Repression of demonstrations, trade union members arrested, NGOs under surveillance: for years these facts have been related to situations of economic and social imbalance and inequity. The rise in social discontent linked to the world economic crisis has increased the repression recorded in recent years. The Observatory Annual Report 2009 shows that in inverse proportion to the fall of the stock exchanges, the inflation of freedom-killing practices and laws relating to the control of the social body was one of the significant characteristics of the problems encountered by human rights defenders in 2008.
Roberto Saviano, author of the report foreword, warns us: «crises in 2008 have already resulted in an increase in social protest movements. In Cambodia, Cameroon, South Korea, Tunisia, Colombia, Zimbabwe and elsewhere, women and men have poured onto the streets to demand respect for their social and economic rights, and the peaceful leaders of these demonstrations are too often the targets of repression. Is this a taste of what is in store for us in the framework of the current crisis and the social movements to which it will legitimately lead?».
For Souhayr Belhassen, right, FIDH President, «the social tension that has spread to all continents has had, all over the world, consequences in terms of freedoms of assembly, association and expression, which largely go beyond the mere framework of the defense of labour or social rights». This report celebrates the steadfast protest of all human rights defenders: «More than ever, in these times of crises, human rights defenders, through their rigourous investigations, their uncompromised actions and their unselfish commitment constitute the last rampart against arbitrariness. Repressive States have understood it well, and increasingly target those defenders of freedom», concludes Eric Sottas, OMCT Secretary General.
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