Slippery India backslides on human rights,

Roth ctd......

There are several reasons for this disappointing performance. First, despite strong legal protections and an independent justice system, the Indian government still commits serious abuses-for example, in Kashmir and in Manipur, in its repression of Naxalite insurgents and their alleged supporters, and in its treatment of Dalits-so it tends to oppose international action on rights, fearing a precedent that might be used against it. Second, as an emerging and globalizing economy, India increasingly prioritizes its economic and strategic interests over the promotion of human rights, particularly as it tries (often unsuccessfully) to minimize Chinese influence in South Asia and to compete with China in countries like Burma.

Finally, like South Africa, the Indian government subscribes to a misplaced Southern solidarity. Both the government and the bureaucracy, which has significant sway over policy-making, harbor a deeply ingrained world view that conflates international rights protection with colonialism. India has every right to remind Western powers of their earlier sins, but it is wrong to subordinate the needs of people suffering abuses today to a policy that is fixated on the past. Sadly, too many Indian officials seem to feel no responsibility for seeing that the people of other countries enjoy the same rights as most Indians.

There have been exceptions. At an important moment in Nepal, for example, India helped ease the way for the establishment of an office of the UN high commissioner for human rights (in part because of fears over a common Maoist movement), although it is now trying to ease out the UN's political mission. With respect to Burma, India appears to have suspended military aid in response to Burma's 2007 crackdown against peaceful demonstrators and the restrictions on international assistance to the survivors of Cyclone Nargis in 2008, but its private diplomacy achieved at best uncertain results.

More typically, however, India is hostile to the international protection of human rights, usually voting against country-specific resolutions at the Human Rights Council. For example, it voted in favor of blocking any debate on Sudan, abstained on a resolution criticizing North Korea, voted against a resolution on Cuba, and endorsed a "no action" motion on Belarus. To justify this hostility to the defense of human rights, India typically parrots the rationale about believing in private engagement on human rights rather than public pressure. Privately, officials say that such enforcement is almost always targeted at poorer countries while powerful nations get away with egregious abuses-an injustice but, as noted, not a legitimate excuse for inaction on behalf of poorer victims.

India also remains sensitive to any public discussion of its own rights record. It often opposes visits to India by UN human rights investigators, permitting visits only by special rapporteurs on the right to food in 2005, on violence against women in 2000, and on freedom of religion or belief in 1996. Meanwhile, it has ignored requests to visit by the special rapporteurs on torture and extrajudicial execution since 1993, as well as more recent requests by UN investigators on racism, toxic waste, human rights defenders, and arbitrary detentions.
Ken Roth is Executive Director of Human Rights Watch
Read more at HRW 2009 annual report