[In the statement, Ms.
Pillay said, “More needs to be done to protect human rights and prevent
violations,” urging China to release Tibetans who had been detained merely for
exercising fundamental rights like freedom of expression, association and
religion. “Social stability in Tibet will never be achieved through heavy
security measures and suppression of human rights,” she said.]
By Nick Cumming-Bruce
GENEVA — The top human rights
official of the United Nations took China to task on Friday over the
suppression of Tibetans’ rights that she said had driven them to “desperate
forms of protest,” referring to about 60 self-immolations by Tibetans
protesting Chinese rule that have been reported since March 2011, including seven since mid-October.
The official, Navi
Pillay, the high commissioner for human rights, said in a statement that she
was disturbed by reports of detentions, disappearances and the excessive use of
force against peaceful demonstrators, as well as curbs on Tibetans’ cultural
rights. Ms. Pillay said “serious concerns” had been raised over the claims of
torture and ill-treatment of detainees and about the standards of their trials.
Ms. Pillay said she had
had “several exchanges” with the Chinese government on the issue, and her rare
public criticism of China’s conduct on human rights appeared to reflect a
measure of frustration.
“We felt the time had
come to talk publicly about that,” a spokesman for Ms. Pillay, Rupert Colville,
said Friday in Geneva. Self-immolations are evidence of how serious the
situation in Tibet has become, Mr. Colville said, and
“we don’t see any visible signs of progress.”
In the statement, Ms.
Pillay said, “More needs to be done to protect human rights and prevent
violations,” urging China to release Tibetans who had been detained merely for
exercising fundamental rights like freedom of expression, association and
religion. “Social stability in Tibet will never be achieved through heavy
security measures and suppression of human rights,” she said.
As examples of that
suppression, Ms. Pillay cited the case of a 17-year-old girl who was reported
to have been severely beaten and sentenced to three years in prison for
distributing fliers that called for freedom for Tibet and the return of the
Dalai Lama. She said others had been sentenced to jail terms of four to seven
years for writing essays, making films or circulating outside China photographs
of events in Tibet.
Ms. Pillay said she
recognized the “intense sense of frustration and despair” that had driven
Tibetans to such extreme actions, but she appealed to them to seek other ways
of expressing their feelings and urged China to allow them to express their
feelings “without fear of retribution.”
She said that China had
pledged to step up cooperation with the United Nations on human rights, but she
said there were 12 outstanding requests to visit China by United Nations
special investigators on various human rights-related issues and called on
China to facilitate access.
AT THE HEART OF A POLITICAL BRAWL IN INDIA, TWO HISTORIC NEWSPAPERS
[At the heart of the acrimonious battle, just the latest between Mr. Swamy and the Gandhi family, is a company called Young Indian. Mr. Swamy claims it was established by Mrs. Gandhi and her son to do what he called a "stinking deal" aimed at acquiring a publicly listed publishing company, Associated Journals. Associated Journals owned property in Uttar Pradesh and Delhi worth, he said, $295 million.]
 |
Anindianmuslim.com
blog
A
screenshot of the masthead of Qaumi Awaz, an Urdu newspaper
started
by Jawaharlal Nehru, that was shut down in 2008.
|
Subramanian Swamy, chief of the Janata Party, on Thursday accused
Sonia Gandhi, the Congress Party president, and Rahul Gandhi, the Congress
general secretary, of illegally purchasing a publishing company to gain
ownership over land that it held, and loaning it money from party coffers.
Hours later, Mr. Gandhi, in a letter addressed to Mr. Swamy and
circulated in the press, called Mr. Swamy's accusations "utterly false,
entirely baseless and defamatory," and threatened to sue. "We are
committed to pursuing all legal actions against the scandalous abuse evident in
your so-called 'press conference,' " the letter said. A suit against Mr.
Swamy could be filed in the next few days, one adviser said.
At the heart of the acrimonious battle, just the latest between Mr.
Swamy and the Gandhi family, is a company called Young Indian. Mr. Swamy claims
it was established by Mrs. Gandhi and her son to do what he called a
"stinking deal" aimed at acquiring a publicly listed publishing
company, Associated Journals. Associated Journals owned property in Uttar
Pradesh and Delhi worth, he said, $295 million.
Beyond Mr. Swamy's allegations, public information about Young Indian,
Associated Journals or the alleged land deals is limited, but the company
appears to be a not-for-profit formed to revive two historic newspapers.
From the Ministry of Corporate Affairs' Web site comes this list of
"Section 25" companies, or those formed "for the sole purpose of
promoting commerce, art, science, religion and charity or any other useful
objects." According to page 61, Young Indian was formed on Nov. 23, 2010,
and lists its address as 5A, Herald House, Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, in New
Delhi.
Among other rules, Section 25 companies must apply any income or profits to
promoting its objectives, and are forbidden to pay dividends to members.
Associated Journals stopped publication of two of its newspapers in
2008, long before Young Indian was formed. Qaumi Awaz, an Urdu newspaper
founded by Mr. Gandhi's great-grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, and the
English-language National Herald, which was edited by Mr. Nehru before he
became prime minister, shut down in the spring of 2008.
At the time, loyal readers decried their closure, particularly because
it came while Mr. Nehru's Congress Party was in power. "Sonia Gandhi's
intervention would have saved the papers," wrote the blogger An Indian Muslim at the time. "Forever I will miss
the newspaper that was once largely circulated in entire North India."
Young Indian planned to revive the papers, the Press Trust
of India reported on Oct. 9. The news agency, citing Registrar of Companies
documents, said the former Indian Express editor Suman Dubey was the signatory
to the company and that the papers would be "set up under the guidance of
top leadership of Congress Party," and that Sam Pitroda, a
telecommunications industry entrepreneur, was also involved.
Rahul Gandhi's office had responded to the Press Trust of India's
e-mail inquiries by saying that Young Indian "is a not-for-profit company
and does not have commercial operations" and that it had "no
intention of starting" any newspapers, and neither Mr. Dubey or Mr.
Pitroda responded to questions.
However, Mr. Pitroda's official website, in his current capacity as
adviser to the prime minister, displays a Hindustan Times article from May 2011 which reported that the Congress Party would soon be
restarting the National Herald along with its Hindi edition, Navjeevan, and the
Urdu edition, Qaumi Awaz.
Mr. Pitroda, the adviser to prime minister on public information,
infrastructure and innovations, was roped in "to give a new look to the
publications," the Hindustan Times said.
On Thursday, Mr. Swamy also alleged that the All India Congress
Committee had given Associated Journals an unsecured loan of over $16 million,
which he said was illegal because a political party cannot give loans for
commercial purposes under the Income Tax Act.
Janardan Dwivedi, chairman, media department of the All India Congress
Committee said in a statement Friday that the object of the Indian National
Congress is the "well being and advancement" of the Indian people and
that it has done its duty by supporting The Associated Journals "to help
initiate a process to bring the newspaper back to health in compliance with the
laws of the land". The support, the statement says, was in the form of
"interest free loans from which no commercial profit has accrued to the
Indian National Congress."
An income tax lawyer, who asked to remain anonymous because of a
conflict of interest, said that a loan such as Mr. Swamy had described would be
illegal according to Section 13 A of the Income Tax Act, which speaks of special
provisions made for the income of political parties. Income of political
parties is exempted from taxation, he said, however the money thus exempted is
not meant to be used for purposes other than those of the political party.
Phone calls to the Registrar of Companies went unanswered, as did
calls to the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, the Securities and Exchange Board
of India and the offices of Mr. Gandhi and Mr. Pitroda.
