Human Rights Watch: World Report 2009

(MoFA, 01/23/09):-It is a commonplace for countries criticized by Human Rights Watch to complain about HRW’s reports, as indeed HRW is always quick to emphasize. And indeed, HRW appears to assume, for that very reason, that none of the complaints are justified. In fact, however, it doesn’t mean that the criticisms may not be merited. All too often, and far more than HRW is prepared to admit, they are. This is, in part, because of HRW’s acknowledged failures to investigate on the ground, or because, on occasions, it has certainly failed to evaluate the origin and political affiliation of the sources that it used. It might be noted that using multiple sources is no guarantee of accuracy if all actually come from the same politically engaged organization. This is of particular concern in conflict situations, in civil war or armed struggle against a government.

Another major difficulty with HRW’s reports is that, in some cases, it has clearly decided in advance of its investigations that a government has a poor human rights record and that nothing it does, or has done, can improve this. As a result, HRW is prepared to believe any, and all, allegations against that government, even when there is no reliable or even actual evidence of specific abuse. Equally, in these circumstances, it is prepared to ignore any, and all, efforts such a government might make to improve its human rights record. It disregards any facts that might appear to mitigate or contradict its own views and allegations. It apparently assumes that any government statements that have the temerity to try and contradict its own views must automatically be invalid. Even when a government produces undisputable and independent evidence that dispute HRW’s allegations, HRW will immediately dismiss these as ‘partial’, refusing to accept that its own actions and reports are frequently deserving of a similar claim. The point is not so much the inaccuracy of HRW’s allegations, or even perhaps its aims and intentions, though its double standards must often remain a matter of concern. It is the failure to identify accurate sources and accurate facts, or in many cases even to try to do so, and the automatic assumption that “opposition sources” are more reliable than “government sources”. It is in fact a fundamental, and very obvious, methodological flaw, underlined in this case by HRW’s failure to visit either Ethiopia, or Somalia, in recent years. HRW, time and again, makes false assumptions on the basis of misconception, ignorance and inaccuracy as the independent investigation of alleged abuses in the Somali Region, commissioned by the Ethiopian Government, makes clear.   

It seems clear that HRW often makes up its mind in advance, or even in defiance, of the evidence. Again and again, HRW fails to indicate that it is reporting unsubstantiated, unproven or at the least controversial or disputed allegations. To assert “credible reports” in these circumstances is hardly sufficient when there are significantly more credible reports asserting precisely the opposite. It might be noted that contrary to HRW’s claims, the Ethiopian Government does not reject international cooperation in this area with a view to improving human rights in Ethiopia or anywhere else in the world. HRW has consistently failed to demonstrate that it is prepared to carry out open-minded and unprejudiced investigations in Ethiopia. Despite this, the Government has made it quite clear that it would still be prepared to co-operate with HRW but this must depend upon HRW proving it will listen to the evidence available even when it contradicts its own preconceptions. HRW’s comments on the 2005 multi-party elections in Ethiopia, for example, make it quite clear that HRW at no point considered this as the democratic development that it was for all other observers. Even in advance of the actual vote, HRW was issuing a report claiming the election could not be considered fair, a verdict that no other observers agreed with. Before the local elections last year, HRW did exactly the same thing. In both cases, the timing of the reports, shortly before the polls, seemed to demonstrate intent to affect voting. If not deliberate, it was, at the very least, quite extraordinarily careless and incompetent.

Similarly, in its comments on the recently passed Charities and Societies Proclamation, HRW continues to allege this is part of a deteriorating environment for civil society. It is very hard to see how HRW can have reached this conclusion independent of opposition allegations which often use similar phraseology. In the first instance as HRW could easily have verified there is very little new in the law which is actually based upon articles 402 to 482 of the present civil code dating back to the imperial era. The proclamation does little more than update and systemize the regulations to allow for regular evaluation of foreign NGOs. It is hard to escape the conclusion that HRW’s main complaint is that it, and other organizations involved in advocacy, will be subject to registration and regular evaluation of the kind that is normal in their own and many other countries. They will not be prevented from operating, only encouraged to be transparent. A similar degree of apparently deliberate misunderstanding appears in HRW’s comments on the new media bill (which HRW grudgingly qualifies as promising to reform “some of the more repressive aspects of the previous legal framework”). It is, after all, normal for any government to keep the right to impound publications on the grounds of national security; criminal penalties for libel or defamation are certainly not unusual.  

Again and again, HRW’s comments appear to start from a specific anti-Ethiopian Government position, highly critical of a human rights record which it claims is marked by steadily increasing intolerance of political dissent or independent criticism, an appellation by which HRW appears to dignify itself. It consistently, and apparently deliberately, refuses to look at any of the very substantial evidence to the contrary, not least the multi-party democratic elections of 2005 and 2008. It persistently puts the worst interpretation on every action and on any legislation even when this view is clearly erroneous and inappropriate. For HRW to say Ethiopia “is conducting an all-out assault on any kind of independent criticism” is obvious rubbish, as it must know if it bothered to follow the output of the Ethiopian media. Equally, whatever one may think about political impact of the arrest of the opposition politician that it has so vociferously complained about, there are genuine legal reasons for this action which HRW has clearly not bothered to investigate. The pardon, following conviction, was granted to W/zo Birtukan Midekssa after she had expressed remorse for her actions, and promised to respect the law and the constitution. Her denial of this removed the legal premise on which the pardon was granted. To ignore this would have serious implications for the integrity of the legal system, the very basis of human rights in Ethiopia. It was something that no judiciary could have accepted. 

Similarly, even the most superficial analysis of the Charities and Societies law makes it clear that independent human rights work has not been “outlawed”, only regulated. There is nothing in the law to demonstrate intent to ban civil society organizations from engaging in works of advocacy, including human rights. Nor are groups based outside country, like HRW, barred from human-rights related work.  There is, however, a requirement that they should be regulated and registered (not, as claimed, licensed). The fact is that NGOs will no longer be able to operate merely to please themselves. Despite HRW’s assertions, regulation is not outlawry.

One could go on at length, but this is not meant to be a catalogue of criticism. It is rather a plea for Human Rights Watch to try and live up to its own aims and intentions, to look at the evidence available, improve its methodology and act in the balanced and unbiased way in which an international human rights body of its reputation should operate