V Other News
| Author | Marc Moquette |
| DOI | 10.1177/016934419100900110 |
| Date | 01 March 1991 |
| Published date | 01 March 1991 |
| Subject Matter | Part C: Human Rights News |
Human
Rights
News
on Human Rights in order to study the various problems of human rights
existing as an aftermath of military rule.
The main human rights problems that the new government has to
address are: (i) Missing persons, individuals summarily executed or killed
as a result of torture; (ii) exiled people; and (iii) political prisoners.
With regard to the first problem, the Government established a
Commission on Truth and Reconciliation, whose functions were to be to
investigate the circumstances surrounding these events; to identify the
victims
and
their whereabouts; to recommend measures to redress the
situation
and
compensate the victims; and to recommend the legal and
administrative measures necessary to prevent for the future the commission
of similar violations (On this Commission, see
NQHR
1990, vol. 8, no. 2,
p. 198). With regard to the last problem, the Governmentpardonedseveral
of the political prisoners and sent a bill to Congress dealing with the
abolition of the death penalty, and with amendments of the laws on
terrorism, on arms control, and on internal security of the State and of the
Codes of Criminal Justice and Criminal Procedure, all of them necessary
to achieve a fair solution for political prisoners still under arrest.
Otheractivities
The Commission is now engaged in the preparation of
other
human rights
instruments, namely a new additional protocol to the American Convention
to abolish the death penalty and a convention to prevent and sanction
disappearances. The GeneralAssembly of the OAS has also requested the
Commission to prepare a legal instrument with regard to the rights of
indigenous populations. Finally the Commision is now cooperating with the
Pan American Health Organization in preparing ameeting in Caracas,
Venezuela, to deal with various human rights problems related to mentally-
ill individuals.
VOTHERNEWS
Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization
On 11 February 1991, the founding assembly was held of the Unre-
presented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO). In the Peace Palace
in The Hague, the Netherlands, representatives of twenty-one peoples and
nations convened to sign the Charter of the organization. Among them
81
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