Two hundred civil societies have demanded that ASEAN establish a regional human rights body at par with international human rights standards. In an open letter addressed to ASEAN’s High Level Panel and Secretary General today, civil societies urged that the Terms of Reference (TOR) of the ASEAN human rights body to include two vital elements for an effective human rights body - the mandates to carry out human rights protection and the provision for independent human rights experts to be appointed to run the body.

Extracts from Open Letter

“We are really concerned about the manner in which the negotiation is taking place right now, ASEAN may end up establishing a regional human rights body that lacks independence and is powerless in carrying out human rights protection.

This will fall far too short of international standards”, said Yap Swee Seng, Executive Director of Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA), a network of 42 human rights organizations across Asia.

“Without the protection mandate and the independent experts, the ASEAN human rights body will be a toothless tiger. ASEAN peoples deserve a better regional human rights mechanism,” added Yap.

The open letter explicitly calls on the High Level Panel to include three protection mandates, namely for the human rights body to be able to carry out country visit, to receive complaints of human rights violations and initiate investigation and finally, to be able to conduct periodic review of the human rights situations of ASEAN member states".

For more information, please contact directly: Mr. Yap Swee Seng, Executive Director, Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA) at yap@forum-asia.org, or +66 81 868 9178

Mr. Rafendi Djamin, Coordinator, Indonesia’s NGO Coalition for International Human Rights Advocacy (HRWG), at Rafendi@hrwg.org, or at +62 813 11442159

Ms. Yuyun Wahyuningrum, East Asia Program Manager, FORUM-ASIA, at yuyun@forumasia. org, or +66 87 991 4451

The full texts of the Press Release and the Open Letter are attached.