[Joint House and Senate Hearing, 113 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
THE OSCE OFFICE FOR DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS AND HUMAN RIGHTS:
ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND CHALLENGES
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND
COOPERATION IN EUROPE
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MAY 21, 2013
__________
Printed for the use of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in
Europe
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via http://www.csce.gov
______________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
95-503 WASHINGTON : 2015
_________________________________________________________________________________
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Publishing Office,
Internet:bookstore.gpo.gov. Phone:toll free (866)512-1800;DC area (202)512-1800
Fax:(202) 512-2104 Mail:Stop IDCC,Washington,DC 20402-001
COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS
SENATE
HOUSE
BENJAMIN CARDIN, Maryland, CHRISTOPHER SMITH, New Jersey,
Chairman Co-Chairman
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island JOSEPH PITTS, Pennsylvania
TOM UDALL, New Mexico ROBERT ADERHOLT, Alabama
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire PHIL GINGREY, Georgia
RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut MICHAEL BURGESS, Texas
ROGER WICKER, Mississippi ALCEE HASTINGS, Florida
SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia LOUISE McINTOSH SLAUGHTER, New
JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas York
MIKE McINTYRE, North Carolina
STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
.
THE OSCE OFFICE FOR DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS AND HUMAN RIGHTS:
ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND CHALLENGES
----------
May 21, 2013
COMMISSIONERS
Page
Hon. Benjamin Cardin, Chairman, Commission on Security and
Cooperation in Europe.......................................... 1
WITNESSES
Ambassador Janez Lenarcic, Office of Democratic Institutions and
Human Rights Director, Organization for Security and Co-
operation in Europe............................................ 3
APPENDICES
THE OSCE OFFICE FOR DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS AND HUMAN RIGHTS:
ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND CHALLENGES
----------
MAY 21, 2013
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe,
Washington, DC.
The hearing was held from 2:29 p.m. to 3:27 p.m. EST in the
Capitol Visitor Center Senate Room 210-212, Washington, D.C.,
Senator Benjamin Cardin, Chairman of the Commission on Security
and Cooperation in Europe, presiding.
Commissioners present: Hon. Benjamin Cardin, Chairman,
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Witnesses present: Ambassador Janez Lenarcic, Office of
Democratic Institutions and Human Rights Director, Organization
for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
HON. BENJAMIN CARDIN, CHAIRMAN, COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND
COOPERATION IN EUROPE
Mr. Cardin. Well, good afternoon, and let me welcome you
all to this hearing of the Helsinki Commission, in which we're
very honored to have Ambassador Lenarcic here, the director of
the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights in the
OSCE. Ambassador Lenarcic is a--is a familiar face and a person
who we have worked with for a long time and it's a pleasure to
have him here. It underscores the importance of the work that
you do in the Helsinki Commission and the priorities that we
place on the human dimension.
Since the Helsinki Final Act in 1975, human rights have
formed an inseparable and core part of the OSCE's comprehensive
concept of security. Agreement was reached back in 1990 to
create specialized institutions to assist the participating
states in implementing their human dimension commitments. And
based on U.S. proposal, the then Office of Free Elections was
established in Warsaw. It later was expanded to encompass human
rights under the title it is now known by as the Office of
Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, or better known as
ODIHR.
In enhancing the role of ODIHR, the 1992 Helsinki Summit
declared that the participating states express their strong
determination to ensure full respect for human rights and
fundamental freedom, to abide by the rule of law, to promote
the principles of democracy and, in this regard to build,
strengthen and protect democratic institutions as well as to
promote tolerance throughout the society.
I think the international community is well aware that the
U.S. Helsinki Commission has made human rights, the human
dimension and the work of ODIHR our top priority. We're proud
of the role that we've had in advancing many of the most
important human rights issues--from trafficking, where we now I
think have brought about the sharing of best practices to stop
this modern form of slavery; to the tolerance agenda, where
we're very proud of the role that we've had in improving the
capacity of OSCE through special representatives and sharing,
again, best practices among the participating states; to
transparency initiatives that we're very proud of our
initiative in those areas that have put a spotlight on anti-
corruption strategies in countries to advance that basic right
of good governance. And certainly we've made progress, but,
nonetheless, we still face significant issues.
While some OSCE countries have successfully transitioned to
democracy, others appear to be moving backwards. Several
participating states have yet to hold free and fair elections.
Freedom of the media is threatened in many OSCE states, where
journalists are harassed, attacked and even killed for their
work. And the Internet and other digital media are restricted.
Nongovernmental organizations and human rights defenders
face reprisal for their work. Extremism laws are used to go
after opposition activists and nontraditional religious groups.
Anti-Semitism, racism and discrimination continue to result in
hate crimes. Roma, Europe's largest ethnic minority, continue
to face discrimination in education, employment, and housing. I
support ODIHR's work to address these issues.
The OSCE itself also faces challenges. This year marks the
10th anniversary of the Roma Action Plan and the OSCE's first
conference on racism, xenophobia and discrimination. 2014 will
mark not only the 10th anniversary of the OSCE Tolerance Unit
but also the adoption of the seminal Berlin declaration on
combating anti-Semitism. And I was very proud to be part of
that U.S. delegation to the Berlin meetings that resulted in
that declaration.
However, even as we commemorate and approach these
anniversaries, OSCE's efforts to address these issues face
political problems. For two years in a row, Russia has blocked
all human-dimension decisions by the OSCE Ministerial Council,
including a proposal at the Dublin Ministerial last December
which would have strengthened the OSCE tolerance efforts.
Agreement to hold a high-level tolerance conference taking
place today in Albania came only at the last minute and
significantly diminishing its impact.
I'd like to take this opportunity to applaud ODIHR's 2011
Roundtable, 2012's hate crimes training and other outreach
efforts to the seven (million) to 10 million people of African
descent in Europe, who have been especially targeted by hate
groups in addition to challenges experienced by North American
African-descent population. African-descent civil society is
still in great need of additional capacity-building, and I hope
ODIHR can build on these efforts.
I would also like to see ODIHR strengthen its work on
gender issues and assisting participating states with promoting
equality of opportunity between women and men. In this regard,
I would like to acknowledge the presence in our audience today
of the OSCE chair-in-office, Special Representative on Gender
Issues June Zeitlin, and thank her for her work in this regard.
Ambassador Lenarcic, I understand you are working with the
State Department to arrange a visit to the detention facility
at Guantanamo Bay in preparation for the possible monitoring of
any illegal proceedings related to it. I myself have visited
Guantanamo and I support you doing so as well as ODIHR's
involved in monitoring the situation there. I believe the
United States policy concerning the remaining detainees should
be transparent and in accordance with acceptable standards. I
look forward to your thoughts on how these and other human
rights efforts can be advanced by the OSCE.
I first got to know Ambassador Lenarcic when he chaired the
OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna during Slovenia's 2005
chairmanship in office. After his Vienna assignment, he was
appointed Slovenia's state secretary for European affairs in
2006. He also served as a diplomatic adviser in the Office of
the Prime Minister and in the permanent mission to the United
Nations in New York. Ambassador Lenarcic was appointed director
of the Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights in
July of 2008.
Welcome. We look forward to your testimony.
AMBASSADOR JANEZ LENARCIC, OFFICE OF DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS
AND HUMAN RIGHTS DIRECTOR, ORGANIZATION FOR SECURITY AND CO-
OPERATION IN EUROPE
Mr. Lenarcic. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Ladies and gentlemen, I would like first to express my
gratitude to you for this opportunity. I'm very pleased and
honored to be able, again, to testify before this commission.
I'm very much grateful for the consistent support that this
commission and the United States have extended to our office
and its activities.
I think that this meeting today is also an opportunity to
look at the five years that have passed since I appeared here
for the first time back in September 2008, as well as to look
ahead--but not too far ahead because, as you know, I'm entering
my last year in this office.
Before I continue, in the interest of saving time for
discussion, I would request, or suggest that my prepared
statement be put into the record.
Mr. Cardin. Without objection, your entire statement will
be put in the record.
Mr. Lenarcic. Thank you, sir. And I would limit then my
introduction to a few highlights.
First, if we look back to all these years, there were many
significant developments and challenges throughout the OSCE
area and around it. And these developments, unfortunately, have
led recently to what appears to be a mismatch between the
decreasing ability of decision-making bodies of the OSCE to
adopt timely and substantive and relevant decisions. And you
mentioned that, Mr. Chairman, in your introduction. And this
is, on the other hand--on the other hand, we have other parts
of the organization, the same organizations, that are
responsible for implementing those decisions and are able more
or less to do their work. I'm talking about secretariat
institutions, field offices and others.
One of the major factors that impacted the OSCE in these
years was undoubtedly the financial crisis that hit just after
I appeared before you five years ago. And this, obviously, has
resulted in restriction of resources, of available resources,
but not only that. Some of the participating states have had to
economize and they did so by prioritizing immediate
firefighting, I would call it, over long-term fire prevention
and protection. And that happened also within the OSCE human
dimension. The available resources have shrunk while the
challenges have increased.
Others, meanwhile, whether affected by that same economic
crisis or not, have continued to prioritize stability over
human rights standards and system continuity over systemic
reforms. I think we have seen a situation developed in OSCE,
where some of the willing have become less able, while some of
the increasingly able have become less willing. And the result
is that we have now individual appetites for questioning
existing commitments sometimes stronger than the common desire
to further strengthen them. And this is also visible in what
you noted in your introduction, Mr. Chairman: the absence of
meaningful human dimension decisions taken by the ministerial
council over the last couple of years.
But there is also the other part of the OSCE: overseeing of
the institution's field operations and secretariat, and
including, of course, of the parliamentary assembly, which are
trying to assist and support participating states. And a lot
has been over two and more decades in turning commitments into
practice and offering best practices that--for the
participating states and other regions and organizations to
learn from them.
This part of the OSCE is the one that helped develop
democratic institutions in the war-torn region of the Balkans.
This is the OSCE that has pioneered the development of
standards, methodologies and expertise in many fields. And this
is also the part of the OSCE whose accomplishments are little
known, simply because effective prevention of conflicts draws
less attention than the conflicts themselves.
In short, I do see, after all these years, OSCE as a--to
use the language of enterprise--a profitable and well-
functioning enterprise based on sound principles but with an
increasingly paralyzed boardroom. The main problem is not so
much that the discussions in that board room, which is the
permanent council, on meeting protocols and possibly new
products that these discussions require increasing amounts of
both energy and time. The main problem is that this paralysis
in our boardroom, combined with the ongoing budgetary squeeze,
result in slowing down our assembly line, the assembly line
which produced well-tested and quality OSCE products.
Let me now go through some of these products. And I will
try to focus only on a few of the highlights here. First, human
rights defenders. Our office continues to work closely with
civil society and nongovernmental organizations in order to
ensure that their voice is heard in the OSCE and that they can
play their fundamental role in human rights protection. We try
to ensure that they can operate in an enabling environment,
free from reprisals, harassment, and intimidation.
Unfortunately, in many countries, we have witnessed in the
past few years that there is deterioration of the situation of
human rights defenders. We have seen disturbing developments
where the environment for human rights defenders to operate
freely has become much more restricted. That's why the meeting
of the civil society organizations on the margins of the Dublin
Ministerial last December made a strong call by producing a
Declaration on Human Rights Defenders. We will heed that call.
And we launched a project aimed at producing recommendations to
participating states how to protect human rights defenders,
which is an old obligation of the OSCE-participating states
codified, if I may say so, already in Budapest in 1994. We will
mark the 20th anniversary of the Budapest document next year.
And, in our view, this is a good opportunity to recall this
obligation--common obligation of OSCE participating states to
protect human rights defenders.
In the area of rule of law, I would like to highlight our
trial monitoring activities. Trial monitoring can be an
important way to promote transparency in the administration of
justice and full adherence to fair trial standards. Since 2008,
we have conducted large trial monitoring projects in Armenia
after 2008 presidential elections, in Belarus in the aftermath
of the 2010 elections, and currently in Georgia, where we
monitor criminal proceedings against former senior officials of
the previous government; proceedings that were initiated after
the 2012 parliamentary elections there.
Of course, I wish to thank the United States for its
continuous financial and political support to these projects,
which would not be possible if we had to rely solely on our
regular budgets.
You mentioned, Mr. Chairman, the anti-trafficking, where
OSCE has pioneered standards and commitments. I could tell you
that over all these years, in close cooperation with the
special coordinator of OSCE on trafficking on human beings,
Mrs. Giammarinaro, we have been developing and promoting a
human rights-based approach in combating trafficking.
ODIHR was one of the first international bodies to raise
the issue of trafficking for not only sexual, but also labor
exploitation by advocating for a diversified approach to the
identification of victims and assistance to trafficked persons.
We also specialized in establishment of compensation funds and
we advocated the access of victims to compensation for the
losses that they have suffered.
Gender--and I share your pleasure with seeing Ms. Zeitlin
here--gender has remained one of our most important activities
over all these years. Our office has attempted to mainstream
the gender aspects into all--all--of its programmatic
activities.
Let me just illustrate this by our election related
activities, where all observation and assessment activities
take into account the gender aspect of elections. And we have
also been active in promoting women's political participation
throughout the OSCE and beyond, notably in the Mediterranean
partner countries. We have developed a plethora of tools in
support to OSCE-participating states and the field operations,
for instance, the base line study gender equality in elected
office six-step action plan. So it implies that if there is
political will, six steps would do and improve the
participation of women in political and public life.
Freedom of peaceful assembly and association is one of
those freedoms that have come under increasing strain in the
OSCE since 2008. In some participating states, the space for
free expression of these fundamental rights is shrinking as a
result of restrictive legislation and practices, including
increased scrutiny and monitoring of civil society activity
through, for instance, deployment of tax, labor and other
inspections.
Another troubling development is the tendency to brand
legitimate exercises of freedom of peaceful assembly and
association as the activity done by so-called extremists or
foreign agents. We are launching now a joint activity with the
Council of Europe's Venice Commission to develop guidelines on
freedom of association. These guidelines will be designed to
assist the participating states in implementing their important
commitments in this area and will complement the existing joint
guidelines on freedom of peaceful assembly that we produced
recently also together with the Venice Commission.
Mr. Chairman, you mentioned Roma and Sinti issues. Indeed,
the OSCE action plan on improvement of the situation of Roma
and Sinti, which was adopted in 2003, was a landmark document.
It was a pioneering document, but it remains not implemented.
This was the case in 2008 when I already reported to you about
our preparation of status report after five years since the
adoption of the Roma and Sinti action plan.
We are now preparing a second status report at the 10th
anniversary of the adoption of the action plan. I can already
tell you that preliminary reading of the background data that
we have collected for this second status report indicates that
Roma and Sinti overall remain discriminated against, remain
vulnerable, and that sizeable communities live--continue to
live in abject poverty and on the margins of societies. And
that all this is happening also in countries that otherwise
(are known ?) as well-developed ones.
On hate crimes, you are aware of our annual report, which
clearly shows that more needs to be done to develop the
capacity to effectively address such crimes. In many instances,
law enforcement agencies and officers lack the required
knowledge and skills to recognize hate crimes as such and also
to offer effective and adequate victim protection.
And for these reasons, victims are often reluctant to
report hate crimes and that results in underreporting of this
phenomena. We are developing a number of tools and activities
to assist participating states to improve their performance in
this area, notably by our program on training against hate
crimes for law enforcement. This is a success story I can say.
To date, this--through this program, we have trained more than
70,000 police officers in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland, and with
the support of the OSCE mission in Kosovo, also in Pristina. We
are planning to continue this work this year and next in
Albania, Italy, where I will sign the memorandum next year,
Montenegro and Ukraine.
Combating hate crimes is only one of our ongoing activities
in the field of promoting tolerance and nondiscrimination,
which are much wider. We have a variety of tools and activities
in this area, in the areas of combating anti-Semitism,
combating discrimination against Muslims as well as of
Christians and members of other religions. We work closely
together with the special representative--personal
representatives of the chairperson in office, including Andy
Baker, in this field. Next month, for instance, we will help
organize jointly a conference in Berlin on the security of
Jewish communities.
With regard to freedom of religion or belief, you probably
are aware of the fact that we have overhauled the institutional
structure at our disposal; there is a new panel of experts on
freedom of religion or belief that has been established
recently. It has 12 notable personalities serving in it and we
believe that it will allow us to improve our capacity to assist
participating states in meeting their obligations in the area
of freedom of religion or belief so that everyone will be able
to exercise this freedom in whatever way they wish to do it,
when and where they wish to do it.
It is now more than two years since the events unfolded
that became commonly referred to as the Arab Spring. I can
report to you that our office has been actively promoting
closer cooperation between the OSCE and its Mediterranean
partners of cooperation. We have come particularly far with our
cooperation and support to the efforts by Tunisia in many
fields, but we also are pursuing expansion of this cooperation
with others.
Mr. Chairman, of course, we have to--I have to also mention
one of the major activities of our office, which is election
observation. We have deployed many election observation
missions over these years. We have cooperated in most cases
well with the parliamentary assembly of the OSCE and other
parliamentary partners.
I would single out the observation missions in the Russian
Federation in December 2011 and March 2012. Why? Because you
will recall that five years earlier, it was not possible for
our office to monitor elections there due to the restrictions
imposed at that time. So there was a challenge how to overcome
that legacy. And I think that challenge was met. It was not
easy. It was not easy to overcome the mistrust and suspicion,
but I think we were able to do that and we were able to produce
together with--on both cases, with OSCE Parliamentary Assembly
and other parliamentary partners two reports--two assessments
of those elections. And I am confident about the value of those
reports. There are many other election observation activities
that are ongoing and I do hope that there will be a good
cooperation between our office and parliamentary assembly,
maybe a word about it a little later.
Before I go there, just one more thing. Election
observation is not an end in itself. We see it as only a stage
in the longer process, a process which should include the
follow-up to recommendations that are usually contained in our
final reports. I'm pleased to note that that is a growing
number of participating states that do engaged in earnest in
follow-up activities. And this group includes the United
States. As we speak, this week, the follow-up visit is underway
in order to present and discuss our final report from the last
November elections and to discuss its recommendations. I'm
particularly pleased the U.S. is engaging in this activity in
earnest because I think it's important for the OSCE that the
U.S. is able to show an example to others also in this area.
A word about the cooperation with the OSCE Parliamentary
Assembly. I would like to emphasize here before you that we are
fully committed to cooperation with our parliamentary assembly
on the basis of the '97 cooperation agreement as endorsed by
the ministerial council decision. That ministerial council
decision talks about election observation as a common endeavor
of our two institutions, ODIHR and OSCE Parliamentary Assembly,
and other parliamentary bodies as appropriate. And it calls for
partnership. And we are committed to this.
I think that the previous president of the parliamentary
assembly, Petros Efthymiou, put it very well when he said that
OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and ODIHR have complementary roles
to play. I fully agree with it and also have to know that
during his presidency of parliamentary assembly, our
cooperation was generally good.
I would like to move towards conclusions, sir, with
importance of the United States leadership in the promotion of
human rights, freedoms, rule of law and democracy, importance
which was clearly demonstrated over the past century and also
in the framework of the OSCE.
But as for any leadership, it is most effective when it is
done by example. In January 2012, on the 10th anniversary of
the transfer of the first detainees to the U.S. naval base in
Guantanamo Bay, we--it was with regret and dismay that we had
to issue a press release stressing that universal human rights
standards require that also detention of terrorist suspects
should be accompanied by concrete charges and that the persons
detained under these charges shall be immediately informed of
them and brought before a competent judicial authority. We also
called for a swift closure of Guantanamo of--we called for
prosecution of the remaining detainees in accordance with
international fair trial standards or for their release.
And, most recently, President Obama echoed what
international human rights and democracy activists have been
saying for years--that Guantanamo, I quote, ``hurts the United
States in terms of its international standing,'' end of quote,
and that the facility, quote, ``likely created more terrorists
around the world than it ever detained,'' end of quote.
The United States has traditionally aspired to play a role
as both a leader and example for others. If it wishes to do so,
it must move, I believe, without delay towards closing of the
Guantanamo detention center.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank you once
more for your kind invitation. I would like to thank you and
the commission and the United States for its staunch,
consistent support for our activities. I very much look forward
to our discussion and also to our continued cooperation for the
remainder of my term in this office. Thank you.
Mr. Cardin. Mr. Ambassador, thank you for that very
comprehensive overview of the work under your portfolio. It
certainly is a very ambitious agenda from the point of view of
the challenges that we have within the OSCE region.
I also appreciate you started with the--some of the
procedural challenges that we have. I think the OSCE has been
one of the most successful consensus organizations in modern
history, but a consensus organization requires the cooperation
of all the participating states with a common objective, and a
willingness to sit down and listen as well as to voice
concerns, and to recognize that there are principles that we
all need to improve upon. And by the work of the OSCE, each of
our states can become stronger in all three baskets. And I
think that's the hallmark here.
I also thank you for bringing up the election monitoring.
We think that's one of the basic responsibilities that we have.
And I think we all are somewhat feeling better today because of
renewed commitments between the parliamentary assembly and
ODIHR to work out its issues. And, as I understand it, the most
recent observation teams have worked and it looks like we're
back on track on the observation issues.
I am concerned about some suggestions being made by
participating states that they want more of the election
monitoring decision-making done by consensus rather than done
in a professional manner between ODIHR, and the chair in
office, and the parliamentary assembly.
Can you just share with us--you know, we want to make
progress on the process issues. We certainly don't want to
backtrack. Can you just fill us in as to whether we're going to
be able to move forward in a similar manner, as we have in the
past, in election monitoring?
Mr. Lenarcic. Now? Thank you, sir. I think your concern is
very well justified. I think that the attempts to place a
greater share of the ODIHR's or any other OSCE institution's
activities under the consensus-based decision-making of the
permanent council can only result in hampering the activities
of the institutions. I think that such attempts must be
resisted.
It was for a reason that OSCE decided to establish distinct
institutions and give them their mandates. It is necessary to
allow these institutions--and I think I'm talking about all
three of them, all three of these institutions established by
the ministerial council, to be able to deliver on their mandate
without undo--without undo hindrance.
There are attempts, as you said, that important parts of
ODIHR's activities, including in election observation, would be
placed under this decision-making authority of the permanent
council. For instance, that--let's say, preliminary statement
should first be discussed and agreed in the permanent council.
I think that such arrangement would inevitably result in the
absence of any meaningful assessments of election processes.
Clearly, if every state has a veto, they would prevent anything
that would reflect negatively. It would, in other words, spell
the end of professional, independent and impartial election
observation. It would mean the end of election observation as a
professional activity which is devoid of the politics between--
playing out between the participating states.
Mr. Cardin. I agree with you completely and that's a matter
that I can tell you this commission will be watching very
closely. I've had discussions with our mission in Vienna on
this issue. And we will continue to push very hard to continue
the professional manner in which the election activities have
been taking place within OSCE.
You mentioned the human rights defenders and protecting
human rights defenders, which is something that is a very high
priority to us. I'd like to put into that a recent concern
that's been brought to our attention about NGOs and NGOs'
participation in OSCE activities and proposals made by Belarus
and Russia that would cause the vetting process to deny active
participation by many of the NGO organizations.
Can you just bring us up to date on this issue as to
whether we are--how well NGOs are able to operate within the
OSCE framework and within OSCE countries? And what does the
trend line here look like?
Mr. Lenarcic. Thank you, sir. I think that the--one of the
unique features and advantages of the OSCE is precisely the
format of its human dimension events. I think the OSCE is the
only international organization which holds its human
dimension, human rights events in the format which is
completely open to nongovernmental organizations, to civil
society representatives; but not only open, it places them. It
gives them place at the table and they can take the floor and
confront participating states with their views and suggestion.
Clearly, this can often be uncomfortable for some
participating states. It's never comfortable when government
policies are criticized, especially in front of others, but
that's what actually OSCE is all about. OSCE is about peer
pressure. OSCE is about peer review. And the civil society
organizations and nongovernmental organizations have a crucial
role to play. And this role was most recently reaffirmed or
acknowledged again at the highest level at the Astana summit,
where the leaders of OSCE participating states acknowledge the
role of civil society organizations in helping them meet their
OSCE commitments.
So I think it is of utmost importance to preserve the
access of nongovernmental organizations to OSCE conferences, to
human dimension meetings. It is, therefore, of utmost
importance to not allow attempts to exclude this or that civil
society representative upon request of an individual state.
There are--there is one exception, according to OSCE rules. It
is defined in the Helsinki document from 1992, which stipulates
that all NGOs will be able to participate in OSCE human
dimension events, except for those organizations and
individuals that advocate violence or justify terrorism. So
this is the only exception. I think that this arrangement is
adequate.
There are ongoing complaints--ongoing complaints almost
every year about certain individual organizations appearing,
appearing before--appearing at the human dimension event. But
those complaints usually--I would say, are an issue between two
or more participating states, because state A claims this
person should not be seated at the OSCE conference table
because according to a court decision in our country, that
person was convicted of terrorist activities. But that same
person lives and works in another participating state which
obviously disagrees with that court judgment.
So this is an issue that in my view should be solved
between the countries concerned and not--not--at the conference
itself. Certainly, we at ODIHR do not see our role--our role as
policing the human dimension events. We see our role as opening
the door to all those who wish to attend and participate. And
we don't see our role as identifying those who are not supposed
to attend and throw them out.
Mr. Cardin. I would just underscore the point that you
made. I understand the exception that's there on participation,
but I would argue that's not for an individual state's
determination, even if the event is in that individual state.
It has got to be a broader acceptance that the organization is
disqualified rather than it being suspicious that an NGO is
being denied participation because the host country doesn't
particularly like what they stand for rather than being
disqualified for the reasons that you mentioned. So I think we
have to be pretty aggressive in protecting the participation,
which is what we believe in as an organization.
I want to move to the issue that you mentioned, which I
think is very, very important: trial monitoring. In more and
more countries, we're finding that countries that have
transitioned into free and fair elections and to democracy,
after an election is over are using every tool at their
disposal to crush their opposition, their new opposition,
including using the trial process in imprisoning the
opposition, denying them full rights to participate in the
government in order to try to maintain the power of their new--
their new election. The election may have been free and fair,
but as a result of the elections they're taking steps that are
really questionable as to the rights of opposition.
You've mentioned a couple of points in your opening
comments about monitoring trials that could very well be
political in nature. And you also mentioned the opportunity,
freedom of expression, and the ability to effectively oppose
the government in power. It seems to me that we have some
countries that have--that we thought were pretty far along the
way that require some attention today that may resist that. How
can we effectively put a spotlight on those concerns and try to
improve the conduct in these countries?
Mr. Lenarcic. Thank you. There are two firm commitments
made by OSCE-participating states to invite international
observers. One widely known is to invite international monitors
for elections. Another one, which is less known, is commitment
to invite international observers to monitor trials. It is as
unequivocal as the first one. And we tried to use that. We
tried to use it in--on occasions, when there are--when there
are concerns with regard to the motivation for the trials, with
regard to the fairness of the trials, or with regard to the--to
the circumstances that result in the--in the trials.
In all the three cases that I mentioned, Armenia, 2008;
Belarus, 2010; and, most recently, Georgia, we use these
arguments--this unequivocal commitment combined with the
concerns that were due to circumstances in order to advocate
this kind of exercise.
Mr. Cardin. Let me interrupt you just for one moment. I was
aware that we had the right to monitor trials. It seems to me
we're better off if we never have a trial in some of these
cases and that is there any way that we can work with countries
to say, don't just try to find a criminal statute or invent a
criminal statute so the person you beat ends up in jail, but to
really look at the type of country you want to live in and
understand that elections have consequences. You won, but
you're--you won because of a free and fair election. It's your
responsibility to maintain that. Understand that once the
indictments are there, you have the opportunity to monitor how
the trial itself takes place. It seems to me we want to prevent
the intimidation factor to start off with.
Mr. Lenarcic. That's a strong point that you made, sir, but
I don't think that we are in a position to prevent trials if
prosecutors, you know, go ahead and trials start, but we can
monitor them. And we can--and the purpose of monitoring is to
ascertain to what extent the defendant was afforded fair trial
guarantees. And those fair trial guarantees are quite
unequivocal and are contained in a number of OSCE commitments.
So there is a solid basis for our work in monitoring the
trials.
And there is also key added value in such monitoring. Every
monitoring exercise results in a comprehensive report, which,
if it identifies significant shortcomings, it also contains
specific, concrete recommendations for the country to undertake
in order--what measures to take in order to improve its
judiciary, the functioning of a judiciary, its independence, as
well as to strengthen the fair trial guarantees.
I can tell you that the Armenian authorities worked with us
seriously and engaged with us intensively on the basis of our
report from the trial monitoring in that country. We're still
waiting for Belarus to work with us on recommendations from our
trial monitoring report in their case. I am optimistic with
regard to the readiness of Georgia and its authorities to work
with us on recommendations that will be part of our final
report when we issue it.
Mr. Cardin. Let me move on I guess beyond than just
monitoring. We had the chair in office here not too long ago
when we brought up the Ukraine situation, where the former
leader was--is now in prison, and how the European institution
has found that that was a political action. Do you coordinate
some of the work that you do with the appropriate institutions
within Europe that are monitoring some of these activities?
Mr. Lenarcic. In the case that you mentioned, the case of
former Ukraine prime minister is the European Court of Human
Rights that has been seized with the matter and we--of course,
that court is completely independent and autonomous. We do, on
the other hand, cooperate closely with another institution of
the Council of Europe, the so-called Venice Commission, on a
number of issues related to human rights, rule of law,
independence of judiciary. We produce joint legal opinions
about relevant pieces of legislation so there is good
cooperation with the Council of Europe.
Mr. Cardin. Let me--I don't want your comments on
Guantanamo Bay to go without a response. And my response is
pretty brief. I agree with you, everything you said, without
equivocation.
I would add one additional point, and that is--in every one
of our country--every one of our states, we're struggling with
budget problems. And the cost of Guantanamo Bay is
astronomical. When you look at the comparable cost of bringing
the detainees to trial and housing them in a more mainstream
penal facility, the cost would be a fraction of what it's
costing the U.S. taxpayers today in Guantanamo Bay.
Now, that's not the reason to close Guantanamo Bay. That's
not the reason to do everything you just said, but it's another
factor that I think needs to be understood. So I hope that you
will be aggressive in this and I can assure that there are
members of Congress that will be working on this issue with you
and members of our commission.
I want to get your thoughts on how we go to the next level.
It's been a decade since the tolerance agenda really was in
full stride. You mentioned the document for the Roma
population, and what was done, and tremendous commitments made.
And I agree with you, not enough progress has been made. I
think we've made significant progress on tolerance and very
proud of what we've been able to accomplish in sharing of best
practices.
On gender issues, there are still significant problems in
our region. We've got to get beyond just the ability to run for
office, but also deal with the family issues and have to deal
with the economic issues on gender.
What strategies would you recommend that we employ, those
of us who are interested in keeping the tolerance agendas and
the equity agendas aggressive, to take it to the next level,
recognizing it's now been a decade that we've followed this
strategy?
Mr. Lenarcic. From what we have experienced, the areas
where things could definitely be lifted to a higher level are
at least two.
One is our training programs, like the one that I
mentioned, training against hate crimes for law enforcement.
This is important because if hate crimes are not recognized as
such, then nobody sees it as a problem from the perspective of
tolerance and nondiscrimination. And hate crimes can be
described as the extreme form--extreme manifestation of
intolerance and discrimination. In that area, what really would
be needed would be better collection of data by all
participating states. This is a perpetual problem that we are
encountering when we collect information that serves as a basis
for our annual report.
We see that some states don't even collect data. Some
collect only part of the data necessary. This data collection
and statistics, these are important things because you don't
have that, you don't have the understanding of the dimension of
the problem. So this is one thing where we are trying to foster
greater efforts by the participating states to systematically
collect data, to analyze data, to convey that data to us so
that we can--we can get the picture of what the dimensions of
the problems really are.
If somebody asked me today is the--are the incidents of
hate crimes on the rise or not, I couldn't give you an answer.
If you look at our annual report, you will see some
participating states with a high number of hate crime
incidents. But that is--does it mean that those crimes are more
common in that country? Not necessarily. More likely it is due
to the fact that that country is collecting its data more
successfully and systematically.
So there are--these efforts should be upgraded, but on a
strategic level I think that tolerance and nondiscrimination
issues, including issues connected to with Roma, would need to
be--would need to continue to be kept on the agenda. Sometimes,
one has the--one has the impression that there is no more
attention paid to these issues. And this comes at a
particularly unfortunate time. It is obvious that the current
difficulties that many countries are dealing with due to
economic and financial situation the result--do result in
scapegoating members of minority, migrants, Roma and others. So
we do see the increase in that context of the manifestations of
discrimination and intolerance. So we should keep this item
very high. And also this conference that is taking place in
Tirana this week is I think a welcome step in this direction.
Mr. Cardin. I agree. I think information is critically
important. Statistics are important. I think you will find that
there are states that are doing this the right way. The United
States, I think our statistical information on hate crimes is
pretty sophisticated. And it can be very informative as to
where we need to put our priorities.
I think there are other participating states that have
equally strong statistical information. Some states don't. And
that's where best practices can help and that's where I think
the special representatives can help in trying to promote the
practices in states, at a minimum, to get the information so we
can evaluate.
I can assure you the commission wants to work with you in
how we can strategize to continue to keep a focus on these
areas. The plight of the Roma is a high priority of our
commission and it will remain a high priority. Dealing with the
problems of anti-Semitism, anti-Muslim activities and anti-
Christian activities are going to be front and center for this
commission. And gender equality issues are going to be matters
that we're going to spend a lot of time to make sure that we'll
move forward on. So these are issues that we have promoted in
the past, special conferences. We have promoted agendas at the
ministerial meetings and strategies.
What I would urge is that we come together and try to
figure out the right strategy to advance these issues moving
forward, recognizing the procedural hurdles that have been more
difficult in recent years and also recognizing the competing
areas. You laid out a very comprehensive report and where there
are so many different areas. And the resources--and I don't
mean just financial resources, just the resources have to be
used in a most judicious way in order to set priorities so we
can make progress in each of these areas.
I can assure you that this commission will strongly support
your work. And we look forward to your recommendations and
advice as to how not only our commission, but also the United
States Congress and the administration can weigh in to help
advance the objectives of the human dimension within OSCE. We
value very much your recommendations and we want to make sure
that you have the tools in order to carry out your
responsibilities. And we will continue to fight from a
procedural point of view to make sure that OSCE can continue to
be a functioning institution to advance the human dimension.
Thank you for your public service. Thank you for coming to
the United States. We very much appreciate that.
Mr. Lenarcic. Thank you.
Mr. Cardin. The commission will stand adjourned.
A P P E N D I X
=======================================================================
Prepared Statements
----------
Prepared Statement of Hon. Benjamin Cardin, Chairman, Commission on
Security and Cooperation in Europe
I would like to welcome Ambassador Lenarcic back here to the
Commission today and thank him for this opportunity to discuss the
ongoing work of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human
Rights.
Since the Helsinki Final Act in 1975, human rights have formed an
inseparable and core part of the OSCE's comprehensive concept of
security. Agreement was reached back in 1990 to create specialized
institutions to assist the participating States in implementing their
human dimension commitments, and based on a U.S. proposal, the then
Office of Free Elections was established in Warsaw. It later was
expanded to encompass human rights under the title it is known by
today, the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).
In enhancing the role of the ODIHR, the 1992 Helsinki Summit declared
that ``the participating States express their strong determination to
ensure full respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, to abide
by the rule of law, to promote the principles of democracy and, in this
regard, to build, strengthen and protect democratic institutions, as
well as to promote tolerance throughout society.''
I think the international community is well aware that the U.S.
Helsinki Commission has made human rights, the human dimension, and the
work of ODIHR our top priority. We are proud of the role that we have
had in advancing many of the most important human rights issues: from
trafficking, where we share best practices to stop this modern form of
slavery; to the tolerance agenda, where we are very proud of the role
that we have had in improving the capacity of the OSCE through the work
of the OSCE Special Representatives and sharing best practices; to
transparency initiatives that have put a spotlight on anti-corruption
strategies to advance good governance. We have made progress, but
nonetheless, we still face significant issues.
While some OSCE countries have successfully transitioned to
democracy, others appear to be moving backwards. Several participating
States have yet to hold free and fair elections. Freedom of the media
is threatened in many OSCE States, where journalists are harassed,
attacked, or even killed for their work, and the Internet and other
digital media are restricted. Non-governmental organizations and human
rights defenders face reprisals for their work. Extremism laws are used
to go after opposition activists or non-traditional religious groups.
Anti-Semitism, racism, and discrimination continue to result in hate
crimes. Roma, Europe's largest ethnic minority, continue to face
pernicious discrimination in education, employment, and housing. I
support ODIHR's work to address these issues.
The OSCE itself also faces challenges. This year marks the tenth
anniversary of the Roma Action Plan and the OSCE's first Conference on
Racism, Xenophobia, and Discrimination. 2014 will mark not only the
tenth anniversary of the OSCE's Tolerance Unit, but also the adoption
of the seminal Berlin Declaration on combating anti-Semitism--where I
myself was proud to be part of the U.S. Delegation. However, even as we
commemorate and approach these anniversaries, OSCE efforts to address
these issues face political problems. For two years in a row, Russia
has blocked all human dimension decisions by the OSCE Ministerial
Council, including a proposal at the Dublin Ministerial last December
which would have strengthened OSCE Tolerance efforts. Agreement to hold
the High Level Tolerance Conference taking place today in Tirana,
Albania came only at the last minute and significantly diminishing its
impact.
I would like to take this opportunity to applaud ODIHR's 2011
roundtable, 2012 hate crimes training, and other outreach efforts to
the 7-10 million people of African descent in Europe who have been
especially targeted by hate groups, in addition to challenges
experienced by the North American African descent population. African
descent civil society is still in great need of additional capacity
building and I hope that ODIHR can build on these efforts.
I also would like to see ODIHR strengthen its work on gender issues
and assisting participating States with promoting equality of
opportunity between women and men. In this regard, I would like to
acknowledge the presence in our audience today of the OSCE Chairman-in-
Office Personal Representative on Gender Issues, June Zeitlin, and
thank her for her work in this regard.
Ambassador Lenarcic, I understand you are working with the
Department of State to arrange a visit to the detention facility at
Guantanamo Bay, in preparation for possible monitoring of any legal
proceedings related to it. I myself have visited Guantanamo, and I
support your doing so as well as ODIHR involvement in monitoring the
situation there. I believe the United States policy concerning the
remaining detainees should be transparent and in accordance with
acceptable standards.
I look forward to your thoughts on how these and other human rights
efforts can be advanced in the OSCE.
Prepared Statement of Ambassador Janez Lenarcic, Office of Democratic
Institutions and Human Rights Director, Organization for Security and
Co-Operation in Europe
__________
Distinguished Commissioners, Ladies and Gentlemen,
Allow me first of all to express my great appreciation for the
honour of the invitation to address you again. I remain grateful for
the support of this distinguished Commission and of the United States
to the activities and the mission of my Office. This is, furthermore, a
welcome opportunity to reflect back on the years that have passed since
I last testified in 2008, at the very beginning of my tenure as ODIHR
Director, and the challenges and opportunities ahead as I am entering
the last year of my term.
Over these years, we have witnessed significant developments and
challenges throughout the OSCE area and in our closest neighbourhoods.
Unfortunately, these developments and challenges may have led to an
increased mismatch between the decision-making part of the OSCE, and
those bodies in the rest of the organization responsible for
implementing those decisions.
When I last appeared before you, many of our participating States
were just about to be among the hardest hit by the worst global
economic crisis in living memory, and some may still have the worst of
it ahead. Five years of austerity have squeezed available resources,
and some participating States have had to economize by prioritizing
immediate fire-fighting over long-term fire prevention and protection,
so to speak, including within the OSCE's human dimension. Others,
meanwhile, whether affected by the economic crisis or not, have
continued to prioritize stability over human rights standards, and
system continuity over systematic democratic reform.
For the OSCE one might argue that the past few years have seen a
development of a situation where some of the willing have become
increasingly less able, while some of the increasingly able have become
less willing. The result has been that individual appetites for
questioning existing commitments sometimes seem stronger than the
common desire to further strengthen them. The result has also been that
the increased mistrust and suspicion in internal OSCE relations that I
spoke of during my previous visit, seems further entrenched on some
fronts.
But there is also the other part of the OSCE, and this is the OSCE
of the institutions, field operations and secretariat, which are
mandated and tasked to assist and support the participating States.
This is the OSCE that, over the past two decades, has been instrumental
in turning commitments into practice, and offer best practices for
other regions and organizations to learn from. This is the OSCE that
helped develop democratic institutions in the war-torn region of the
Balkans, including in the country soon to become the EU's next member-
state. This is the OSCE that has pioneered the development of
standards, methodologies and expertise in many fields, and has done so
for a ``bang for the buck'' that few if any can match. This is also the
OSCE whose many accomplishments are little known simply because
effective prevention of conflicts draw less attention. Last but not
least, and for the reasons just mentioned, this is the OSCE for which
the demand for its services is growing, rather than diminishing.
I therefore see the OSCE largely as a profitable and well-
functioning enterprise based on sound principles, but with an
increasingly paralysed boardroom. The main problem is not so much that
discussions in the boardroom on meeting protocols and possibly new
products require increasing amounts of both energy and time. The main
problem, and risk, is that, as collateral damage from this process,
combined with the ongoing budgetary squeeze, our assembly-line is
slowed down or even put on halt, limiting the output and value of well-
tested and quality OSCE products requested.
I would now like to turn to some of these products, consistently
delivered under the OSCE/ODIHR brand.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Our Office continues to work closely with human rights defenders.
We provide training opportunities for civil society and include NGOs in
our activities. This is to ensure that their voice is heard and that
they can play, as effectively as possible, their fundamental role in
human rights protection. Most importantly, we remain strongly committed
in our efforts to ensure that they can operate in an enabling
environment, free from reprisals, harassment, and intimidation.
Unfortunately, what we have witnessed in the past few years is that
much work remains to be done. We have also seen disturbing developments
that would indicate that the environment for some human rights
defenders to operate freely has become more, not less, restricted. The
meeting of civil society organizations on the margins of the Dublin
Ministerial made a strong call by adopting a Declaration on Human
Rights Defenders. Our Office is now redoubling its efforts by
initiating the development of OSCE/ODIHR Recommendations on the
Protection of Human Rights Defenders. Our aim is to publish this
document in spring 2014 following a fully inclusive process with human
rights defenders across the OSCE region. Our hope is that the
Recommendations will assist OSCE's 57 participating States to fulfil
their commitment to protect human rights defenders and that they will
provide a solid basis, for human rights defenders themselves, to
campaign for their own rights and those of the citizens and communities
they so bravely defend.
In our efforts to promote human rights and the rule of law in the
OSCE region as outlined in the Copenhagen document, our Office has
developed a methodology for trial monitoring, which is used in our own
trial monitoring operations and in our training and capacity-building
of civil society. Trial monitoring can be an important way to promote
transparency in the administration of justice, and full adherence to
fair trial standards. Since 2008, ODIHR has monitored trials in Armenia
following the 2008 presidential elections, in Belarus in the aftermath
of the 2010 elections and currently in Georgia, where we monitor
criminal proceedings against former senior officials of the previous
government, initiated following the 2012 parliamentary elections. The
ODIHR recommendations from trial monitoring have been widely recognized
as providing a key added value in support to OSCE participating States
in their efforts to implement OSCE rule of law commitments. ODIHR
wishes to thank the United States for its continuous financial and
political support to ODIHR in relation to the trial monitoring
portfolio, given the complexity and mid- to long-term duration of these
activities. In this regard, I would also like to welcome the openness
of the United States authorities to host an ODIHR mission to assess the
possibility of observing proceedings before the Military Commissions at
the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.
Together with the OSCE Special Co-ordinator on Trafficking in Human
Beings, ODIHR has already for many years been at the forefront of the
international fight against trafficking in human beings by pioneering,
developing and promoting a human rights-based approach in the
development of anti-trafficking policies and legislation of OSCE
participating states, including National Referral Mechanisms, access to
justice and compensation for victims. ODIHR was also one of the first
international organizations to raise the issue of trafficking for
labour exploitation and trafficking in men, by advocating for a
diversified approach to the identification of and assistance to
trafficked persons depending on their sex and age, as well as on the
type of trafficking. With this aim in mind ODIHR is trying to build the
capacity of lawyers, specialized in trafficking cases, advocates the
establishment of compensation funds for victims of trafficking, and
encourages the OSCE participating States to explore the possibility of
filling such funds with confiscated criminal assets from human
trafficking cases.
In accordance with the 2004 OSCE Gender Action Plan, ODIHR has a
strong mandate in relation to the promotion of women's political
participation in the OSCE region and the strengthening of national
mechanisms for the promotion and protection of gender equality. ODIHR
takes a holistic approach to gender, striving to mainstream gender into
all its programmatic activities and applies a strategic approach to
women's political empowerment in the form of local capacity building,
networking and knowledge sharing among gender advocates and political
actors. The aim of increasing awareness among OSCE participating States
of the importance of gender equality forms the core of our two main
programmes on ``Human Rights, Women and Security'' and ``Increased
Participation of Women in Politics''. Furthermore, ODIHR's Election
Observation Mission Reports are gender mainstreamed, and Gender
Analysts form an integral part of EoMs in the OSCE region. Given
ODIHR's increased engagement with the OSCE's Mediterranean Partners for
Co-operation, ODIHR has also worked on transferring good practices and
the experience of the OSCE participating States in promoting women's
political participation to the Mediterranean partner countries, in
particular to Tunisian counterparts upon request. ODIHR has also
developed a plethora of tools in support to OSCE participating States
and its Field Operations in the implementation of gender commitments,
such as the Baseline Study ``Gender Equality in Elected Office: A Six-
Step Action Plan'', the ``Handbook for National Human Rights
Institutions on Women's Rights and Gender Equality'' as well as the
upcoming ``Comparative Study on Women structures for MPs in the OSCE
Region'' and the ``Handbook for Women in Political Parties'' to be
published in 2013.
Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Association has come under
increasing strain in the OSCE region since 2008. In some OSCE
participating States, the space for free expression of these
fundamental rights is shrinking as a result of restrictive legislation
and practices, including increased scrutiny and monitoring of civil
society activity. Another troubling development is the tendency to
``brand'' legitimate exercises of freedom of peaceful assembly and
association as the work of ``extremists'' or ``foreign agents''. ODIHR
is now launching a joint activity with the Venice Commission of the
Council of Europe to develop guidelines on freedom of association,
which will be designed to assist States in implementing their important
commitments in this area and to complement our existing Guidelines on
Freedom of Peaceful Assembly.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
For nearly two decades now, ODIHR has vigorously raised attention
to the plight and challenges of our Roma and Sinti communities, and
provided concrete assistance to the OSCE participating States in
meeting their Roma and Sinti commitments. In 2008, I reported on the
first ODIHR Status Report assessing the participating States' efforts
after five years' implementation of the landmark 2003 OSCE Action Plan
on Improving the Situation of Roma and Sinti within the OSCE Area. This
year, we are marking the tenth anniversary by preparing the second
Status Report for release this fall. The past five years have seen a
continued increase in terms of initiatives and programmes, with
considerable funds devoted to the improvement of the socio-economic
situation of Roma communities. However, and notwithstanding all the
resources invested, a preliminary reading of the background data for
the second Status Report indicates that Roma and Sinti overall remain
vulnerable, with sizeable communities living in abject poverty and on
the margins of society (including in many otherwise well-developed
countries).
Despite progress made by some participating States to combat hate
crimes, much more needs to be done to develop the capacity to
effectively address such crimes. In many instances, law enforcement
agencies and officers lack the required knowledge and skills to
recognize hate crime to be able to offer effective and adequate victim
protection. For this reason, victims are often reluctant to report hate
crimes to law enforcement agencies with the result that the magnitude
of this problem is underreported and the victims are left without
justice. To support the efforts of the participating States to address
this issue, ODIHR has particularly focused on training of police. Our
Training against Hate Crimes for Law Enforcement (TAHCLE) has to date
included training of more than 70,000 police officers in Bulgaria,
Croatia, Poland, and, with the support of the OSCE Mission in Kosovo,
training of police officers in Pristina. In 2013, ODIHR is planning to
work in Albania, Italy, Montenegro and Ukraine on this issue.
Combating hate crimes is only one of our ongoing activities in the
field of promoting tolerance and non-discrimination. We continue to
develop a variety of tools and activities to assist the participating
States in combating anti-Semitism, discrimination against Muslims, as
well as of Christians and members of other religions. Next month, for
instance, we will help organize a conference in Berlin on the security
of Jewish communities.
In some parts of the OSCE region, there are significant obstacles
to exercising freedom of religion or belief. In some states, for
example, communities cannot register and obtain permission to operate
due to bureaucratic and restrictive procedures. In 2012, our Office has
launched training seminars for government officials and civil society
to raise awareness about international standards. We are also
developing guidelines on the recognition of religious or belief
communities in collaboration with the Council of Europe's Venice
Commission to present examples of good practices in this field. We hope
that the recently completed overhaul of the OSCE/ODIHR Advisory Panel
of Experts on Freedom of Religion or Belief will strengthen our ability
to assist participating States in meeting their obligation to ensure
that everyone is able to exercise their fundamental freedom to believe
what they wish, when they wish and where they wish.
Since my last appearance in 2008, ODIHR has also witnessed the
impact of the ``Arab Spring'' on the OSCE region, and the call for
increased engagement by OSCE participating States with its
Mediterranean Partners, as outlined in the 2011 Ministerial Council
Decision No. 5/11. In response, ODIHR is facilitating the exchange of
good practices and experiences between OSCE participating States and
the Mediterranean Partners and is providing expert assistance in the
fields of election observation, political party regulation,
legislation, human rights monitoring and women's political
participation. ODIHR projects promote democratization and increased
understanding of the human dimension upon request from Mediterranean
Partner countries. ODIHR's recognized expertise and its co-operation
with the Council of Europe's Venice Commission in reviewing legislation
has been seen by OSCE Mediterranean Partners as a valuable contribution
to their reform efforts. Some of our key tools, such as the Guidelines
on Political Party Regulation, the Guidelines on Freedom of Peaceful
Assembly, the Guidelines on Assembly Monitoring and our hallmark
Election Observation Handbooks are increasingly being made available
also in Arabic.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Needless to say, this presentation would not be complete without
sharing some recent highlights from what has been a signature activity
for more than two decades since the Office was first established as the
Office for Free Elections. Over these years, ODIHR has developed a
comprehensive methodology for professional, independent and impartial
election observation, one that many other major actors, including the
EU, have based their own methodology on.
Among the many election observation missions we deployed over
recent years, the last parliamentary and presidential elections in the
Russian Federation stand out. Their observation was a major undertaking
under complex and challenging circumstances. As you will recall, ODIHR
was not able to observe those elections in 2007 and 2008, and we had to
overcome that legacy. The challenges involved, however, were met, and I
am proud of the two final reports that these two missions produced, and
confident in the value of the recommendations they contain.
This year, the ODIHR has already deployed election observation
activities to ten participating States (Armenia, Bulgaria, the Czech
Republic, Iceland, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Malta,
Monaco, and Montenegro, as well as on-going Election Observation
Missions in Albania and in our newest participating State, Mongolia).
We are also looking forward to upcoming elections later this year in
Austria, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Germany, Norway, Tajikistan, and
Turkmenistan. We continue our efforts to follow electoral developments
across the OSCE region and I am pleased to note that the ODIHR has now
observed elections in 56 of the 57 OSCE participating States.
It has been said many times that election observation is not an end
in itself, but is intended to assist participating States in
implementing their election-related OSCE commitments. In the 1999
Charter for European Security, participating States committed
themselves ``to follow-up promptly ODIHR's election assessments and
recommendations''. To promote more effective follow-up, ODIHR now
regularly presents its final reports with findings and recommendations
``in country'' following each electoral process. Such follow-up visits
serve to discuss ODIHR's election recommendations as well as possible
areas of future co-operation and assistance. Most recently, visits have
taken place to present final reports in Belarus, Georgia, Montenegro,
Spain and Ukraine. This week, we are presenting the final report on the
United States elections to a wide range of interlocutors here in DC.
Let me at this point thank you, the Helsinki Commission for the support
we have received over the years--not only for the activities we
undertake in Europe and Asia, but also here in the United States. By
inviting ODIHR to present its findings and recommendations in this
country, the United States is again demonstrating that it stands behind
the commitments it has made and is ready to show an example. We look
forward to good co-operation and positive discussions in the week
ahead.
Let me also reaffirm that ODIHR relies on the continued co-
operation of all participating States in seconding qualified short-term
and long-term observers to our missions. As many of you will know,
ODIHR was forced to cancel the Limited Election Observation Mission
(LEOM) to Italy earlier this year due to a lack of secondment of long-
term observers (LTOs) from participating States. The involvement of
LTOs permits observation of the administrative preparations for
elections, the campaign, adjudication of complaints, and the media and
gives all participating States the opportunity to take part in election
observation missions, as is part of their common commitment to each
other. ODIHR therefore appeals to participating States to review their
rules, policies, and practices regarding the secondment of long-term
and short-term observers so as to enable election observation
throughout the OSCE area, in line with the 2010 Astana Commemorative
Declaration that reiterated that ``all OSCE principles and commitments,
without exception, apply equally to each participating State.''
I would also like to take this opportunity to recognize the
valuable contribution of parliamentarians to election observation, and
in particular our co-operation with the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly. As
I have emphasized before, we are committed to partnership, based on the
1997 co-operation agreement. As the participating States stressed when
they endorsed the 1997 agreement, in Ministerial Council Decision 19/
06, election observation is a common endeavour involving ODIHR, the
OSCE PA and other parliamentary bodies. I can assure you all that ODIHR
remains committed to work in this spirit of co-operation and
partnership. I also fully agree with the view, often voiced by the
previous President of the OSCE PA, Petros Efthymiou, that the PA and
ODIHR have complementary roles to play. And I note that under his
presidency of the PA our co-operation was generally good and smooth.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I started this presentation by reflecting on some of the main
developments and challenges we have witnessed since my last hearing
here, and on the work of my Office and the OSCE as a whole in
addressing those and future ones. When I took up my tenure, my point of
departure was that the Helsinki Final Act, in its spirit and its
letter, and the commitments undertaken in Copenhagen, Paris, Moscow and
elsewhere, established that the protection of human rights is the first
responsibility of government, and that the only system of government is
one that is transparent, democratic and accountable. I also stressed
that every democracy is ``condemned'' to forever being ``work in
progress''; I highlighted the uniqueness of the OSCE as a platform for
peer-review; and the ability and value of its institutions and missions
to be of assistance and support when asked by some or tasked by all.
Some of those most directly involved with and frustrated over the
recent inability of the decision-making machinery in Vienna to produce
timely budgets, agendas for events or human dimension decisions, may
question whether the OSCE has lost its relevance. As the Director of
the OSCE's principal institution in the human dimension, I certainly
understand, share and feel this frustration.
After five years as ODIHR Director, I nevertheless remain fully
convinced that neither is the OSCE broken, nor has it lost its
relevance. On the contrary, its principles, values and achievements
remain as relevant as ever. And so does its potential. I am equally
convinced that by employing the same determined leadership and formula
that produced the Helsinki Final Act in the midst of the Cold War, the
current mistrust and suspicions can also be overcome, for the same
mutual benefit of all participating States, based on high standards,
and not double-standards.
Nobody could deny the importance of United States leadership in the
promotion of human rights, freedoms, the rule of law and democracy over
the past century, not least within the framework of the OSCE. But as
for all leadership, it is the most effective when done by example.
In January 2012, on the tenth anniversary of the transfer of the
first detainees to the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, it was with
both regret and dismay I had to stress that universal human rights
standards require that the detention of terrorist suspects shall be
accompanied by concrete charges and the persons detained under these
charges shall be immediately informed of them and brought before a
competent judicial authority. I also called for a swift closure of
Guantanamo, prompt prosecution of the remaining detainees in accordance
with international fair trial standards, or their release.
Recently, President Obama echoed what international human rights
and democracy movements and organizations have been saying for years,
that Guantanamo ``hurts the United States in terms of its international
standing'' and that the facility ``likely created more terrorists
around the world than it ever detained''. The United States has
traditionally aspired to play a role as both a leader and example for
others; if it wishes to do so, it must move, without further delay,
towards closing of the Guantanamo detention centre.
In conclusion, I would like to thank you once more for your kind
invitation to address you here today; I look forward to our discussion
and our continued co-operation for the remainder of my term in Office.
Thank you for your kind attention.
?
This is an official publication of the
Commission on Security and
Cooperation in Europe.
<{<{<
This publication is intended to document
developments and trends in participating
States of the Organization for Security
and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
<{<{<
All Commission publications may be freely
reproduced, in any form, with appropriate
credit. The Commission encourages
the widest possible dissemination
of its publications.
<{<{<
http://www.csce.gov @HelsinkiComm
The Commission's Web site provides
access to the latest press releases
and reports, as well as hearings and
briefings. Using the Commission's electronic
subscription service, readers are able
to receive press releases, articles,
and other materials by topic or countries
of particular interest.
Please subscribe today.