Japan breached human rights of Greenpeace protesters, says UN
A United Nations committee has ruled that the Japanese Government repeatedly breached human rights guarantees in pursuit of two Greenpeace whistleblowers who exposed an illegal trade in whale meat. The finding is seen as an embarrassment for Japan before the trial of the ”Tokyo Two” activists next Monday.
The UN Human Rights Committee’s Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found the rights of the activists not to be arbitrarily deprived of liberty, and to engage in protest, were not respected by the Japanese justice system.
Junichi Sato, 32, and Toru Suzuki, 42, were jailed for 26 days without charge after being arrested in 2008.
Greenpeace had been investigating claims that the crew of the whaling factory ship Nisshin Maru had taken hundreds of kilograms of meat as part of a blackmarket.
The two took a box of the meat, which Greenpeace presented at a press conference in Tokyo, before taking it to the city’s public prosecutor, seeking action. Instead the pair were arrested for theft.
Amnesty International filed a complaint to the UN committee last year. In its investigation released to the Herald yesterday, the committee concluded the detention of the two was arbitrary, and contravened three articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and two articles of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Andrew Darby
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