Terrorist War Seen As Excuse For Asia Crackdown

by Marwaan Macan-Markar

By mid-October, evidence began trickling out of the western Xinjiang province, where some eight million Uighurs live, that Beijing had begun cracking down on this ethnic minority as part of its own new "anti-terrorism campaign."

For groups like the New York-based Human Rights Watch, the assault on the political and civil liberties in Xinjiang was the latest round in the strong-arm tactics that Beijing has been pursuing against suspected Uighur separatists.

"Chinese authorities have not discriminated between peaceful and violent dissent," the rights watchdog states in a recent background note. "Their fight against 'separatism' and 'religious extremism' has been used to justify widespread and systematic human rights violations against Uighurs, including many involved in non-violent political, religious and cultural activities."

Yet China, as it has become increasingly clear over the past two months, is only one of a number of Asian governments using the martial tone set in Washington to pursue tough anti-terrorism measures domestically.

This shift troubles the region's activists, who fear the increased use of "terrorism" in the coming year by governments that wish to quell internal unrest, separatist movements or even local opposition -- and find the heightened security fears since Sept. 11 a friendly environment for cracking down on critics.

Likewise, rights campaigners worry about the specter of national security states returning to dominate Asia's political landscape as it did during the Cold War years, which could result in political and civil liberties being violated by governments.

"It is a major concern," Hina Jilani, a UN human rights expert, told IPS in an interview. "It is already being observed that a new national security doctrine is emerging that is undermining standards of international humanitarian and human rights law."

"There is a disturbing tendency of resorting to military means and methods, including adoption of laws and measures that create states of exception," added Jilani, a Pakistani lawyer who is now the UN secretary general's special representative on human rights defenders. "Under the garb of emergency and security laws fundamental rights and freedoms are suspended."

Advocates of this doctrine are giving it legitimacy by pointing to the anti-terrorism efforts being shaped in the United States, says Basil Fernando, executive director of the Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission.

"'See how the U.S. does and imitate' is the slogan now," he explains.

Since the Bush administration launched the war on terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States, it has been pushing for extraordinary legal measures at home to go after suspects linked to the attacks that killed more than 3,000 people.

These measures include holding suspects in custody for prolonged periods of time without access to the law, and a proposal to try foreign suspects in secret military courts.

"A general attitude with the cynical phrase 'these are extraordinary times' is bound to become a common expression. That in these times the law can be ignored is the implication," Fernando asserted. "Such an attitude, once accepted, threatens security in every way, though it is promoted with the promise of restoring security."

In Malaysia, authorities have used the war on terrorism to justify arrests under its draconian Internal Security Act, a colonial-era law that allows detention without trial and has often been used against political dissenters.

In neighboring Indonesia, the government has seized the chance to mount harsh crackdowns on separatist movements in Aceh and Irian Jaya provinces.

In the southern Philippine island of Mindanao, where Muslims are waging a separatist struggle, local human rights monitors have noted two troubling developments: the army has been given new powers in civilian control formerly handled by the national police, and arrests without warrants have been legalized.

In India, the government is determined to get parliament to approve an anti-terrorism bill that critics assail for its blatant violations of human rights and the rule of law.

Last week, a leader of one Indian political party went on record to say that the bill was being introduced to terrorize supporters of his party at a time when the state he is in faces provincial elections next year.

Meantime, tough rhetoric coming from Asian capitals is keeping step with harsher measures eyed by several governments in the region.

"At the level of rhetoric the talk of more security is high," said James Gomez, who heads an Asian Internet advocacy group promoting democracy. "This plays into the population, and pro-democracy sentiments are internally muted."

For Gomez, the rhetoric of terrorism being used by governments to prepare the people psychologically for strong anti-terrorism measures reveals more in what is not said. "By far, the important message is that these regimes want to control the growth of civil society," he said.

Jilani, the UN expert, anticipates that limits would be placed on such rights as the freedom of expression in countries where the national security doctrine prevails. "I foresee the use of such legislation to suppress freedom of opinion and expression, the right to peaceful protest, in a more blatant manner than it is already being done," she said.

However, not all share that pessimistic forecast and argue that Asia will be spared the type of national security states that dominated its political landscape during the Cold War, like Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines were at the time.

"I doubt that the national security measures being put in place will create oppressive regimes like we had during the years of communism," asserted Chayachoke Chulasiriwongs, a professor of international relations at Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University.

He adds that Asia has undergone major changes since the end of the Cold War, including a surfeit of liberal ideas, greater public awareness about democracy and human rights, and the notion of "transparency" in the region.

"People have realized what is going on," Chayachoke said. "Transparency and human rights are words that many know. Governments cannot ignore this."