The requested article has expired, and is no longer available. Any related articles, and user comments are shown below.
© (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2017.Japan protests against U.N. privacy expert's queries on conspiracy bill
By Linda Sieg TOKYO©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
34 Comments
Login to comment
Disillusioned
Ah, poor old Japan. Those pesky foreigners are sticking their noses into Japan business again. Japan will never understand that, it is not the center of the earth. It is a little island and only separated by a few hundred kilometers of ocean.
Cricky
Bungling old men trying to defend the indefensible. Protesting the expression of legitimate concerns.
Ricky Kaminski
Welcome to the Nippon Kaigi and cohorts fascist regime.
Aly Rustom
This is getting orwellian. Japan is now protesting the UN's concerns about its human rights?
See? Its not just the posters on here. The UN High Commissioner is expressing concerns- not only about the bill, but also about the Abe regime's handling of any questions or concerns. I'm sorry, but this has the making of authoritarianism all over it.
What's so unreasonable about that??
Who the hell are YOU to tell the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner that their content is inappropriate?! Suga has lost it.
Right. We're supposed to take your word for this??
Good on you! Please do! This regime has lost it.
Exactly. Unless, of course, its aim is to turn Japan into an absolute authoritarian state.
That's exactly what's going to happen.
Huh? What about the other 20%?
Take note people. When the UN itself starts to express concerns about the human rights bill in your country that in effect will negate in the future any claim Japan can make publically that it respects human rights. The UN should pull Japan on this and no longer allow leaders of Japan to proclaim at the UN general assembly that they are a nation that respects human rights. Not after this.
Citizen2012
Thank you Mr Joseph Cannataci for monitoring and being a watchdog on international human rights, urging the Japanese govt to explain its position to the world on that matter, this bill is dangerous. Refreshing to NOT see a general apathy for a change.
BertieWooster
Someone has got to rein Abe in before he does any real damage. He's beginning to look like Mr Kim up North~
sangetsu03
I think we would be better served with anti-conspiracy bills which apply to politicians. In a society were the people are supposed to be the masters, and the politicians the servants, we are slowly moving toward the opposite. Instead of being served, we are increasingly being ruled. This cannot be permitted.
Garthgoyle
Ahahaha! Don't joke about it (sarcasm). They already did that with UNESCO so who knows?
Citizen2012
Dixit Mr Suga... this would have more weight if not coming from a govt which does not hesitate stepping on its own constitution, "re-interpreting" any text at will and using their two-thirds majority in both houses of parliament to force bills on the population with the only goal to please military and fascism expansion, time for them to understand that Action implies Reaction.
AgentX
It's funny (actually, not at all) how they can push through bills that erode human rights so fast, when all we can get are 'thinking about forming a panel to think about reducing Japan's slave labor market.
We have very much arrived at a kind of 1920's totalitarian Japan again. The world was too slow to react to it last time... looking like the same thing is happening this time, too.
kurisupisu
Can we have a public debate on the matter and all the bill's clauses to be published in a national newspaper?
Then can we have a referendum so that all the Japanese people can vote ?
dcog9065
The problem is the two-thirds majority in both houses the LDP controls. This is much more dangerous than people think in that a bill doesn't really even need to be debated to pass
Cricky
The self appointed political elite are not used to being questioned, Japan walked out of the League of Nations ( first UN). Because no one understood the complexity (bizarre) way of dealing with (self entitled old grumpy men) Japan.
CH3CHO
kurisupisu Today 01:39 pm JST
The proposed bill is here. http://www.moj.go.jp/keiji1/keiji12_00142.html
Tokyo-Engr
@CH3CHO - Thanks for the link. Not sure why kurisupisu was voted down. This sounds like quite a draconian bill worthy of open debate. It is one thing to take necessary steps to protect the public and the nation but it appears this legislation goes beyond that.
Aoi Azuuri
"Conspiracy law for counterterrorism" is doubtful.
Conspiracy law will be modern version of pre-war crackdown.
Goodlucktoyou
@kuri I can't understand why anyone could downvote your comment. @CH3 gave a link to something, but how does a 70 year old farmer find it, read it and understand all the jargon? To change the constitution there has to be a public debate with a wide range of voices, followed by a referendum.
CH3CHO
Disillusioned Today 08:52 am JST
It sounds quite like white supremacist, doesn't it?
CH3CHO
Joseph Cannataci, U.N. special rapporteur's one of main points was, http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Privacy/OL_JPN.pdf
Japanese proposed law
US law
I think Japanese proposed law is no more vague and subjective than US one.
CH3CHO
Goodlucktoyou Today 05:00 pm JST
You mean 70 year old Japanese farmers are uneducated? I think they fully understand what is written, if the text were presented. One of the good think about Kanji is that jargon is self-explanatory when written in Kanji.
Remember, 41% of Japanese are against the conspiracy bill and 39% are for the bill.
Goodlucktoyou
unstopable abe's big ego will see him severely telling off the UN. probably at this very moment, he has his clan drawing up a far-reaching list of sanctions against the UN and all its member states.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
@Aly Rustom Today 08:49 am JST
Yes, and the UN is being hypocritical. Because the origin of all this, the "Convention against Transnational Organised Crime" is a UN instrument. In essence, the UN is telling Japan to implement the conspiracy bill and NOT implement it at the same time.
Aly Rustom
that's BS. What he said was the security bill does not to be rushed through, but only the right wing wishes to see it rushed through because then that would give them blank the powers over everyone.
The wording of the bill is very vague and as many Japanese lawyers have stated it is open to abuse by a right-wing fascist government.
if your benchmark of freedom, democracy, and human rights is US law, that's pretty low. The Americans dropped two atomic bombs on you. They are holding human beings illegally in Guantánamo Bay.
Mr. Shimazaki, May I suggest you try to raise your human rights standards a little bit more? The United States is hardly a benchmark.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
@Aly Rustom May 24 09:37 pm JST
First, whatever the merits of this bill, it was not "rushed through". If Mr. C had even so much as bothered to check even frigging Japanese Wikipedia before opening his big mouth, he would have realized the bill has been proposed on and off for over a decade. Japan has signed the darn convention in 2001. Japan is already in year 17 or so of trying to pass a conspiracy bill with the first proposal in 2004. Rushed is not the way I'll be using to describe it.
No, it cannot be limited to a terrorist group because that's not the demand of the original convention. Further here is what the proposal says:
その他の組織的犯罪集団(団体のうち,その結合関係の基礎としての共同の目的が別表第3に掲げる罪を実行することにあるものをいう。次項において同じ。
It not only has to be a group of persons whose common purpose is to carry out the crimes enumerated in Appendix 3. It makes an additional attempt to limit by saying it has to said common purpose has to be the "fundamentals" of the association (結合関係).
And no new powers have been granted to the police since the Criminal Procedure Code is not being altered. And what do you think they do NOW to the people they feel should be watched? Well, they watch them!
smithinjapan
"The content of the May 18 letter from Cannataci was "clearly inappropriate and we strongly protested," Suga said."
Sorry, Suga, but the "shoganai" attitude to suppression doesn't extend overseas, nor does the desire to silence criticism.
The best part is how much more attention these clowns draw to themselves -- the opposite of what they want -- when they try to protest the reaction by protestors who KNOW the bill and things like it are wrong.
Aly Rustom
No the UN expressed concerns regarding the wording. And not only them.
Its the wording of the bill that allows the LDP to turn Japan into a fascist nation all over again.
Aly Rustom
excuse me. I meant blanket powers
Aly Rustom
Yes it was. And only a few days ago, Abe refused to even discuss the contents. This was reported HERE as well, so please don't go there
I think a UN official has better sources than friggin Japanese Wikipedia
Yes. And it was shot down EVERY time! Gee- I wonder why??
Of course. NONE of Abe's cheerleaders would describe it that way, but that is exactly what it is. A rushed proposal that Abe knows is not popular. He's taking a page out of the US playbook about how to ram unpopular proposals through. And only the likes of Makoto Sakurai support that.
Kazuaki Shimazaki
@Aly Rustom Today 12:50 pm JST
No the UN expressed concerns regarding the wording. And not only them
In essence, the only way to satisfy Mr. C's doubts is to not have the conspiracy bill, because no matter how you word it, you are still giving the government the power to get people at an earlier, fluffier, less certain stage than the General Part of the Criminal Law allows.
Its the wording of the bill that allows the LDP to turn Japan into a fascist nation all over again.
The wording of the bill is already conservative and tries to not make the new conspiracy charge an all-encompasser. As CH3CHO already pointed out, the wording is no worse than the US law, and the US law doesn't even try to restrict conspiracy to criminal organizations or terrorist groups.
And as yet, the Criminal Procedure is not having new changes.
drlucifer
The UN a foreign organisation is questioning, where are the people the said law changes
will affect ? They are nowhere to be seen or heard.
I know , they are busy watching food programs.
John Brown
Although I can not agree with what is going on in Japan..., how is it really any different from Republicans in the US doing what they do or any other government when they have the majority of the people on the far right in power, but only the minority backing them?
CH3CHO
While I am strongly against the conspiracy bill, I do not think UN has the right to intervene in the law making process of an independent nation.
Here he is. http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Privacy/SR/Pages/SRPrivacyIndex.aspx
A UN special rapporteur is not a UN official but an "independent expert" who is allowed to submit a report to the UN. His report has not been reviewed by anyone.
His web page shows his mandates, which, of course, does not include intervening in law making process of another country. He is clearly acting on his personal capacity using the pretense of an UN rapporteur.
Here is his letter in question. http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Privacy/OL_JPN.pdf
It is based on "according to the information received", without specifying what "the information" was and who provided "the information."
He goes on to say,
Please provide any additional information and/or comments you may have on the accuracy of the above-mentioned allegations.
to show he is not so confident of "the information."
Why can he be so arrogant as to say,
Kazuaki Shimazaki
How many people have bothered to search for the offending letter? Here it is:
http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Privacy/OL_JPN.pdf
To be honest, regardless of the merits of the bill, the letter is fairly devoid of merit. For example, the guy's first complaint was:
First, this is hard to rebutt on a "point of fact", because the fact argued is not "It makes it hard to read" but "Someone said it'll be hard to read". As long as one person, anywhere in the world, regardless of his IQ or other qualifications or the merit of his argument, mumbled that concern, this would be unimpeachable.
On the merits, this is an absurd claim. Has he actually checked the readability of real articles that use the "inline method" on large numbers of referenced articles? I have, here is an example:
And I'm pretty sure there are not 277 articles in there (the special part of the entire UK RF is only about 260-280 articles) Is this really better than putting it into an Annex?
I can go on, but let's just say, I can really understand the Japanese government's viewpoint and anger at the poor preparation shown by the rapporteur.