Haruna
I know you are tenacious, but your Malian bandits, i.e., the government, are without legs to stand on with regard the Tuaregs. The critical dispute is really about whether Mali is willing to respect the human rights of its Tuareq minority.
On the Aboriginal issue, Australia's atrociousness is not in question, and the current Prime Minister actually apologised to the country's indigenous people. I refer you to the work of John Pilger, campaigning journalist, human rights advocate, and himself a white Australian.
Your excerpt one is actually United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2625, and its formal title is "Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States". This Resolution departed from the prior concentration of self-determination on anti-colonialism, and it was vehemently resisted by newly independent countries. A proviso is built into the Resolution, and that exception was the reason why it was resisted by newly independent states.
Contrary to your intent in drawing our attention to Resolution 2625, it clearly leaves open the possibility of dismembering a state for reasons of self-determination UNLESS the state conducts itself "in accordance with the principle of self-determination of peoples and thus possessed of a government representing the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction as to race, creed or colour." The key principle is that the government concerned must represent "the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction as to race, creed or color". In other words, the government must accord all its people equal rights and protection under the law. Are your Bamako friends trained on this vis-a-vis Mali's Tuareg people.
Excerpt two deals with a different question under the general rubric of self-determination. In the case of Western Sahara, the Sahrawii people were in the complicated position of having three nations, Spain, Mauritania, and Morocco, fighting for sovereignty over their territory. Resolution 2625 dealt with this issue by allowing the inhabitants of Western Sahara the choice of deciding how they would ultimately want to emerge as a free people. Hence the choice of establishing "a sovereign and independent State, the free association or integration with an independent State or the emergence into any other political status freely determined by [the] people ...".
You appear to have a soft spot for human rights abusers of the Malian variety, but I submit to you that all Bamako needs to do is treat its Tuareg people with dignity and equality law. This is what self-determination is all about. I urge you to discard the Australian propaganda.
LJDarbo
From: Haruna Darbo <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Self-determination: The Australian Perspective. Courtesy: Australian Indigenous Law Reporter.
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Wednesday, 28 January, 2009, 7:27 PM
And Mali is no where near epileptic seizure about About Australia's genuine concerns. I said I feel sorry for the UN. Haruna. After we digest this Kukeh, I will share Australia's position proper as it relates to the Aboriginal issue. The Aborigines are no Tuaregs as am sure you will agree, and Australia's position itself doesn't say much about the Aborigine's claim to the doctrine of self-determination based simply on the UN's Human and Peoples' rights declaration. However, presenting conflicting positions better prepares us to present a more cogent resolution of wanton claims to self-determination (pantomimickry). This makes me wanna declare my rights to self-determination from Yahya.
I want you my friends, to take particular note of the following excerpts:
The Friendly Relations Declaration stated that the right of self-determination:
"shall not be construed as authorizing or encouraging any action which would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity of sovereign or independent states conducting themselves in accordance with the principle of self-determination of peoples and thus possessed of a government representing the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction as to race, creed or colour."
6. As stated by the Friendly Relations Declaration (supra), the right of self-determination of peoples in non-self-governing territories could be implemented by way of:
"The establishment of a sovereign and independent State, the free association or integration with an independent State or the emergence into any other political status freely determined by [the] people ...". Once that choice is made ("external" self-determination), the right of self-determination which remains can only be exercised in ways which are consistent with that part of the Friendly Relations Declaration cited in paragraph 5 - that is, with the territorial integrity of the state, so long as the government of that state is representative. The break up of a state can still occur, but this should be considered as dependent on domestic political circumstance rather than on references to the right of self-determination in international law.
Commission on Human Rights
Working Group on the Draft Declaration
Self-Determination -- The Australian Position
INFORMATION RECEIVED FROM THE GOVERNMENT OF AUSTRALIA:
At its fifty-fifth session in March 1995, the UN Commission on Human Rights decided to establish an open-ended inter-sessional working group with the purpose of elaborating a draft declaration, considering the draft submitted to it by the Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities entitled "United Nations Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples" (Commission on Human Rights resolution 1995/32). A first session of the Commission on Human Rights Working Group was held in Geneva during the period 20 November -- 1 December 1995. The report of the session is reproduced in (1996) 1 AILR 483, 483-495. At the first session of the Commission on Human Rights Working Group, the Government of Australia submitted a position paper on self-determination which is reproduced below (UN
Doc E/CN 4/1995/WG 15/2/Add 2).
Recent years have witnessed an evolution of the right of self-determination. In the post Second World War context, it was principally thought of as a way in which the decolonisation process could be legitimised and facilitated. The right is now beginning to be discussed in terms of the development of democratic structures and minority and indigenous rights within existing states.
2. The concept of self-determination first assumed international political significance following the First World War, with US President Woodrow Wilson's enunciation of his Fourteen Points. The principle was invoked in Europe as a justification for the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian, Turkish and (partly) Russian Empires. Subsequently, and especially in the period following the Second World War, the principle was converted into a legal right on which were based colonial territories' claims for independence. However, the expression of the right to self-determination in international legal instruments has not been limited to this context: rather, self-determination is a right of all peoples.
3. Article 1 of the Charter of the United Nations includes among the purposes of the UN, "(the development of) friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples". In the early 1950s the General Assembly acknowledged that self-determination was a right of all peoples and nations, a right which was eventually set out in common Article 1 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights:
"All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. " 4. Alongside this seemingly categorical imperative was another imperative of international law: the principle of territorial integrity. The principle is implicit in the Charter [1] and is generally regarded as a fundamental norm of international law. [2] States have repeatedly denied that the right of self-determination is a right of secession. 5. The international community has sought to reconcile the two principles of self-determination and territorial integrity in the General Assembly's
Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples (1960) and the Declaration on Principles of International Law on Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States in Accordance with Charter of the United Nations ("the Friendly-Relations Declaration" of 1970), and, more recently, the Declaration of the International Human Rights Conference in Vienna (I993). The Friendly Relations Declaration stated that the right of self-determination:
"shall not be construed as authorizing or encouraging any action which would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity of sovereign or independent states conducting themselves in accordance with the principle of self-determination of peoples and thus possessed of a government representing the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction as to race, creed or colour." [3]
This was reaffirmed in the Declaration adopted on 24 October 1995 by the United Nations on the occasion of its 50th anniversary.
6. As stated by the Friendly Relations Declaration (supra), the right of self-determination of peoples in non-self-governing territories could be implemented by way of:
"The establishment of a sovereign and independent State, the free association or integration with an independent State or the emergence into any other political status freely determined by [the] people ...". Once that choice is made ("external" self-determination), the right of self-determination which remains can only be exercised in ways which are consistent with that part of the Friendly Relations Declaration cited in paragraph 5 - that is, with the territorial integrity of the state, so long as the government of that state is representative. The break up of a state can still occur, but this should be considered as dependent on domestic political circumstance rather than on references to the right of self-determination in international law. [4] 7. Some states have argued that the right of
self-determination is a limited right which is extinguished on the attainment of independence by an ex-colonial territory -- in other words, the right only applies to people in colonial territories. However, this qualification is not found in the Covenants, the General Assembly Declarations referred to above, the Vienna Declaration or any other instrument of the United Nations. On the contrary, the statements of the right consistently refer to it as a right belonging to "all peoples". The right must therefore be more general and continuing. Following on from this, the question to be addressed is the content of the right of self-determination. It is clear that, in accordance with the foregoing analysis, it does not give rise to a right of secession from an independent state with a representative government. While the international community accepts this principle, its practical application is not without difficulty. States have been
reluctant to pass judgement on the representativeness of government. Nevertheless, the assessment as to whether a particular government is representative of its people must be capable of some objective assessment, and it would be difficult to say that a government elected by free and universal suffrage could be described as unrepresentative of its people or people. [5] State practice since the Second World War in fact demonstrates that a right to secession will only arise where a government is guilty of gross and systematic abuses of the human rights of a group which could be categorised as a people. ¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤ To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at:
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