Commonwealth leaders fail to support human rights commissioner

A Commonwealth leaders summit on Saturday failed to agree to appoint a human rights commissioner, despite Australia, Britain and Canada backing the move seen by rights advocates as vital for the 54-nation group to remain credible. Leaders of the mostly former British colonies are meeting in the remote Australian city of Perth under pressure to reform and toughen measures against human rights abuses in member states.
But after two days of talks the leaders only agreed to take tentative steps to deal with human rights, an issue which has focused squarely on Sri Lanka and accusations of war crimes in the final stages of its civil war that ended in 2009. Former Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, chair of an eminent persons group set up to recommend Commonwealth reforms, said failure to adopt the groups' proposals which include the commissioner would be a failure.
"If this CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting) does not deliver such reforms it is our duty to sound the caution to you that this CHOGM will be remembered not as the triumph it should be, but as a failure," he said. Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the leaders agreed to be more proactive with the Secretary General intervening early to protect political and human rights, but deferred the proposal for a commissioner.
"Australia and a number of delegations indicated they were supportive of this proposal but there were a number of delegations concerned by it," said Gillard. Many states were concerned a human rights commissioner would overlap the work done by the Secretary General and Commonwealth watchdog, the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group. "To address these concerns leaders agreed that the Secretary General and Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group should further evaluate this proposal and report back," said Gillard. Sri Lanka opposed the plan for a high commissioner. "Such a commissioner ... could be intrusive," presidential spokesman Bandula Jayasekara told Reuters.
Sri Lanka is under international pressure to allow an independent inquiry into accusations of war crimes during its 25-year civil war. It says will wait for the results of its own investigation next month, calling the pressure over human rights a propaganda war waged by the defeated Tamil Tigers. Canada, home to a large ethnic Tamil community, has said it will boycott the 2013 Commonwealth summit in Sri Lanka unless the host country improves its human rights record.
The eminent persons group said the Commonwealth in recent years had failed to maintain its strong stance in defence of human rights seen during its campaign for an end to South African apartheid. "The Commonwealth faces a very significant problem. It's not a problem of hostility or antagonism, it's more of a problem of indifference," said group member former British defence minister Malcolm Rifkind.
"Its purpose is being questioned, its relevance is being questioned and part of that is because its commitment to enforce the values for which it stands is becoming ambiguous in the eyes of many member states," he said. Badawi's panel decided to make its report public with Rifkind calling it a "disgrace" that Commonwealth leaders had not authorised its release themselves.
Leaders spent Saturday in seclusion in the west Australian city's King's Park and are expected to finalise their communiqué on Sunday. Some leaders, including British Prime Minister David Cameron, are due to fly out before Sunday's final day. The travel plans of 17 of the leaders have been affected by Qantas Airline's decision to ground all its planes in an industrial dispute. The leaders are also under pressure to focus more on issues such as HIV/AIDS, as well as climate change and debt that are threatening many of its smaller island members, which make up more than half of the Commonwealth states.
Smaller countries within the group, many at risk from the effects of global warming, are pressing for a strong statement ahead of next month's international summit of climate change in the South African city of Durban. There have also been calls on leaders to help end the practice of child brides. Twelve of the 20 countries with the highest rates of child brides are in the Commonwealth. And health advocates say laws in 41 Commonwealth states making homosexuality a crime breached human rights, hindering the fight against HIV-AIDS. Commonwealth states represent 60 percent of the world's HIV-AIDS population.