IAAR Action in the United Nations Commission on Human Rights
Indigenous Australians Against Racism (IAAR) in conjunction with supporters in the Trade Union Movement and elsewhere has over the preceding 4 years been collecting statements from Indigenous Australians who have been the victims of Human Rights violations committed by Australia’s Law Enforcement and Government Officials.
While the Rudd Government and the various State and Territory Governments around Australia would like to us all to believe that human rights violations against Indigenous Australians ceased in the 1930’s or at the very latest the 1940’s this is not the case.
The methodology employed by the IAAR when collecting Victim Statements was to limit the people from whom we took statements to those who’d been victims of human rights violations between the year 2000 and the present. The IAAR further filtered these statements by excluding those people who had had charges proved against them on more than one separate occasion.
After taking a victim’s statement, the IAAR then looked for independent and verifiable evidence to support the victim’s allegations. As a further filter the IAAR has only included statements where the alleged incidents have been independently substantiated by third parties. The third parties the IAAR has taken supporting statements from include priests, doctors, social workers, Justices of the Peace and foreign tourists.
The IAAR currently has approximately 2,000 victim statements and 8,400 supporting statements. At this stage it is proposed that members of the IAAR will present these statements and its findings to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights when it has completed the information gathering and vetting process.
The IAAR has had preliminary discussions with the United Nations Commission on Human Rights Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights.
The Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights has provided the IAAR with details on the procedures and mechanisms for bringing a matter or matters to the attention of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.
On the reverse of this sheet in “nut-shell” format is an outline of the United Nations framework of mechanisms of Indigenous peoples issues, which the IAAR will be relying on to bring these matters before the International Community.
Procedures and mechanisms
Commission on Human Rights procedures and mechanisms are mandated to examine, monitor and publicly report either on human rights situations in specific countries or territories (known as country mechanisms or mandates) or on major phenomena of human rights violations worldwide (known as thematic mechanisms or mandates). These procedures and mechanisms are collectively referred to as the Special Procedures of the Commission on Human Rights.
| United Nations framework of mechanisms of Indigenous peoples issues | |
| The United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations;The United Nations Commission on Human Rights Working Group elaborating a Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous PeoplesPermanent Forum on Indigenous Issues; andSpecial Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous peoples | |
| Relevant instruments | |
| International TreatiesConvention concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Independent Countries (ILO No. 169);International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination;Convention on the Rights of the Child;Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; and Convention on Biological Diversity Declarations United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; and Organisation of American States Proposed American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Other Indigenous Declarations Indigenous Peoples Cancun Declaration on the WTO; Indigenous Peoples Seattle Declaration on Mining; Beijing Declaration of Indigenous Women; and The Kimberley Declaration, International Indigenous Peoples Summit on Sustainable Development Declaration of Indigenous Peoples on Climate Change, Second International Indigenous Forum on Climate Change (The Hague, 15 November 2000) |
All of the Human Rights Violations identified by the IAAR as having been committed by Australian Law Enforcement and Government Officials against Aboriginal Australians fall into the criteria set out in Article II (a) to (e) of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948.
It is the avowed intention of the IAAR to identify, validate and present to the world every instance of Human Rights Violations committed against Aboriginal Australians by Australian Law Enforcement and Government Officials since 2000.
The following table presents the number and types of Human Rights Violations against Aboriginal Australians identified and verified by the IAAR as at November 2008:
| VIOLATION | NUMBER OF VICTIMS |
| Sexual Assault (Rape) (Female) | 387 |
| Sexual Penetration Foreign Object (Female) | 167 |
| Sexual Penetration Foreign Object (Male) | 436 |
| Assault AABH (Female) | 678 |
| Assault AABH (Male) | 987 |
| Murder/Unlawful Killing (Female) | 4 |
| Murder/Unlawful Killing (Male) | 12 |
| Supply Drug Of Dependence (Police Officer) | 427 |
| Supply Drug Of Dependence (Other Govt.) | 897 |
| Causing serious mental harm | 987 |
| Forcibly removing children of the group to another group | 356 |
| Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group | 139 |
This data forms a substantial part of the research for my PhD titled Corruption and Racism in the Australian Federal Police and the death of Australia’s democracy.
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Dumb abo shit you’ll learn
Thanks, PTT for proving my point.
I’m lovin the facts and the way you put your site together. Keep up the good work, you really have opened my eyes to the situation(s) that are going unreported/unnoticed by most.
Thank you very much for your comments. I know that the issues I’m traversing are controversial and sometimes challenge people’s perceptions of the society in which we live. But, in the end truth can be cathartic for all. I appreciate you dropping bye and reading my blog and more so for commenting. Cheers Bakchos
Working with ‘fairly’ assessed Australians employed by their ‘fair-go’ compatriots far from Australia itself, I found a statement made too often about them by others, including non-British Europeans, Asians, South Asians and Americans, “Australia is full of Supremacist gasbags who are racist in the core.” So I decided to crawl the web a little bit. And your statistics only support the honest opinion of those who are not bothered to be partisan. But you would hear crappy excuses like, uh, oh, I aint white, I am pink, I would love to exchange my skin colour with you. I am honest (rest are not), I believe in values and moralities, yes we do have bad elements but thats only a few. Statistics where I meet them, prove contrary for ALL of them!
Good job, I hope your PhD is assessed by non-Aussies 🙂 otherwise they would even change the university norms and criteria to block your becoming a recognised authority on the subject (or even worst, one of the professors may become the sole author of your research paper overnight, claiming 35 years experience on the subject).
Just a question — are all those assaults (from figures shown) perpetrated by non-indiginous people (namely whites of course)? If not, then your chart is very misleading and you are just as guilty of racism. I think what happened to the aboriginal Australians is terrible (but don’t forget, in the context of the times, it was probably to be expected from any race of people). In fact, an equal amount of atrocities were committed towards other whites as well, and towards many other people in general (by a varying multitude of races/nationalities). Indeed, people have been invading, destroying and conquering others since the beginning of time (even aboriginal history is not spotless — many murders occurred before 1788 too). However, paying back bad with bad is infantile. I had a patient bragging about the number of ‘breaks’ she does and then in the same sentence condemned ‘whites’ for discriminating against aboriginals and unfairly accusing them of being thieves and robbers. I asked her ‘Can you be surprised if you engage in that sort of behaviour? While I don’t agree with racism I can fully understand people being wary when they see an aboriginal person near their house if that’s the case.’ Then she said, well you stole our land so you deserve it. Well, 1) I did not personally steal her land, but I live here now and can’t do anything to turn back time and change history and 2) Repaying bad for bad is equally deplorable. Stealing things from ‘white’ people makes her just as bad as the ‘white’ people who inhabited land used by her ancestors (I don’t say belonging since aboriginal people were nomadic and claim never to have ‘owned’ land like the whites). What to do? There will never be reconciliation because [the majority of] aboriginal people refuse to forgive. You can’t have reconciliation on one side without forgiveness on the other. It is a fact or life, and the longer people won’t forgive, the longer they entrap themselves in a cycle of misery, resentment and hatred.
hellojo, perhaps you should read the introduction to this page again. The table relates to the stats collected which reflect “Human Rights violations committed by Australia’s Law Enforcement and Government Officials”. Given that the enforcers of Australian law are most frequently non-Indigenous, I think the answer to your initial query should be plain.
Paying bad for bad is indeed poor attitude, but there is no escaping the fact that the current circumstances of Australia’s Indigenous are the direct result of the marginalization that commenced with settlement 224 years ago. You are quite right, you cannot have reconciliation without forgiveness on the other side, but if the aggressor never makes serious efforts to amend and respect those they have oppressed, why would he has has been wronged feel that the “The Apology” was anything more than rhetoric? Respect is the key word here and the whole point behind Blak and Black, for it is the lack of respect that allows the racism to continue.
Thanks for your great work. Anyone with any experience at all in Aboriginal Australia knows that is just the tip of the nightmare and that entrenched and systematised racism are difficult to counter; with ready-made justifications at hand as to why things do not need to change. Principle among these is “I personally am not a racist … etc” – well the news for all you buddies out there is that we are all racist and the battle against it starts in your own heart – and there’s no end to it. Remembering that 99.9% of what you are told by mainstream media is utter BS is one place to start.
Complete and utter bull shit…. popular news is a joke.
I am so grateful to have found your blog, I love good research methodology and to me your research looks very, very bulletproof.
Are there many blogs around like yours, I’d appreciate a few links if you have some good ones,
oxox
Hello, Hannah.
Bakchos is away collecting data at present, but will reply to you when he is back home in the next couple of days.
Watershedd