the military conflict. In 2010, there were reports of increasing politicisation of the judiciary and law enforcement agencies, contributing to a culture of impunity. There have been few successful investigations into prominent allegations of human rights violations. For example, there has been little visible progress during 2010 in investigating the 17 serious human rights cases considered by a Presidential Commission of Inquiry that completed its work in 2009; the abduction of human rights defender Sinnavan Suthanthararaja in May 2009; or the assassination of Sunday Leader editor Lasantha Wickrematunga in January 2009. Our High Commission has raised our concerns with the Sri Lankan government about the lack of progress on these and other cases. Death Penalty The death penalty has not been carried out in Sri Lanka since 1976. Amnesty International describes Sri Lanka as “abolitionist in practice”. Capital punishment remains legal and the death sentence continues to be handed down for crimes 284
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United Kingdom Foreign & Commonweal
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© Crown copyright 2011 You may re-
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Guantanamo Bay 53 Counter-prolifera
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Foreword by Foreign Secretary Willi
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Foreword by Minister of State Jerem
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SECTION I: Promoting British Values
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legislation and practices, includin
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Domestic observation also plays an
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Georgia, Uganda, Mozambique and Leb
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surge in abductions: 51 reporters w
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The Government publicly launched it
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prevent their execution. We also wo
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prison management by those who atte
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We also offered political and pract
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Special Tribunal for Lebanon During
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Freedom to practise religion in Aze
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protect concepts or specific belief
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The UK was keenly involved during 2
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criminalise homosexuality. And in M
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what progress has been made. And to
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Dalits still continue to face discr
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Roma The Government remains concern
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Envoy for Post-Holocaust Issues Sir
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Andrew presented the revised UK cou
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SECTION II: Human Rights in Safegua
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x end the indiscriminate use of ter
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All individuals have the right to a
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x an inquiry to examine whether, an
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Counter-proliferation The Governmen
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the use of these munitions in futur
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departments to ensure that the reso
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those in camps. Successes included
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Kashmiri people. We also call for a
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The Responsibility to Protect At th
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For the first time the strategy dra
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affected countries. At the end of 2
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SECTION III: Human Rights in Promot
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ights and democratic principles sho
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three international conventions lis
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emedies by victims of human rights
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Indonesian Voluntary Principles par
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A new Bribery Act received Royal As
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efuse an application, consideration
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One particular case arose in July,
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and an education programme for scho
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cases or linking child abduction to
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The UK sees the Commonwealth as an
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to health. We abstained on the Gene
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priorities ahead of the 2011 review
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The European Union The EU’s econo
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With support from several other mem
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continue to communicate the achieve
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David Morris visited Albania in 201
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the EU announced the launch of 10 n
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persons continue to face severe cha
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to enable Commonwealth countries to
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Despite these difficulties the UK w
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SECTION VI: Promoting Human Rights
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the end of 2011. Similar training w
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Almost all populated Overseas Terri
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families, which addressed their rol
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Afghanistan The Afghan government,
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appropriate, convict insurgents and
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structures throughout the Afghan po
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cases, UK-captured detainees have a
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Television and radio stations, webs
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educe the impact of conflict on wom
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Belarus After some small steps towa
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Death penalty Belarus is the only r
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2000. The Belarusian authorities ha
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Burma The year 2010 saw the first e
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under the new constitution, 25% of
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leaking confidential information. T
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Surveillance of the Burmese Buddhis
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We regularly raised the need for di
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DFID and our Embassy reinforced civ
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Our high commission staff from neig
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Death penalty The death penalty rem
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Chad are Islam (52%), Christianity
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Conflict Since the comprehensive vi
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China China has made huge progress
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2010. One ended with the execution
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has continued. Under this system po
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Liu Xiaobo, who is currently servin
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We believe that the special tribuna
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Colombia The tone of the national d
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clear majority -14 of 16 judges - w
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Presidential Programme on Human Rig
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igade in Apartadó and the Chargée
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Elections Cuba held municipal elect
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The Cuban government also released
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Democratic People’s Republic of K
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developed juvenile justice system.
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The World Food Programme remains co
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engaged with the relevant DRC autho
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Prisons and detention issues Prison
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ather than a source of protection.
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Conflict The DRC has suffered the e
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Eritrea The real lack of progress o
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estimates are in the tens of thousa
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drought and to promote the voluntar
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Iran The year 2010 was marked by a
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We were deeply concerned about the
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continued to execute those who comm
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epeatedly called on the Iranian gov
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and for continuing her work as a la
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The Iranian authorities also contin
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Women continued to be at the forefr
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Protection of civilians Iran is hom
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Iraq The year 2010 saw the governme
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Death penalty The death penalty con
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Prison facilities in Iraq remained
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twice as high as in men in rural ar
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adly treated by the Iraqi authoriti
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One of the key tools we have to pro
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Palestinian Authority security forc
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states of the EU in the December 20
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Page 239 and 240: “Today marks the fourth anniversa
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Page 243 and 244: government on a regular basis throu
Page 245 and 246: In June Libya asked the UN High Com
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Page 249 and 250: to terrorism in Pakistan in 2010, w
Page 251 and 252: atifying it. It had also not amende
Page 253 and 254: government to account, although som
Page 255 and 256: parliamentarians and activists, we
Page 257 and 258: Caucasus depends on human rights be
Page 259 and 260: However, events in 2010 demonstrate
Page 261 and 262: Caucasus region, particularly in Ch
Page 263 and 264: freely. But the vagueness of the la
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Page 267 and 268: Saudi Arabia Many of our concerns a
Page 269 and 270: In October 2008 King Abdullah launc
Page 271 and 272: The Saudi Ministry of Interior is c
Page 273 and 274: The National Dialogue, which was la
Page 275 and 276: In April, a court in Buraidah was r
Page 277 and 278: Somalia The Transitional Federal Go
Page 279 and 280: Programme in training more judges,
Page 281 and 282: Throughout 2010 al-Shabaab imposed
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Page 289 and 290: also held in the same facilities as
Page 291 and 292: prison sentence, he lost his seat a
Page 293 and 294: Monitoring groups reported that dur
Page 295 and 296: Women’s rights Sri Lanka has an e
Page 297 and 298: north by the Liberation Tigers of T
Page 299 and 300: missing relatives. A smaller number
Page 301 and 302: Sudan This is a critical time for S
Page 303 and 304: Promoting human rights in South Sud
Page 305 and 306: In the South there were numerous re
Page 307 and 308: Rule of law The administration of j
Page 309 and 310: independent newspapers have experie
Page 311 and 312: Children’s rights The Child Act w
Page 313 and 314: Syria Widespread violations of huma
Page 315 and 316: themselves. Prisoners were not allo
Page 317 and 318: 27 July. There has been no response
Page 319 and 320: Women’s rights The Syrian constit
Page 321 and 322: Turkmenistan Turkmenistan is a sign
Page 323 and 324: Torture and other ill treatment The
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Page 327 and 328: areas, and to support parliamentary
Page 329 and 330: Defenders of Uzbekistan claimed tha
Page 331 and 332: defamation related to his work for
Page 333 and 334: Women’s rights Gender discriminat
Page 335 and 336: Vietnam Freedom of expression and p
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and appeal hearings and to visit pr
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Torture and other ill treatment In
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and Cu Huy Ha Vu, who was charged w
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Children’s rights Human trafficki
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Yemen The government of Yemen faced
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We will also offer the government d
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officials raised their concerns abo
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Zimbabwe The human rights environme
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improvement in human rights and gov
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Human rights defenders The state ha
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Artists also faced harassment in 20
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Human Rights and Democracy - Official Documents

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