This is the transcript from the Chat on Human Rights hosted by the U.S. Virtual Consulate Davao on March 13, 2006. The chat was held discuss the U.S. Department of State’s release of the annual series of Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. These reports, which are required by the U.S. Congress, cover internationally recognized individual, civil, political, and worker rights.
The following questions and answers are from the chat. Participants included the Virtual Principal Officer from the Virtual Consulate Davao (Consul), the Human Rights Officer from the U.S. Embassy in Manila (HRO), Atty. Dominador Calamba, Commissioner of the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHR), Edgardo Diansuy, Director and Chief Protocol of the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHR).

CONSUL: Good Morning and welcome to the chat to discuss the U.S. government’s 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices. We are fortunate to have several experts joining our chat today. The U.S. Embassy Political Officer who is assigned to the Human Rights portfolio, Dr. Nymia Simbulan Executive Director, PhilRights, and Edgardo Diansuy, Public Information Office Director from the Commission on Human Rights will be with us today. We are just waiting for our guests to join us and should start in a few minutes.

CONSUL: We are going to go ahead and begin. Please ask your questions

User Asked: tom - Good morning, is there a copy of the report posted on the web?

HRO: Yes, please visit http://Philippines.usembassy.gov for the Philippines report as well as a link to the entire report covering more than 190 countries.

User Asked: cherry pie - why does the US do a human rights report in the first place? What do you expect to happen by having this report?

HRO: The United States believes that democratically governed nations are more likely to secure the peace, deter aggression, expand open markets, promote economic development, protect American citizens, combat international terrorism and crime, uphold human and worker rights, avoid humanitarian crises and refugee flows, improve the global environment, and protect human health. Thus, the United States is committed to keeping human rights issues at the forefront of our international agenda. As Secretary Rice said when she introduced the report last week, the US government hopes that this will encourage governments, media, NGOs and civil society to start a constructive dialog on important issues such as these.

User Asked: Ron - Do the human rights report address enforcing human rights by the Philippines government

HRO: The report is broken into sections on specific human rights topics and each section relates current Philippine law in this area.

User Asked: Manuel cayon2 - Aside from providing trainings and exposures to US legal and law enforcement programs, has the US assumed a more active role in persuading, or compelling governments to respect human rights? What are these roles or actions that were made, especially in the Philippines?

HRO: The U.S. works with the Philippine government to improve its ability to effectively ensure that the existing laws are implemented. One example is USAID’s program to help reduce court backlogs, thus shortening the amount of time that detainees have to wait for their case to be heard. Another is USAID’s program helping the Philippine Commission on Human Rights link its regional offices together via a computer network. We issue grants to Philippine human rights workers to visit their colleagues in the US to learn how to better address problems at home. Because of the importance of the issue, we will continue to work with our Philippine government counterparts to continue to progress in this area.

User Asked: tom - I missed reading the US Government's statement on the Presidential Proclamation 1017. Was a statement made?

HRO: The Embassy did issue a statement on the Presidential Proclamation 1017. It can be found on the embassy website, philippines.usembassy.gov

User Commented: tom - To Ron I have the report on my screen and in scanning it besides stating the laws there are no mentions of the Philippine Government enforcing such laws. Except the following paragraph from the report. The government and several NGOs worked to protect the rights of the country’s 8.02 million overseas citizens, most of whom were temporary or contract workers. The government placed financial sanctions on and criminal charges against domestic recruiting agencies found guilty of unfair labor practices. Although the POEA registered and supervised domestic recruiters practices successfully, the authorities sometimes lacked sufficient resources to ensure workers protection overseas. It sought cooperation from receiving countries and proposed migrant worker rights conventions in international forums. The government also provided assistance through its diplomatic missions in countries with substantial numbers of migrant workers.

CONSUL: We’d like to introduce some of our guests that have joined us today from the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines. With us are Atty. Dominador Calamba, Commissioner, Davao. He was formerly the Regional Director of Davao City before he was appointed as Commissioner.

CONSUL: Also joining us is the Director and Chief Protocol Edgardo Diansuy of the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines.

User Asked: Manuel cayon2 - placed alongside the rest of East Asia and the Pacific, how would the US describe the Philippine human rights record in 2005? Do you see any dramatic change in this assessment for 2006, when new things have developed, such as the supposed crackdown on political critics?

HRO: The report is structured to address each country’s particular conditions, and no comparison is made on a regional basis. For 2006, we remain optimistic that by working together, we can improve the basic adherence to human rights for each citizen of the Philippines

CHR: This is from the Commission on Human Rights commenting on Tom’s comment to Ron: The commission on human rights tell the government that this treaty has been ratified by the Philippine government and if this is violated we call attention of the gov’t. to take appropriate action. The commission on human rights cannot prosecute. It can only investigate violations of civil and political rights…. With regards to economic and cultural rights, the commission on human rights can only monitor government compliance

User Asked: cherry pie - What is the Commission on Human Rights doing about Proclamation 1017?

CHR: We have an advisory on that, in fact after this we are going to the senate because we were asked to testify about 1017 and on some alleged human rights violations committed by the police against some members of congress who were participating in rallies and demonstrations and on the raid on the media like the TRIBUNE

CONSUL: To all our participants, you may send your visa inquiries to the Virtual Consulate by going to the home page and click the contact us link on the top of the page. Select the general inquiries and send your questions to the Virtual Consulate. Thank you for your cooperation

User Asked: Manuel cayon2 - when you say, "can improve the basic adherence", what do you mean, or what was the initial observation or assessment of the things that transpired this year?

HRO: By “basic adherence” we mean that laws must be enforced if human rights are to be respected. The report states that often, laws are not enforced or cases are not pursued (such as with cases of extrajudicial killings.)

User Asked: Hans Moran - Good Morning, I am associated with the Bahay Pagasa facility of the University of St. La Salle for juvenile delinquents. What programs does the US Consul have for the inhumane conditions of children in the Philippine jails and how can we avail of help for our facilities for juvenile delinquents?

HRO: The US government is following this problem closely. The Embassy has plans to work with the Philippine government agencies responsible to foster best practices training and other programs. The juvenile justice bill is a step in the right direction. USAID-funded programs are ready to work with the government on the bill’s implementation

User Asked: Manuel cayon2 - to the CHR, what points would you raise in the Senate?

CHR: It depends on the questions that they’re going to ask. We will be presenting to the senate our advisory on 1017 and our stand on the arrest of some lawmakers and the raid on a newspaper office THE TRIBUNE

User Asked: tom - To: CHR I was just providing an observation of the report in discussion to Ron and including a paragraph from the report and was just verified by the consulate in his last posting "The report states that often, laws are not enforced or cases are not pursued (such as with cases of extrajudicial killings." I don’t believe I stated that CHD did or did not do anything or what authority you have in these situations. Now though you have made clear your responsibilities in these circumstances

User Asked: Manuel cayon2 - to the CHR, may we know the content, or the tone, of your advisory on the pp1017, what's your evaluation on the raid of the Tribune, the arrest of the lawmakers?

CHR: The chr advisory on proclamation 1017 is to the effect that the Philippines ratified the international covenant on civil and political rights. When that proclamation was issued, they should have informed the United Nations about it and that it should not violate human rights especially the human rights contained in the bill of rights in the Philippine constitution. The constitution did not say that with the proclamation, the bill of rights may be suspended. It does not say that. And therefore, the gov’t cannot arrest without warrant. The arrest of the lawmakers was not at all justified in law and in fact they should not have been arrested without any warrant. The raid on the media THE TRIBUNE has no basis at all. It was a violation of the freedom of expression and of the press

CONSUL: Thank you for joining us today. We appreciate your questions and comments. A transcript of today’s chat will be posted shortly.

CONSUL: Unfortunately we will be ending this session as we have gone over our allotted time for today. CHR can be contacted at 632-928-5792 for further comments and questions.