FOCUS

Focus
Asia-PacificNewsletter of the Asia-Pacific Human Rights Information Center (HURIGHTS OSAKA)

December 2022 Vol. 110

Contents
Right to Information in India: Information
Commissions
This is an excerpt of a report on theperformance of a government office that
implements the Right to Information law ofIndia.
- Satark Nagrik Sangathan
Page 2
Protecting Internet Freedom in Asia-Pacific’s
Cyberspace
This is an overview of the situation ofinternet freedom in Asia and the Pacificwith the COVID-19 pandemic as immediatejustification for its restriction.
- Albert J. Rapha and Aufarizqi Imaduddin
Page 5
Human Rights Action on Climate ChangeThis is an excerpt of a report by theCommission on Human Rights of thePhilippines on the human rights componentof the impact of climate change.
- Jefferson R. Plantilla
Page 8100th Anniversary of the Suiheisha
Declaration and the Suiheisha History
MuseumThis is a discussion of the celebration of the100th anniversary of the Suiheisha
Declaration by a newly-renovated museum
dedicated to elimination of discriminationin Japan.
- Komai Tadayuki
Page 13

Editorial
Accessible Public Information andProtected Private Data
People play active role in society when they are well-informed
about government operations and related matters. Accesstherefore to such public information is an essential requirement.
Public services can be demanded, especially by thedisadvantaged members of society, provided that appropriate
and adequate information on the services and goods are easily
available. Corruption as well as discrimination in the delivery ofservices and goods (including subsidies in light of COVID-19
pandemic) occur whenever public information is withheld.
Government officials escape accountability for illegal acts whenpublic information is hidden or destroyed.
On the other hand, governments are bound to protect private
data from being improperly accessed or stolen for fraudulent,
political and other objectives. The storage of private data indigital form exposes such information to hacking and othermeans of violating the right to privacy of members of society.
With increasing digitalization of society, freedom to accesspublic information and protection of private data are daily
necessities. Such freedom extends to responsible expression of
opinion and dissemination of information to the public.

1

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110

Right to Information in India: Information Commissions
Satark Nagrik SangathanIndia was ravaged by thedeadly second wave of the
COVID 19 pandemic in 2021.
As per official figures, the virus
c l a i m e d a r o u n d fi ve l a k h(500,000) lives, though studies
and reports by investigative
journalists estimate a muchhigher toll.1 The public healthsystem, unable to cope with thescale of the pandemic,collapsed resulting in oxygen
shortages and non-availability ofbeds and essential drugs.
Lockdowns imposed by state
governments led to largescaleloss of livelihoods, especially for
those in the unorganized sector.
The poor and marginalized
were the worst affected. Relief
and welfare programs fundedthrough public money became
the sole lifeline of millions wholost income-earning
opportunities after the
lockdowns imposed in 2020
and 2021. The crisis clearly
established the vital need fortransparency in public health,food and social security
programs. It became evident
that if people, especially thepoor and marginalized affectedby the public health emergency,
are to have any hope ofaccessing their rights andentitlements, they need to haveaccess to relevant and timely
information.
The pandemic underlined theneed for proper implementationof the Right to Information (RTI)
Act, which empowers citizens
to obtain information fromgovernments and hold themaccountable for delivery ofbasic rights and services.
Estimates suggest that every year
forty to sixty lakh
(4,000,000-6,000,000) 2 RTI
applications are filed in India.
Under the RTI Act, informationcommissions (ICs) have been set
up at the central level (Central
Information Commission) and in
the states (State Information
Commissions). These
commissions are mandated tosafeguard and facilitate people’s
fundamental right toinformation. Consequently, ICs
are widely seen as being criticalto the RTI regime.
ICs have wide-ranging powers
including the power to require
public authorities to provide
access to information, appoint
Public Information Officers(PIOs), publish certain
categories of information andmake changes to practices of
information maintenance. They
have the power to order aninquiry if there are reasonablegrounds for one, and also havethe powers of a civil court for
enforcing attendance of persons,discovery of documents,
receiving evidence or affidavits,
issuing summons for
examination of witnesses ordocuments. Section 19(8)(b) of
the RTI Act empowers
commissions to “require thepublic authority to compensate
the complainant for any loss orother detriment suffered.”2

Further, under section 19(8) andsection 20 of the RTI Act, they
are given powers to impose
penalties on erring officials,
while under Section 20(2), ICs
are empowered to recommend
disciplinary action against a PIO
for “persistent” violation of one
or more provisions of the Act.
Effective functioning of ICs is
crucialfor
properimplementation of the RTI Act.
In a judgment dated 15
February 2019, the Supreme
Court3 held that ICs are vital forthe smooth working of thetransparency law: “24) ……inthe entire scheme provided
under the RTI Act, existence of
these institutions [ICs] becomes
imperative and they are vital forthe smooth working of the RTI
Act.”
Sixteen years after the
implementation of the law,
experience in India, also
captured in various national
assessments on theimplementation of the RTI Act,4
suggests that the functioning of
ICs is a major bottleneck in theeffective implementation of thesunshine law. Large backlog of
appeals and complaints in manyICs across the country haveresulted in inordinate delays indisposal of cases, which render
the legislation ineffective. ICs
have been found to be
extremely reluctant to impose
penalties on erring officials forviolations of the law. An
assessment of the working of ICs

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
across the country during thefirst phase of the pandemic
showed that twenty-one of thetwenty-nine ICs were notholding any hearings as of 15
May 2020, even after thenational lockdown had been
eased and only seven ICs madeprovision for taking up urgent
matters or those related to lifeand liberty during the period
when normal functioning wasaffected due to the lockdown.
Amendments to the RTI Act andRules
Recent amendments to the RTI
Act have taken away theprotection of fixed tenure andhigh status guaranteed to thecommissioners under the law,
thereby adversely impacting theautonomy of ICs. One of themost critical parameters forassessing the efficacy of any
transparency law is theindependence of the appellatemechanism it provides. Securityof tenure and high status had
beenprovidedforcommissioners under the RTI
Act of 2005 to enable them tofunction autonomously anddirect even the highest offices tocomply with the provisions of
the law. Their tenure was fixedat five years. The law pegged thesalaries, allowances and otherterms of service of the Chief andcommissioners of the Central
Information Commission andthe chiefs of state commissions
at the same level as that of theelection commissioners (whichequals that of a judge of theSupreme Court).
The RTI Amendment Act5 which
was passed by Parliament in July
2019, and the concomitantrules 6 promulgated by thecentral government, has dealt a

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
severe blow to the
independence of ICs. The
amendments empower thecentral government to makerules to decide the tenure andsalaries of all commissioners in
the country.
The RTI rules, prescribed by thecentral government in October
2019, reduced the tenure of all
information commissioners to
three years. More significantly,
Rule 22 empowers the central
government to relax theprovisions of the rules in respectof any class or category of
persons, effectively allowing thegovernment to fix different
tenures for different
commissioners.
The rules do away with the highstature guaranteed tocommissioners in the originallaw. A fixed quantum of salary
has been prescribed for thecommissioners - Chief of CIC at
Rs. 2.50 lakh per month and allother central and state
information commissioners at
Rs. 2.25 lakh per month. By
removing the equivalence to thepost of election commissioners,
the rules ensure that salaries of
information commissioners canbe revised only at the whim of
the central government. Again,
the government being
empowered to relax provisions
related to salaries and terms ofservice for different categories
of persons, destroys theinsulation provided tocommissioners in the original
RTI Act.
The autonomy of commissions
has been further eroded byenabling the central government
to decide certain entitlements
for commissioners on a case bycase basis. The rules, which are3silent about pension and postretirement entitlements, statethat conditions of service forwhich no express provision has
been made shall be decided ineach case by the central
government. The power to vary
the entitlements of different
commissioners could easily be
used as a means to exercise
arbitrary control and influence.
Th e s e a m e n d m e n t s c o u l dpotentially make commissioners
wary of giving directions todisclose information that thecentral government does notwish to provide.
How Transparent are the ICs?
Satark Nagrik Sangathan has
been undertaking assessmentsof the various aspects of theimplementation of the RTI Act
in India. Every year, since 2018,a report on the performance of
information commissions in the
country is published. The 2020
assessment report titled Report
Card of Information
Commissions in India 2020-21
looked at the performance ofICs in terms of providing
information to citizens about
their own functioning.
For institutions that are vested
with the responsibility ofensuring that all publicauthorities adhere to the RTI
Act, it is alarming to note that in
the seventeenth year of theimplementation of the law, mostICs failed to provide complete
information within the
stipulated timeframe in response
to information requests filed tothem.
The legal requirement for thecentral and state ICs to submit
annual reports every year to theParliament and state legislatures

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
Agenda for Action to Enhance
Transparency in the Working ofICs
1. All ICs must put in placenecessary mechanisms toensure prompt and timely
response to information
requests filed to them.
2. Each IC must ensure that
relevant information about its
functioning is displayed on its
website. This must include
information about the receipt
and disposal of appeals andcomplaints, number ofpending cases, and orders
passed by commissions. The
information should be
updated in real time.

respectively, is to make, among
other things, their activities
transparent and available forpublic scrutiny. Very few ICs
fulfil this obligation and evenfewer do it in time.
Answerability of ICs to theParliament, state legislatures andcitizens is compromised whenannual reports are not publishedand proactively disclosed every
year, as required under the law.
Tr a n s p a r e n c y i s k e y t o
promoting peoples’ trust in
public institutions. By failing todisclose information on theirfunctioning, ICs continue toevade real accountability to thepeople of the country whomthey are supposed to serve.
Unless ICs significantly improvetheir responsiveness to RTI
applications, provide
information proactively in the
public domain through regularly
updated websites and publish
annual reports in a timely
manner, they will not enjoy theconfidence of people. The
guardians of transparency need
to be transparent andaccountable themselves.

4

3. ICs must ensure that, as
legally required, they submit
their annual report to theParliament/state assemblies ina reasonable time. Violations
should be treated as contempto f Pa r l i a m e n t o r s t a t elegislature, as appropriate.
The Parliament and legislative
assemblies should treat thesubmission of annual reports
by ICs as an undertaking to
the house and demand themaccordingly. Annual reports
published by ICs must also bemade available on theirrespective websites.
4. Appropriate governments
should put in place amechanism for online filing of
RTI applications, along thelines of the web portal set upby the central government(rtionline.gov.in). Now thestate governments of
Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh,
Karnataka and Delhi havealso set up similar online(Continued on page 15)

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110

Protecting Internet Freedom in Asia-Pacific’s Cyberspace
Albert J. Rapha and Aufarizqi ImaduddinOver the past four years, theA s i a - P a c i fi c r e g i o n
w i t n e s s e d a c o n s i d e ra b l e
increase1 in its online
population with 2.56 billion
users by 2021, the largest
number of internet users
globally.2 Not to mention thetwo economic giants of theregion, China (939.8 million
internet users) and India (624million internet users), which
are currently leading thenumber of internet users
worldwide.
With the omnipresence of theinternet in the region, securing
the freedom of individuals while
using the internet has become acritical issue for authorities
across Asia-Pacific.
Regrettably, the advent of
COVID-19 pandemic led to aplummeting trend in the score
of internet freedom gauged by
Freedom House in its latest
report3 in a handful of AsiaPacific economies and could
possibly continue to worsen in
the post-pandemic era. This
report is an annual humanrights-based study focused on
the digital sphere, gauging threemain aspects: (1) Obstacles toaccess, (2) Limits on content
and (3) Violations of user rights
i n cy b e r s p a c e i n s e ve n t ycountries worldwide. The scoreis measured on a 100-point
scale, so the lower the score
gained, the less freedom
enjoyed by people in a country
while surfing the digital sphere.

As shown in Figure 1 below,
internet freedom tended to
decline in the entire ten
selected Asia-Pacific countries,
namely, Indonesia, Singapore,
Thailand, the Philippines,
Malaysia, Vietnam, China,
Australia, India, and South
Korea during the COVID-19
pandemic in 2020 before
making a slight improvement in
2022.
In 2019, a year before the
COVID-19 pandemic, the ten
selected Asia-Pacific countries
could merely obtain an overall
score of 49.50 out of 100 or
categorized as “partly free,”before making a marked decline
to 48.50 and 48.40 out of 100
in 2020 and 2021 respectively.
Of the ten selected countries,

Australia ranked at the top (withan average score of 76 or
categorized as “Free”), while
China gained the least (with anaverage score of 10 or
categorized as “Not Free”).
While eight of them faced adownturn trend (Indonesia,
Singapore, the Philippines,
Vietnam, Malaysia, Korea,
Australia, and India), two others
had stagnant internet freedomscore (China and Thailand) since
the early days of the pandemic(2020) compared to previous
scores in 2019.
Digital Surveillance, Censorshipand Data Breaches
The restriction of freedom on
the internet can undoubtedly be
attributed to the stringent

Figure 1

Source: Authorsʼ formulation based on Freedom Houseʼs Internet Freedom
Score Report 2019-2022.

5

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
COVID-19-related policies
enacted by authorities in AsiaPacific countries during the
pandemic. The authorities
across the region are
considerably exerting digitaltechnologies to create resilienceagainst the virus. However,these actions constitute a
double-edged sword.
On the one hand, utilizing
digital tools would improvegovernments' effectiveness inraising people's awareness ofthe pandemic and mitigating the
spread of the virus. On the other
hand, the excessive power ofgovernments is inclined towards
tightening control overcyberspace, resulting in the riseof digital surveillance or online
media censorship that iscommonly justified as necessary
in curbing the spread of
COVID-19 and maintaining
domestic socio-economic
stability.
For the latter, state surveillance
practices have been evident in
the use of digital-based healthplatforms across countries in theregion, resulting in the huge
potential of mass surveillance toensure public health and safety.
South Korea4 has developed oneof the world's mostcomprehensive contact tracing
systems using closed-circuit
video footage, mobile phone
location tracking, and credit
card transaction logs. The
national digital health code
system plan5 of the Chinese
government, which is already
employing cutting-edge
technologies such as facialrecognition, Global Positioning
System (GPS) tracking anddrones, is seen as a concrete
form of digital authoritarianpractice. Coupled with the

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
c o n t r ove r s i a l z e r o - C OV I D
policy, it is not surprising thatpublic uneasiness in China has
culminated in the emergence of
unprecedented “blank paper”
mass protests lately.6
M o r e o v e r, t h e C OV I D - 1 9
pandemic has become ajustification for governments tocensor and control online space
to maintain domestic stability
and to avert proliferation of
online fraud schemes thatvictimize people. Freedom
House has found that at least
twenty-eight countries haveblocked users and platforms tosuppress unfavorable healthstatistics and criticism of thegovernment's handling of thepandemic.7 Cases of control of
online space can be found inseveral Southeast Asian
countries like the imposition of
uniformity8 in online news by
the Vietnamese government andthe tendency to control9 news
coverage by the Singaporean
government. Also, Amnesty
International reported that
Th a i l a n d , a s p a r t o f t h e
Emergency Decree invoked in
response to the COVID-19
outbreak, declared that“publishing or distribution of
information about COVID-19
which is misleading and may
induce public anxiety” 10 isprohibited and could lead to
imprisonment.
Another crucial issue thats h o u l d b e c o n s i d e r e d bygovernments across Asia-Pacificis the personal data protection
mechanism since citizens' data
are prone to leak in countries
across the region. During the
pandemic, countries like
Singapore 11 and Indonesia 12
faced severe data breaches
linked to their national public

6

health system, endangering thesafety of personal data. Amidst
the extensive use of digitaltechnologies, cyber resilienceand personal data protection
should be prerequisites before
applying any digital-led
innovation in public services in
the future.
Why is this Happening and
How to Move Forward?
We can see a general trend of
global decline of digital
freedom and the rise of digital
authoritarianism. Erol Yaybrokeof the Center for Strategic andInternational Studies stated,“Established democracies lack a
c o n s i s t e n t a n d c o l l e c t iv e
strategic approach to combat
authoritarian use of digital andonline space, even as they often
preserve and promoteadvantageous elements oftechnology.”13 This is because
controlling the online space isin and of itself a double-edged
sword as earlier stated.
How can a fair and democratic
government control a space
without limiting the freedom of
the platform itself? As we haveseen with data collection andmisuse of digital regulation,
governments can justify theiractions in the name ofprotecting their citizens;
however, defending the citizens
can be perceived as somewhat
authoritarian. This is especiallyapparent during COVID-19
pandemic, where more than ten
countries have shut down theinternet, while twenty
countries14 have increased or
added new laws limiting online
communication.
So, what can the government do
to ensure digital freedom?

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
Maintaining a democratic andopen internet is a key factor. The
fi r s t s t e p t o t h i s i s d a t aprotection. Countries are now
taking steps to ensure thatcitizens' data are safe. The best
example is the European
Union's General Data
Protection Regulation (GDPR).
The GDPR is the pinnacle ofdata protection rules, the moststringent in the world. By
making businesses accountablefor handling and treating thisinformation, it aims to offer
customers control over theirdata.15 The Asia-Pacific region
has much catching up to dowith its European counterpart.
Indonesia, for example, recently
ratified the first comprehensive
personal data protection law in
S e p t e m b e r 2 0 2 2 .16 D a t aprotection is an essential firststep when it comes to ensuring
digital freedom, as it will serveas the foundation for a safe
environment regarding digitalplatform usage.
Maintaining a democratic andopen internet is imperative toany democratic regime. Exercise
of freedoms has been restricted
in recent years due to one factor
or another. Not only must the
government ensure that theircitizens' privacy and data areprotected, but they must also
protect freedom of assemblyand freedom of expression.
These freedoms are no longer
confined to the physical realm
but have extended to the digitalplatforms. It is the right ofeveryone to voice their opinion
and meet with like-minded
individuals without fear. This is
the foundation and pillar of ahealthy, free digital space.

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
Albert J. Rapha is a researchaffiliate at the Centre for Policy
S t u d i e s a n d D e ve l o p m e n t
Management (PK2MP) at
D i p o n e g o r o U n i v e r s i t y,
Indonesia.
Aufarizqi Imaduddin is currently
a graduate student at the Schoolof Business and Management,
Bandung Institute of Technology,
Indonesia.
For further information, pleasecontact: Albert J. Rapha, e-mail:albertjehoshua@gmail.com.

Endnotes
1 Number of online users in the
Asia-Pacific region from 2017 to2021,
Statista,www.statista.com/statistics/1040
574/apac-number-of-online-users/.
2 Number of internet users in the
Asia-Pacific region as of January
2021,by country, Statista,
www.statista.com/statistics/2651
53/number-of-internet-users-in-the-asia-pacific-region/#:~:text=As%20of%20January%202020%2
C%20China%20ranked%20first%20with,users%20worldwide%
2C%20reaching%20over%202.3%20billion%20in%202019.
3 Countering an Authoritarian
Overhaul of the Internet, Freedom
House,
https://freedomhouse.org/report/
freedom-net/2022/countering-authoritarian-overhaul-internet.
4 Mark Zastrow, South Korea isreporting intimate details of
COVID-19 cases: has it helped?,
Nature, 18 March 2020,www.nature.com/articles/d4158
6-020-00740-y.
5 Iris Zhao, China's planned national digital health code systemraises concerns over state surveillance, ABC News, 26 November
2022,
www.abc.net.au/news/2022-1126/china-plan-for-national-digit7

al-health-code-system/1016904
48.
6 China's protests: Blank paper
becomes the symbol of raredemonstrations, BBC, 28 November
2022,
www.bbc.com/news/world-asiachina-63778871.
7 Information Isolation: Censoring
the COVID-19 Outbreak, Freedom
House,
https://freedomhouse.org/report/
report-sub-page/2020/informati
on-isolation-censoring-covid-19-outbreak.
8 Dien Nguyen An Luong, Vietnam Wants to Impose News
Uniformity Even in Cyberspace– at What Cost? Fulcrum, 19
October2022,
https://fulcrum.sg/news-uniformi
ty-in-cyberspace/.
9 Freedom on the Net 2022 - Sing a p o r e , Fr e e d o m H o u s e ,https://freedomhouse.org/countr
y/singapore/freedom-net/2022.
10 Thailand: "They are always
watching": Restricting freedomof expression online in Thailand, Amnesty International, 23
April
2020,
www.amnesty.org/en/documents/asa39/2157/2020/en/.
11 David Sun, Fullerton Healthvendor's server hacked; personal details of customers soldonline, The Straits Times, 25
October2021,
www.straitstimes.com/singapore/courts-crime/fullerton-health-ve
ndor-hacked-personal-details-of-customers-sold-online.
12 Hackers leak personal data of
279 million Indonesians, The
Star, 22 May 2021,
www.thestar.com.my/aseanplus/
aseanplus-news/2021/05/22/hac
kers-leak-personal-data-of-279million-indonesians.
13 Promote and Build: A Strategic
Approach to Digital Authoritarianism, Center for Strategic andInternational Studies, 15 October
2020,
www.csis.org/analysis/promote-(Continued on page 15)

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110

Human Rights Action on Climate Change
Jefferson R. PlantillaA

cting on a Petition,1 theCommission on Human
Rights of the Philippines held an
inquiry on the responsibility of
the world’s largest investorowned fossil fuel and cement
corporations for human rights
abuses resulting from theimpacts of climate change.2
Hearings attended by experts
from different countries were
held in the Philippines, United
Kingdom and the U.S. from2016. The results of the hearings
were contained in the report
entitled National Inquiry on
Climate Change issued on 6
May 2022 by the Commission.3
C o m m i s s i o n ’s I n q u i r yJurisdiction
The issues raised by the Petition
appeared to be beyond theC o m m i s s i o n ’s m a n d a t e t oinquire upon under thePhilippine Constitution andjurisprudence. However, the“Commission noted theacceptance under customaryinternational law of thei n t e r r e l a t e d n e s s ,interdependence, andindivisibility of human rights
and, therefore, took the viewthat it may investigate the whole
gamut of human rights allegedly
impacted in the Petition.”
Additionally, the Commission“noted the allegation thatc l i m a t e ch a n g e a dve r s e l y
impacts the right to life,
classified as a civil and politicalright under the International

Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights (ICCPR),4 to which thePhilippines is a party” and aright that falls within the
C o m m i s s i o n ’s m a n d a t e t oinvestigate.
Below are some of therecommendations from the
National Inquiry on Climate
Change Report on actions
needed to address the climatechange issue in relation tohuman rights.
National Human Rights
Institutions (NHRIs)
The climate crisis calls not justfor an evaluation of Stateobligations on human rights, but
a more significant examination
and understanding of thehuman rights responsibilities ofbusinesses.
NHRIs “play a crucial role inpromoting and monitoring theeffective implementation ofinternational human rights
standards at the national level”5and bridging stakeholders to“promote transparent,
participatory and inclusive
national processes of
implementation andmonitoring.”6 In the face of oneof the greatest human rights
challenges of our time, theCommission notes that NHRIs
around the world are rising to
the challenge and haveincreased engagements aimed
at protecting climate-affectedrights.7

8

In October 2015, the Global
Alliance of National Human
Rights Institutions (GAHNRI)
adopted the Mérida
Declaration, encouraging all
N H R I s t o “ i n fl u e n c e t h enational process of
implementation andaccountability to ensure humanrights are integrated in theprocess of tailoring and tracking
goals, targets and indicators”8 of
the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable
Development. It highlighted therole of NHRIs to “promote
remedies for all human rights
violations and … use theirprotection powers to address
serious human rights concern
linked to the implementation”9of development goals, including
the realization of Sustainable
Development Goal (SDG) No.
13 on climate action. The
declaration also encouraged
cooperation between NHRIs
and private actors, reaffirming
the role businesses can play inf u l fi l l i n g t h e S D G s , a n dhighlighting the need to alignimplementation with the UNGP
[United Nations Guiding
Principles on Business andHuman Rights: Implementing
the United Nations ‘Protect,
Respect and Remedy’
Framework], and otherinternational human rights
standards.10
A month later, in November
2015, the CommonwealthForum of National Human
Rights Institutions adopted theSt. Julian’s Declaration on

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
Climate Justice, 11 the firstcollaborative declaration ofcommitments signed by NHRIs,
acknowledging and affirming
their role in climate action.
More recently, during its Annual
Meeting in December 2020,
GANHRI adopted an outcome
statement on the role of NHRIs
in combating the climate crisis.12
Recognizing that a humanrights-based approach leads tomore sustainable and effective
climate action and policies, itcalled on all States to ratify andimplement international andregional human rights
instruments. Likewise, it called
for the implementation of thep r o v i s i o n s o f t h e Pa r i s
Agreement, to promote humanrights based and peoplecentered climate action.13 Also
noteworthy in the statement is
the recognition of the need forclimate justice, which it defined“as addressing the climate crisis
with a human rights-based
approach whilst also making
progress towards a justtransition to a zero-carbon
economy.”14
Guided by these declarations
and its specific learnings fromthe Inquiry, the Commission
recommends and encourages its
fellow NHRIs to:a. Continuously engage withclimate scientists and otherexperts in the field to keep
abreast of the best available
science on climate change,
event attribution, as well as
technological developments
related thereto;b. Col la bo rate wi t h ot her
NHRIs and engage inregional and international
mechanisms to monitor
government and business

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
compliance with their duties
and responsibilities when
dealing with climate-relatedtransboundary harms andcross-border human rights
violations;c. Ensure that climate change
actions, including
monitoring, investigations,decisions and legislation are
participatory, transparent
and accountable;
d. C o n t r i b u t e t o t h edevelopment of laws andlegal frameworks on theintersection of human rights,
climate change and businessenterprises throughmonitoring, research, casestudies, investigation,
decision on cases and otheractivities within theirmandates;e. P u r s u e m e a n i n g f u lcollaboration withgovernment actors andencourage them tounderstand and integrate
human rights obligations in
national climate action
policies by advising them on
human rights-based
a p p r o a ch e s t o c l i m a t e
mitigation and adaptation,
through the integration of
the different international
climate agreements, theSustainable Development
Goals, and the adherence tot h e G e n e va P l e d g e t opromote and respect humanrights in climate action;f. Actively dialogue with thebusiness sector and work forthe development of
normative frameworks thatwill embed the respect forhuman rights in the
obligations of businesses such as the conduct ofenvironmental and human9

rights impact assessments
and due diligence across allphases of their operations, aswell as providing remedies
in case of violations;g. Increase monitoring andreporting on government’s
compliance with business,
human rights and climatechange obligations andcommitments, throughinternational human rights
mechanisms like theUniversal Periodic Review
and other treaty bodies;h. Strengthen engagements
w i t h c i v i l s o c i e t y,particularly in educating
communities about thecauses and impacts ofclimate change and how it
relates to the realization ofhuman rights in order tomainstream climate
awareness in the public
consciousness and drive
responses ranging fromindividual changes oflifestyles to concerted
climate actions;i. Recognize that some climate
actions are inevitable tonegatively impact humanrights; that the transition to acarbon-less economy would
necessarily put some sectors
at risk of losing theirlivelihoods or that
evacuating those living in
danger zones would
necessarily mean loss ofhomes; the challenge is tofind a balance towards themost just, humane andequitable climate solution;and finallyj. Commit to achieving climate
justice, particularly for thoseacutely impacted but haveleast contributed to theclimate crises.

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
CourtsMany individuals andorganizations have now resorted
to initiating actions before Statebased judicial mechanisms tocompel climate actions15 andinfluence the development oflaws and policies in both thedomestic and international
spheres. Litigation has beenused to compel governments toprovide more ambitious
emissions targets,16 establish theright to a healthful ecology forf u t u r e g e n e r a t i o n s ,17 o rdelineate the role of States withregard to transboundary
environmental harms.18
S i m i l a r l y, t h e p r o g r e s s ive
interpretation of laws by courts
enhances regulation andaddresses gaps in law where
legislation may be vague orwhen current legislation is not
up to date with developments ins c i e n c e. 19 In the case of
Massachusetts v. EPA20
forinstance, the court held that the
U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency under its statute had thepower to regulate GHGs
[Greenhouse Gases], eventhough the statute did nots p e c i fi c a l l y c o n t e m p l a t eemissions regulation.
Courts must also interpret thelaw in conformity withinternational obligations and act
as enforcement tools of States’international obligations –including those relating toclimate change.21 The couplingof international obligations withdomestic regulation is not new.
The courts in Urgenda v.
Netherlands and Leghari v.
Pakistan established their States’commitments
underinternational conventions aspart of their domestic
obligations to their citizens. In

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
Pro Public v. Godavari Marble
Industries Pvt. Ltd.,22 the court
established that mining in a
protected area is inconsistent
with the principles found ininternational environmental
protection and the Nepal
Constitution.
The judiciary may also grant
remedies not expressly provided
by laws. “[T]he imprimatur ofthe courts confers considerable
legitimacy on the operation of
the administrative state[;] [...]
c o u r t s h av e c o n s i d e r a b l elatitude to develop law on theirown.”23 A review of government
acts has been accepted bycourts to compel publicagencies and offices to act andr e v i s e p o l i c i e s .24 C i v i corganizations and individuals
have used the threat of judicial
review to compel governments
into climate action.25
Judiciaries worldwide have also
provided remedies that protect
the environment and the people
affected by environmental
degradation. Examples of these
are the Tutela26 writs, found in
Latin American countries andthe Writ of Kalikasan27 in thePhilippines. These special writs
have been consistently used bytheir respective courts to protect
the environment. 28 Regional
courts have also promoted
remedies by issuing Advisory
Opinions to help clarify theduties and rights relative to theenvironment and transboundary
harm.29
Justice Brian Preston asserts that
“ [ I ] n t h e c l i m a t e ch a n g econtext, courts have moved
beyond their primary function ofresolving disputes between
private individuals and are now
being used by public interest

10

litigants as vehicles forachieving social change.”30 The
Commission encourages all
courts to embrace their powert o i n fl u e n c e a n d i n s p i r egovernment action. However,caution must be exercised to
avoid “overly aggressive judicial
review [that] has the potential toengender administrative
ossification—agency paralysis—among other phenomena.”31
Thus, without favoring any
particular party or going beyond
their authority, courts should
strive to inform, determine,
explain and uphold, throughtheir decisions, the rights andobligations of parties
concerning particular climate
laws, policies and issues. In
dismissing claims, courts should
clarify the factual and legal
bases that were found wantingo r i n s u f fi c i e n t t o p r ov i d e
guidance not only to the parties
but also to future actions. It
should be emphasized that evenwhen courts do not rule in favorof the claimants, they still
contribute to meaningful
climate response through theirelucidation of the law and therights and obligations of theparties. Judicial contribution to
the development of the law andj u r i s p r u d e n c e o n va r i o u s
climate issues is indispensable
to the success of the global
climate action.
In the determination of claims
and liabilities, courts may takejudicial notice of the findings of
NHRIs or other similar bodies.
Legal Profession
Justice Brian Preston32 explains
the role that lawyers play inclimate change:

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110

Recognising that addressing
climate change depends on
responses on a small scale,and that any legal action
which involves climatechange issues will impact on
climate change policy, gives
rise to a responsibility onlawyers to be aware ofclimate change issues in daily
legal practice. It calls for a
climate conscious approachrather than a climate blindapproach. A climate blindapproach is where theoutcome of the legal problem
or dispute will have some
impact on climate change
issues, but legal advice isg ive n o r t h e d i s p u t e i slitigated or resolved without
any attention to climatechange issues. A climate
conscious approach requires
an active awareness of thereality of climate change andhow it interacts with daily
legal problems. A climate
conscious approach demands,
first, actively identifying theintersections between theissues of the legal problem or
dispute and climate change
issues and, secondly, giving
advice and litigating or
resolving the legal problem or
dispute in ways thatmeaningfully address theclimate change issues.33

profession must be prepared toplay a leading role inmaintaining and strengthening
the rule of law and supporting
responsible, enlightened
governance in an era marked bya climate crisis.”34

Th e C o m m i s s i o n s h a r e s
Preston’s view and that of theInternational Bar Association(IBA) that the global response to
climate change entails, if notinevitably requires, a host oflegal proceedings if any successis to be gained. Lawyers aroundthe world will be called upon torepresent the conflicting rights
and interests of States,
corporations, communities andindividuals impacted by theclimate crisis. Thus, “the legal

For further information, you may
contact: Commission on Human
Rights of the Philippines(CHRP), SAAC Building, UP
Complex, CommonwealthAvenue, Diliman, Quezon City
1101 Philippines, ph (632)8294-8704;
e-mail:comsec.chr@gmail.com;
https://chr.gov.ph/ or the
Climate Action and Human
Rights Institute (CAHRI) at
cahri.ph@gmail.com, headed by

In whatever side or capacity
lawyers may find themselves inthese proceedings, theCommission appeals to them towork towards the developmentof laws and legal systems thatwill justly protect and upholdthe common interest of
humankind. To this end, theCommission calls on lawyers togenerously lend their expertise
towards improving or creating alegal framework for climate
accountability in their localities,
which may inform andultimately become one of thebases for the development of a
global legal framework foraddressing the challenges posedby climate change.
Note: The author appreciates thehelp in preparing the article offormer CHRP Commissioner
Roberto Cadiz who headed theInquiry Panel.

former CHRP Commissioner
Roberto Cadiz.

Endnotes
1

2

3

4

Jefferson R. Plantilla is a
researcher at HURIGHTSOSAKA.

11

5

6

The Petition was filed by
Greenpeace Southeast Asia andindividuals from across thePhilippines in 2015.
The Commission constituted an
Inquiry Panel composed ofCommissioner Roberto Eugenio
T. Cadiz, as Chair, former
CHRP Chairperson Jose Luis
Martin Gascon, Commissioner
Karen S. Gomez – Dumpit,
Commissioner Gwendolyn Ll.
Pimentel–Gana, and then
CHRP Chairperson Leah C.
Tanodra – Armamento, as
members. Dr. Peter William
Walpole, S.J. joined the panel
as its independent expert.
Full report available at https://chr.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/
2022/12/CHRP_NationalInquiry-on-Climate-ChangeReport.pdf.
United Nations International
Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights, art. 6, 1996, 999
U.N.T.S. 171 [ICCPR]. See also
United Nations Human Rights
Committee (UNHRC), in
General Comment No. 36 on
the right to life, H.R. Comm.,
General Comment No. 36(2018) on Article 6 of theInternational Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights, on the
Right to Life, UN Doc. CCPR/C/
GC/36 (Oct. 30, 2018).
United Nations Human Rights
O f fi c e o f t h e H i g hCommissioner, UN Human
Rights and NHRIs,
www.ohchr.org/EN/Countries/
NHRI/Pages/NHRIMain.aspx.
The Mérida Declaration, The
Role of National Human Rights
Institutions in Implementing the2030 Agenda for Sustainable
Development. Hereinafterreferred to as Mérida
Declaration, par. 15.

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
7

Nathaniel Eisen and Nina
Eschke, Climate Change andHuman Rights: The
Contributions of National
Human Rights Institutions : a
Handbook, German Institutefor Human Rights, 2020.
8 Mérida Declaration, op.cit.
9 Ibid.
10 Ibid., par. 11.
11 Commonwealth Forum of
National Human Rights
I n s t i t u t i o n s , S t . J u l i a n ’s
Declaration on Climate Justice,
November 2015, p. 5.
12 Global Alliance of National
Human Rights Institutions,“GANHRI Statement adopted at
the GANHRI Annual
Conference on Climate
Change: The Role of National
Human
RightsInstitutions” (adopted on 4
December 2020). Available athttps://ganhri.org/wp-content/u p l o a d s / 2 0 2 1 / 0 2 /EN_AC_Statement_for_consultation.pdf.
13 GANHRI Statement, par. 2.
14 GANHRI Statement, par. 3.
15 Nachmany, M.; Fankhauser, S.;
Setzer, J.; & Averchenkova, A.
(2017) Global trends in climatechange legislation andlitigation. Grantham ResearchInstitute on Climate Change
and the Environment.
16 Netherlands Hague District
Court [2015] HAZA C/
09/00456689. Affirmed byHague Court of Appeals andSupreme Court of theNetherlands in 2018 and 2020,
respectively.
17 Philippine Supreme Court[1993] G.R. No. 101083 andJuliana v. United States, 217 F.
Supp.3d 1224 (D. Or. 2016)(U.S.).
18 Inter-American Court of Human
Rights [2017] OC-23/17
19 Setzer, J. & Bangalore, J.
(2017). “Regulating climatechange in the courts,” inAverchenkova, A., Fankhauser,S., Nachmany, M. (eds.), Trends

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
in Climate Change Legislation,
London: Edward Elgar, 2017.
20 United States Supreme Court[2007] 549 U.S. 497 (2007)
21 Colombo, Esmeralda. (2017)“Enforcing International
Climate Change Law in
Domestic Courts: A New Trendof Cases for Boosting Principle
10 of the Rio Declaration?”,
UCLA Journal of Environmental
Law and Policy, 35(1).
22 Supreme Court of Nepal [2015]
068–WO–0082.
23 Markell, D. & Ruhl, J.B. (2012)
An Empirical Assessment of
Climate Change In The Courts:
A New Jurisprudence Or
Business As Usual? 64 FLA. L.
REV. 15, 21. p.20.
24 U r g e n d a v. N e t h e r l a n d s :Hermes, John (2019). "Dutch
Government Plans CO2
Emissions Levy for Industrial
Firms,"
Bloomberg
Businessweek.; Reuters (2019)"Dutch to close Amsterdam
coal-fired power plant four
years early – RTL".
25 Averchenkova, A.; Fankhauser,S.; & Finnegan, J. (2020), “The
impact of strategic climate
legislation: evidence fromexpert interviews on the UK
Climate Change Act,” Climate
Policy, Volume 21, Issue 2,
2021.
26 1991 Constitution of Columbia(Revised 2015).
27 2010 Rules of Procedure forEnvironmental Cases. A.M. No.
09-6-8-SC.
28 C o r t e C o n s t i t u t i o n a l d e
Colombia [2016] T-622 of
2016; Supreme Court of thePhilippines [2019] Abogado et.
a l v. D e p a r t m e n t o fEnvironment and Natural
Resources.
29 Inter-American Court of Human
Rights [2017] Advisory Opinion
Concerning the Interpretationof Article 1(1), 4(1) and 5(1) of
the American Convention on
Human Rights.

1230 P r e s t o n , B . ( 2 0 1 4 ) ,“Characteristics of Successful
Environmental Courts and
Tr i b u n a l s ,” J o u r n a l o f
Environmental Law, 365, 387,
388. respectively p. 31.
31 Markell & Ruhl 2012 (citing
Thomas O. McGarity, “SomeThoughts on ‘Deossifying’ theRulemaking Process,” 41 Duke
Law Journal, 1385, 1386-87(1992); Seidenfeld, M. (2009)“Why Agencies Act: A
Reassessment of theOssification Critique of Judicial
Review,” Ohio State Law
Journal, Volume 70, Number 2,
2009, 251, 254; Yackee, J.W. &Yackee, S.W., “Testing theO s s i fi c a t i o n T h e s i s : A n
Empirical Examination ofFederal Regulatory Volume andS p e e d , 1 9 5 0 – 1 9 9 0 ,” Th e
Wa s h i n g t o n L aw R e v i e w ,Volume 80, 14 July 2012 .
32 Chief Judge of the Land andEnvironment Court of New
South Wales.
33 Preston, B., Implementing a
climate conscious approach indaily legal practice, lecture in a
public seminar at the Faculty ofLaws, University of College
London, London, on 11
February 2020.
34 International Bar Association,
Climate Crisis Statement, 5 May
2020. Available at https://w w w. i b a n e t . o r g / m e d i a s /8 2 2 C 1 9 6 7 F851-4819-8200-2FE29816492
2
.
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3w3ODQ4MDZ8YXBwbGljYX
Rpb24vcGRmfGhmMC9oN2M
vODc5NjMzNjIyNjMzNC84Mj
JDMTk2Ny1GODUxLTQ4MTkt
ODIwMC0yRkUyOTgxNjQ5Mj
IucGRmfDQzYTY0MjUxMDE0
OTVjZTE4YjBhZmU1NzY0YTR
kOTM3YjljNjg0NjdiY2QxNDY
0MzBkYzJjOTNiOGUzNmVlM
WE.

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110

100th Anniversary of the Suiheisha Declarationand the Suiheisha History Museum
Komai TadayukiOn 3 March 1922, people ofthe discriminated Buraku
communities came together tofound the Levelers Association(Suiheisha ). The Founding
Declaration of the National
Levelers Association (Suiheisha
Declaration), proclaimed at its
founding meeting held at the
Kyoto City Hall, is the firstdeclaration on human rights inJapan, and is also said to be thefirst human rights declaration
proclaimed by a discriminatedminority.1 The document has not
lost its radiance and continues
to resonate in our hearts
because it not only denounces
discrimination but also
proclaims the liberation of thediscriminated people

themselves. When people are
discriminated against, it gives
them feelings of inferiority, ands e l f - d e n i a l . Th e L e v e l e r s
Declaration calls on the Buraku
people to unite, and states that”(t)he time has come when wecan be proud of being Eta,”
using a term which is now
recognized as being
discriminatory. I believe it is anexpression arising from a desire
to urge people to accept theirsocial identity and to recover
their human dignity.
Th i s i s why t h e L e ve l e r s
movement was able to connect
and find solidarity with theHyeongpyengsa movement led
by the Baegjeong, aExhibit Corner 3, “The ideals of the National Levelers Association.”13

discriminated minority in Korea,
and to sympathize with otherdiscriminated minorities, suchas the Ainu, people recoveringfrom Hansen’s disease, andpeople of Okinawa. Regrettably,from a gender perspective, theDeclaration includes
expressions such as “manly
martyrs of industry” and“ b r o t h e r s ,” i n d i c a t i n g a
conscious call by men
exclusively to men, andrevealing the limitations of theLevelers Association. But evenin those times when women’s
status was notably lower, theWomen’s Levelers movement
was launched, with efforts by
respected women activists.

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFICDECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110

Suiheisha History Museum
The Suiheisha History Museum
opened 1998 in Kashihara,
Gose City in Nara Prefecture,
the birthplace of the National
L e ve l e r s A s s o c i a t i o n . Th e
L e v e l e r s D e c l a r a t i o n wa s
drafted by Saiko Mankichi, oneof the founders of the National
Levelers Association. Along with
Saiko, other founders of the
Association such as Sakamoto
Seiichiro and Komai Kisaku arealso from Kashihara, making thisarea the origin of the Levelers
movement.
The Museum reopened afterrefurbishment to commemorate
the 100th anniversary of the
Declaration. In doing so, twopoints were borne in mind. One
was to maintain the information
at a level that junior high school
students could understand, andto change the stereotypicalimage of “human rights” and“ d i s cr im in ation” a s being
something serious, heavy anddark, to embrace a wider
audience. Efforts were made toactively include comics, picture
books and song lyrics in the
exhibits so that people canrelate to the issues, and findinterest in human rights anddiscrimination. The other point
was to broaden the contentsfrom mainly pre-war materials
to include human rights issues
such as the Buraku liberation
movement after WWII and thecurrent Buraku discrimination.2
To d a y, h a t e s p e e c h a n d
information inciting prejudiceagainst the Buraku people andcommunity abound on theinternet, while the tendency to
avoid marrying someone fromthe community remains.

Director Komai Tadayuki standing by the entrance to the exhibition
rooms of the Museum.

In order to eliminate thecontinuing
Burakudiscrimination, I hope that the
Suiheisha History Museum
would be used more in school
education. It is my dream that
one day, some of the children
who visit us would want tobecome museum curators. This
museum is run without any
government assistance and isprivately funded.
In 2015, I participated in theFederation of International
Human Rights Museums annual
conference held in Wellington,
New Zealand for the first time,and in December that year, theSuiheisha History Museum
joined the Federation as the firstmuseum in Japan to do so. The
Federation is a loose network ofhuman rights museums aroundthe world that was establishedin 2010 by the initiative of theInternational Slavery Museum,
which is a part of the National
Museums Liverpool in the
United Kingdom.
In 2016, documents recording
the solidarity between theLevelers Association and

14

Hyeongpyengsa held by theMuseum was registered in the
UNESCO Memory of the World
Regional Register for Asia/
Pacific. The discriminatory ideasof the class system of the Joseon
dynasty remained in the Korean
Peninsula under the Japanesecolonial rule. Similar to the
Buraku people since the Meiji
era, the Baegjeong people werealso equal under the law, but
discrimination against themremained. Hyeongpyengsa wasfounded in 1923, and thehistory of both the Levelers
Association and Hyeongpyengsa
leading the movement for amore just society lends courage
to the achievement of peaceand human rights in East Asia
wh e r e p o l i t i c a l l y d i f fi c u l t
conditions prevail.
The Declaration closes with theline, “(l)et there be warmth inhuman society, let there be lightin all human beings” which isemblematic of its ideals. I hope
to continue spreading themessage of the footprints ofpeople who fought for a society
in which human dignity andequality is achieved.

FOCUS ASIA-PACIFIC
Komai Tadayuki is the Directorof the Suiheisha History
Museum.
For further information, pleasec o n t a c t : Ko m a i Ta d ay u k i ,Suiheisha History Museum, ph:81-745-62-5588, fax:
81-745-64-2288, e-mail:suihei@mahoroba.ne.jp;
www1.mahoroba.ne.jp/~suihei/
eng/index.html.

Right to Information in India(Continued from page 4)
portals. Further, the online
portals should also provide
facilities for electronic filingof first appeals and second
appeals/complaints to therespective ICs.
Satark Nagrik Sangathan (SNS)is a citizens’ group working topromote transparency andaccountability in government
functioning and to encourage
active participation of citizens ingovernance. It is registeredunder the Societies Registration
Act, 1860 as Society for
Citizens’ Vigilance Initiative.
For further information, please
visit: www.snsindia.org

Protecting Internet Freedom(Continued from page 7)
and-build-strategic-approach-digital-authoritarianism.
14 Bahia Albrecht and Gaura
Naithani, Digital authoritarianism: A global phenomenon,

DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 110
Endnotes
1 See full text of the English
version of the Suiheisha
Declaration
here
www.hurights.or.jp/archives/o t h e r _ d o c u m e n t s /section1/1922/04/declarationof-human-rights-in-japan.html
and the original text in Japaneseh e r e 「 水 平 社 宣言」www1.mahoroba.ne.jp/~suihei/sengen.html

2 Suiheisha History Museum
website (水平社博物館のウェブサイト), www1.mahoroba.ne.jp/~suihei/.

Endnotes
1 India’s COVID-19 toll may be
six times more than reported,
finds study, Indian Express, 8January 2022, https://indianexpress.com/article/india/
indias-covid-toll-may-be-6times-more-than-reported-findsstudy-7712387/).
2 Peoples’ Monitoring of the RTI
Regime in India, 2011-2013’by RaaG & CES, 2014.
3 Anjali Bhardwaj and others v.
Union of India and others (Writ
Petition No. 436 of 2018),
https://indiankanoon.org/doc/
47245795/.
4 ‘Report Card of Information
Commissions in India’, SNS &CES, 2020; ‘Status ofInformation Commissions inIndia during Covid-19 Crisis’,
SNS & CES, May 2020; ‘Report
Card of Information
Commissions in India’, SNS &CES, 2019, ‘Report Card ofInformation Commissions inIndia’, SNS & CES, 2018;‘Tilting the Balance of Power Adjudicating the RTI Act’,
RaaG, SNS & Rajpal, 2017;‘Peoples’ Monitoring of the RTI
Regime in India’, 2011-2013,
RaaG & CES, 2014;‘Safeguarding The Right To
Information’, RaaG & NCPRI,
2009. The reports are available
at https://snsindia.org/rtiassessments/#IC2021.
5 The Right to Information(Amendment) Act, 2019,https://dpiit.gov.in/rti/rightinformation-amendmentact-2019.
6 NOTIFICATION, Ministry of
Personnel, Public Grievancesand Pensions (Department of
Personnel and Training), New
Delhi, 24 October, 2019, http://
documents.doptcirculars.nic.in/D 2 / D 0 2 r t i /RTI_Rules_2019r4jr6.pdf.

https://akademie.dw.com/en/digi
tal-authoritarianism-a-global-phenomenon/a-61136660.
15 Jake Frankenfield, General Data
Protection Regulation (GDPR)
Definition and Meaning, Investopedia, 11 November 2020,
www.investopedia.com/terms/g/
general-data-protection-regulati
on-gdpr.asp.

16 Hunter Dorwart and Katerina
Demetzou, Indonesia's Personal
Data Protection Bill: Overview,
Key Takeaways, and Context,
F u t u r e o f P r iva cy Fo r u m ,https://fpf.org/blog/indonesias-pe
rsonal-data-protection-bill-overvi
ew-key-takeaways-and-context/.

15

HURIGHTS OSAKA Calendar

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HURIGHTS OSAKA is now preparing the 12th volume of Human Rights Education in Asia-Pacific.
Articles from several countries in the region (such as Uzbekistan, Maldives, Myanmar, Mongolia, Japan,
Hong Kong and Timor Leste) will be included in this volume.

JAPON

TAXE PERCUEPRINTED MATTERAIR MAIL

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HURIGHTS OSAKA, inspired by the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, formally opened in December 1994. It has the following aims: 1) to engender popular understanding in Osaka of the international human rights standards; 2) to support international exchange
between Osaka and countries in Asia-Pacific through collection and dissemination of information andmaterials on human rights; and 3) to promote human rights in Asia-Pacific in cooperation with nationaland regional institutions and civil society organizations as well as the United Nations. In order to achievethese goals, HURIGHTS OSAKA has activities such as Information Handling, Research and Study, Education and Training, Publications, and Consultancy Services.
FOCUS Asia-Pacific is designed to highlight significant issues and activities relating to human rights in
the Asia-Pacific. Relevant information and articles can be sent to HURIGHTS OSAKA for inclusion in thenext editions of the newsletter.
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