Brussels, 12/01/2004 (Agence Europe) - "Human rights must begin at home": with this as the title of its appeal to the Irish Presidency, Amnesty International is calling upon the European Union to recognise the problems in its own Member States. In this document, which was published on Monday, the human rights' defence organisation voiced its concern at the predominance of the fight against terrorism, which is sometimes done at the price of respect for human rights. Amnesty made a mixed summary of European policy. "It is hard to make a judgement", the head of Amnesty's European office, Dick Oosting, told journalists. He believes that "the ambitions are good, as are intentions, the EU is one of the most positive players on the international scene (...) but little is made concrete (...) and there is a downward trend in demands on the Chinas and Russias of this world".
In its 2003 report on human rights, Amnesty International criticised problems in thirteen of the fifteen Member States. "Clearly, there has been no major violation, but there are many problems", said Dick Oosting, criticising the fact that "internal human rights policy is put to one side". Amnesty says that it never hears from the European institutions when it alerts them to problems in the Member States. Amnesty stresses that if the EU does not keep its own doorstep clean, it will lose international credibility, being accused of "two weights, two measures".
As for the "human rights" aspects of European policy, Amnesty International lays particular emphasis on respect for human rights in asylum and immigration policies. Amnesty feels it is essential to add to the European arrest warrant with common rules on standards and guarantees for criminal procedures and provisional detention, regretting the Commission's delays in presenting proposals on the subject. Amnesty also calls upon the Member States to implement existing anti-discrimination texts, and calls upon Ireland to put the proposed framework decision on the fight against racism and xenophobia back on the table.