Subcommittee on International Human Rights Committee on May 25th, 2010

[Guadalupe Marengo]

No, I don't know what that is. A charge against who?

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

This is Oswaldo Álvarez.

[Guadalupe Marengo]

Yes, against Oswaldo Álvarez, who was only recently released. And he's the Governor of Zulia, am I correct? Yes, Oswaldo Álvarez.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

I believe he's the former governor, yes, and ran as a presidential candidate--one of the opposition voices.

[Guadalupe Marengo]

Exactly, and he was detained.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

So to my colleague's point, in fact it is quite dangerous to voice your opinion if you're a political opponent in Venezuela.

[Guadalupe Marengo]

That's what we're beginning to see. As we have said in all sorts of other bodies, there is more intimidation than there used to be, and that is intimidating or could been seen as intimidating the rest of the population, and particularly, of course, those who want to voice their opposition to the government.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Yes.

We had an organization here called Hands Off Venezuela. I don't know if you're familiar with them.

[Guadalupe Marengo]

No, I'm not.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

They said that freedom of expression prevails in Venezuela. That was their testimony before us. It seems to me that with 34 radio licences revoked and presidents of TV stations being incarcerated after they criticized the government, and of course a licence being revoked, this is very serious. And I have to say that the Chavez administration, if my colleague Mr. Marston is right, is very patient. They'd wait seven or eight years after a coup before they'd revoke the licence.

The general population of Venezuela relies, as our population does, on the media to tell them what's going on, to give them a view of what their government is doing, of freedom and democracy and human rights, and for that voice to be muzzled is a very serious thing.

[Guadalupe Marengo]

At Amnesty International we are definitely taking it seriously, and you can see from reports from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and UN bodies that they are also taking it very seriously. Recently a lot of concerns have been expressed by various bodies on these developments in the country.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

What kind of response are you getting from the Venezuelan government? First, are you getting an audience with somebody of substantive rank in the government? Are they listening? Obviously, by their actions, it doesn't seem as if they are when you're saying that people are incarcerated or missing and there's not any investigation. But are you at least getting an audience with a level that's commensurate with your concerns?

[Guadalupe Marengo]

I think lately we're beginning to be concerned that we aren't listened to. For example, only a few months ago, when the Inter-American Court of Human Rights called on the government to reinstate three judges they had pulled out a few years ago, the government threatened withdrawal from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. So those threats are worrying.

And no, in the past few years we haven't received any answers from the authorities on our urgent actions on the cases we have presented to them.

We did have a very good campaign on violence against women, and the interaction with the government and our particular campaign on violence against women was very positive and very good.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

I appreciate too that you mentioned there were advances there. And I think credit should be given where credit is due. However, if it's at the expense of other human rights, if the whole notion is to try to give themselves space so they can govern with impunity, then that's not acceptable at all.

Thank you very much.

[Guadalupe Marengo]

Amnesty International strongly believes that human rights are indivisible and universal. All human rights have to be protected: economic, social, civil, and political, which is what we are saying, not only to this government but to others as well.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

I think you'd have full agreement from this committee.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Scott Reid]

Thank you, Mr. Sweet.

All right, that concludes the questions.

I want to thank our witness, Ms. Marengo, for attending today. We do very much appreciate your willingness to make yourself available. This is very helpful to all of us.

I should just ask before I let you go, is there any final statement you want to make?

[Guadalupe Marengo]

That was my final one just now, on the indivisibility of rights and how you can't just have some and not others, which is our main concern in Venezuela at the moment, all human rights.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Scott Reid]

Thank you very much. We do appreciate it.

The meeting is adjourned.