Freedom of opinion
June 20, 2011
The people who express their opinions freely in China, Iran, Belarus or in Venezuela risk imprisonment, mistreatment or torture. The attempts to suppress protest movements in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Yemen, Syria and Bahrain are also prime examples of contempt of the fundamental human right to the freedom of opinion.
Demonstrators, journalists and writers are the first to feel the backlash that authorities unleash when a state restricts the right to the freedom of opinion.
The possibilities for exercising the right to the freedom of opinion have changed dramatically in recent years, as a look at the current situation in the Arab world makes clear.
Twitter, Facebook and other social media offer platforms on which regimes can be criticized and protests can be organized. But these social media also lend themselves to increasing state surveillance, as recent events in Syria show.
At least 93 demonstrators who used Facebook to call for more political freedom and an end to corruption were arrested in Syria between March 8 and March 23.
Loay Hussein, a journalist and writer, was among them. He had shown solidarity with demonstrators by publishing a petition for the right to the freedom of opinion in Syria on the Internet.
When expression leads to arrest
Being imprisoned for criticizing a regime or expressing dissident opinions is often just the beginning of human rights abuses. Writers' works and journalists' articles are censured or refused publication.
Activists and demonstrators are abused, tortured or "disappear." Freedom of opinion is both fundamental to and indispensable in liberal societies.
It is only when people can express their opinions freely that the power of the state can be opposed by means of a public control so that different opinions can be communicated peacefully.
As soon as the freedom of opinion is restricted, there is a risk that other human rights will be violated as well. As soon as public instruments which facilitate the freedom of opinion are suspended, arbitrariness and violence can come to pass unhindered while the perpetrators get away scot-free.
That's why the freedom of speech is used as an indicator of the extent to which other human rights are respected in a state. Only those who can freely express an opinion are in a position to point out human rights abuses.
But it is harder to detect when the right to the freedom of expression is suppressed than when human rights are violated by torture so there are rarely legal consequences in cases where other opinions and viewpoints are suppressed.
An indicator for democracy
Suppressing the right to the freedom of opinion always shows that words are powerful. The case of Anna Politkovskaya, a Russian journalist who provided critical coverage of the Chechen War, makes this clear, as does the case of Liu Xiaobo, the Chinese initiator of the Charter 08 manifesto demanding political and legal reforms for China.
Politkovskaya was killed in her flat in Moscow in 2006, and the assassination has not yet been solved. Even after winning the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, Liu Xiaobo is still in prison. Their words met with public interest, drew attention to human rights abuses and ultimately became too dangerous for their states' authorities.
Both cases show that human rights activists need all the support they can get in their fight against oppression. Amnesty International has been speaking up for non-violent political prisoners for 50 years.
In 1961 English lawyer Peter Benenson published "The Forgotten Prisoners" in the British newspaper The Observer and started an Appeal for Amnesty. This called for the release of all prisoners incarcerated for merely expressing their political opinions.
Germany's Amnesty International operation was founded by journalists and writers. It campaigns for those in repressive states who express criticism in books and newspapers and advocate human rights either directly or indirectly.
Urgent actions help prisoners
The right to the freedom of opinion is crucial for Amnesty International because it is only when people can make use of the public sphere that they can raise awareness of human rights abuses. Urgent actions are one of the most important kinds of campaigns that provide quick and direct help to political prisoners and people in danger.
Supporters all over the world write protest letters and e-mails to the authorities of states where human rights are being violated. They always manage to save lives.
Amnesty International started 267 urgent actions and published 252 further bits of information on urgent actions in 2010 alone. Roughly one third of them led to positive changes including the release of prisoners, more privileges for prisoners, the repeal of death sentences or even charges against those responsible for human rights abuses.
Monika Lüke is the former chairperson of Amnesty International's German operation.
Author: Monika Lüke / mm
Editor: Sean Sinico