4 Oct 2006

The American undermining of Human Rights Standards cannot be accepted

03/10/06 16:30] During a keynote speech to the 2006 OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting in Warsaw yesterday, Commissioner Thomas Hammarberg urged governments to give the highest priority to the implemention of international standards on human rights.

"Human rights treaties should be seen as contracts between State Parties. Governments which have ratified the conventions have pledged to respect its norms. If one government violates the treaty, the others have an obligation to react. If they do not, this might be seen as a sign that the standards are becoming less important," he said. "It is crucial that other governments react to those Washington decisions which undermine important principles such as the “presumption of innocence”, habeas corpus and the total prohibition of torture."

Read further here and more about the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe