{"id":4055,"date":"2020-08-24T15:12:32","date_gmt":"2020-08-24T15:12:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mfasia.org\/?p=4055"},"modified":"2020-08-24T15:12:32","modified_gmt":"2020-08-24T15:12:32","slug":"singapore-icj-urges-authorities-to-refrain-from-legal-harassment-of-human-rights-defenders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/singapore-icj-urges-authorities-to-refrain-from-legal-harassment-of-human-rights-defenders\/","title":{"rendered":"Singapore: ICJ urges authorities to refrain from legal harassment of human rights defenders"},"content":{"rendered":"

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21 August 2020<\/p>\n

The ICJ today condemned the conviction and imprisonment of human rights defender Jolovan Wham following the dismissal of his appeal by Singapore\u2019s highest court in connection with a conference he had organized in 2016. The ICJ urged the Singapore\u2019s authorities to take action to quash the conviction and immediately release Wham from prison.<\/p>\n

The ICJ further called on the authorities to refrain from targeting human rights defenders for harassment through unwarranted legal proceedings and to amend the country\u2019s Public Order Act which formed the basis for the charges against Wham.<\/p>\n

\u201cWham will now be in jail for organizing an indoor private discussion, in violation of his rights to free expression and freedom of association and peaceful assembly,\u201d said Ian Seiderman, the ICJ\u2019s Legal and Policy Director.<\/p>\n

In November 2016, Wham organized a discussion entitled \u201cCivil Disobedience and Social Movements\u201d for approximately 50 participants in an indoor event venue, which included Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong as a speaker who called in via a video call. Prior to the event, Wham had not applied for a police permit to conduct the discussion, which was required under the Public Order Act (POA) as Wong is not a citizen of Singapore.<\/p>\n

In 2019, Wham was convicted of violating section 16(1) of the POA and sentenced to a fine of S$2,000 (approx. USD 1,463) or ten days\u2019 imprisonment in default by the District Court, following which his appeal was dismissed by the High Court. Yesterday, his appeal against the High Court decision was dismissed by Singapore\u2019s apex Court of Appeal. Today, Wham began his prison term of ten days.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe highly flawed Public Order Act was initially adopted to regulate public assemblies and processions, but has now perversely expanded in its scope of application to cover even private discussions,\u201d said Seiderman.<\/p>\n

In January 2019, the UN Special Rapporteurs<\/a><\/strong> on the right to freedom of opinion and expression, the situation of human rights defenders and the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and association issued a joint statement expressing concern that the conviction was \u201cclearly neither a necessary nor a proportional response to the actions of Jolovan Wham.\u201d The Special Rapporteurs noted that the action had wrongly targeted the \u201clegitimate exercise of the right to freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly in Singapore.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conviction and imprisonment of Wham marks a continued trend of abuse of poorly conceived laws to limit free expression, association and peaceful assembly in Singapore and harass individuals who seek to bring human rights violations to light in the country,\u201d said Seiderman.<\/p>\n

The ICJ calls on Singapore\u2019s legislators also to act to amend other non-human rights compliant laws, including the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA), Administration of Justice (Protection) Act (AJPA), and criminal defamation provisions under its Penal Code.<\/p>\n

Wham was previously convicted in 2018 under the AJPA for alleged contempt of court following a comment on Facebook that \u201cMalaysian judges are more independent than Singapore\u2019s in cases with political implications\u201d. He currently has active charges under the POA relating to the organizing of a vigil for a death row inmate and the holding of a silent protest on an MRT train and is being investigated under the POA for holding signs silently in solidarity with other activists.<\/p>\n

See also<\/strong><\/p>\n

In a 2019 regional report, the ICJ found that in Singapore, non-human rights compliant provisions in POFMA, AJPA and other contempt of court provisions, civil and criminal defamation laws have been used to curtail freedom of expression and information online.<\/p>\n

ICJ, Dictating the Internet: Curtailing Free Expression, Opinion and Information Online in Southeast Asia, December 2019<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Similarly, the ICJ and other human rights organizations have called on Singapore authorities to drop investigations of human rights lawyer M Ravi and others under the contempt of court law and cease their harassment of human rights defenders. On 13 August, in relation to a death penalty case M Ravi is defending, the Court of Appeal opined<\/a><\/strong> that a statement made by the Attorney-General\u2019s Chambers against the lawyer could have been \u201creasonably construed as intimidating\u201d, offering a recent glimpse into the trend of legal harassment faced by human rights defenders in the country.<\/p>\n

ICJ, ICJ<\/strong> and other groups call on authorities to drop investigations under abusive contempt of court law<\/strong><\/a>,<\/strong> March 2020<\/p>\n

To download the PDF file of the statement please click below<\/p>\n

Singapore ICJ urges authorities to refrain from legal harassment of human rights defenders<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        21 August 2020 The ICJ today condemned the conviction and imprisonment of human rights defender Jolovan Wham following the dismissal of his appeal by Singapore\u2019s highest court in connection with a conference he had organized in 2016. The ICJ urged the Singapore\u2019s authorities to take action to quash the conviction and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,216,43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-recent-events","category-statements"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4055","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4055\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mfasia.org\/migrantforumasia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}