This year, Amnesty International’s Annual Report raises concerns that both the junta and large corporations are exploiting Thailand’s legal system to harass human rights defenders.  

 

 

On 22 February 2017, Amnesty International launched its Annual Report 2016/17: The State of the World’s Human Rights. Since Thailand’s 2014 coup, the livelihood of the country’s human rights’ defenders has increasingly been jeopardised, gaining the attention of the international community. 

 

This year, Amnesty highlights that corporations, and not only the state, should be held responsible for such violations. Human rights defenders are facing escalating prosecution, imprisonment, harassment and physical violence for their peaceful work. Sirikan Charoensiri, a leading human rights lawyer, has been charged with multiple offences, including sedition, for her legal work. She faces up to 15 years’ imprisonment.

 

Prosecution of community and land rights activists are often initiated by private corporations, often on grounds of defamation or violations of the Computer Crime Act. For example, a gold mining company has initiated criminal and civil proceedings against at least 33 people who oppose its operations. Andy Hall, a migrants’ rights activist, was convicted in September 2016 for his contribution to a report on labour rights violations by a fruit company.

 

Human rights defenders, especially those working on land issues or with community-based organisations, are facing harassment, threats and physical violence. In April, unidentified assailants shot and injured Supoj Kansong, a land rights activist from the Khlong Sai Pattana community in southern Thailand. Though four activists from that community have previously been killed, by the end of the year no one had been held accountable for the killings.

 

Amnesty International’s Annual Report delivers a comprehensive analysis of the state of human rights around the world, covering 159 countries. It warns that the “us against them” rhetoric setting agendas in Europe and the United States is fuelling a global pushback against human rights and leaving the global response to mass atrocities perilously weak. 

 

The report concludes that global solidarity and public mobilisation is ever more crucial for the defence of individuals who stand up to those in power and defend human rights. They are often cast by governments as a threat to economic development, security or other priorities. 

 

“We cannot passively rely on governments to stand up for human rights. We the people have to take action. With politicians increasingly willing to demonise entire groups of people, the need for all of us to stand up for the basic values of human dignity and equality everywhere has seldom been clearer,” said Salil Chetty, Secretary General of Amnesty International.