Chief Justice cites barriers to integration of members into Asean

MANILA, Philippines – Chief Justice Reynato Puno says distrust of foreigners and differences in approaching human rights prevent the integration of member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Speaking before the ASEAN Law Association yesterday, Puno said resistance to ASEAN integration is due to years of colonial exploitation of these countries.

“They will always greet other states with question marks, always with the suspicion that the plots to subjugate them politically or economically have not completely stopped,” he said.

“It is for this reason that these member-states protect their sovereignty with extraordinary jealousy and protect them not only against the super powers but even against each other.

“They protect their sovereignty against assaults coming not only from other states but assaults coming from transnational corporations, especially those controlled by their former colonialists.

“They resist the slightest diminution of the policy of self-determination and non-interference in their internal affairs and this stiff resistance inevitably slows down all efforts to integrate the socio-economic-political policies in the region.”

Puno said ethnic, cultural and religious heterogeneity in the region, especially on the issue of human rights, could be another reason for the slow integration of ASEAN.

“This lack of homogeneity spawns irreconcilable viewpoints on human rights – their treatment of civil and political rights, as well as economic, social and cultural rights, in the hierarchy of human rights,” he said.

Puno believes some nations in the region want first to enhance economic, social and cultural rights as a condition for the realization of other rights.

“Again, the human rights issue is preventing the quicker integration of the member-states within the ASEAN region,” he said.

“It is the most contentious issue in the ongoing debate about the efficacy of the ASEAN Charter.

“As well observed, the ASEAN Charter on human rights lacks an enforcement mechanism as it concerns itself more with the promotion and less with the protection of individual rights.”

Puno spoke following the lecture of Ambassador Rosario Manalo, the country’s permanent representative to the ASEAN.

Speaking at the Supreme Court session hall, Manalo discussed the ASEAN Charter, which was fully ratified by all 10 member states in 2008.

Puno said the challenge to the ASEAN is “how the principles so eloquently expressed (in the Charter) can be put into practice by each member state.”

“This is the time for compliance and the demand of the earliest enforcement of commitment of each member state.”

Puno said the ASEAN Charter “gives us hope where we have none before.”

“The Charter is moving from discretion-based to rules-based,” he said.

“And more importantly, for the first time, the Charter can be described as more people-oriented.”  — Edu Punay, Philippine Star