 on Think Tech Live, broadcasting from our downtown studio in Honolulu, Hawaii, and Moana, New York. Today, we're looking at fully quality to fair and public hearing, Article 10, independent and impartial tribunal. We're fortunate enough to be able to look at the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which guarantees everyone on earth is entitled to a fair and public hearing by an independent, partial tribunal regarding any criminal charge. We're so fortunate to be able to talk with the Deputy Asia Director of Human Rights, Phil Robertson. Phil, can you tell us the state of Article 10 around Asia? Joshua, thank you very much for having me on the show. This is an issue that we look at all the time. There are a number of different countries which have judiciaries, which have effectively been captured by the ruling party and the government. You know, single-party states like Vietnam and Laos or Cambodia, where it claims it's a democracy, but in fact, it resembles Vietnam and Laos in the sense that there is one party that's completely trolled. Even countries like Thailand, which has a multi-party democracy, you know, there are certain issues that come up before the judiciary that I think the judiciary is influenced on. And when we talk about this actual right, Article 10, you know, of fair and public hearing, you know, in many places, for instance, in Cambodia, it's pretty clear that person who is being taken to trial is going to be found guilty, particularly for any sort of offense connected to civil and political rights and the exercise of people's efforts to, you know, express their views or criticize the government or try to peacefully publicly assemble, you know, organize a protest. But these sort of things are the sort of issues that governments frown on. And they use these courts and these trials to basically impose their will on people and claim that everything is done according to a rule of law. In fact, a lot of times, it's rule by law. And rule by law meaning that whatever the government or the ruling party says is the law will be enforced by the judiciary. People have actually talked about weaponization of the judiciary. In places like Vietnam, for instance, you know, it's a single party communist state. And, you know, these people are being taken into these trials where oftentimes they don't even have access to their lawyer until like two weeks before the trial. They spend as long as a year in pre-trial detention. And, oftentimes, their relatives or others are prevented from even attending the trial. The trials are usually over in a matter of a couple hours with long prison sentences imposed, often on politically motivated charges. You know, so this is not a fair and public hearing. It's not an independent and partial tribunal. And quite clearly, you know, a lot of these times, they would fall into what we would call arbitrary arrest, which is Article 9 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. You know, the Article 9, Article 10, and Article 11 of the UDH are all sort of connected because they all deal with these issues of fair and public hearings and independent and partial tribunals. And, you know, many of these people, for instance, in Article 11, you know, there's the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to the law. Well, you know, the fact that these people are being taken into these courts presumes that they're guilty. You know, there's a lot of real need for judicial reform and getting a lot of these judiciaries out of the clutches of the political elites who control some of these governments. Otherwise, you know, the whole idea of Article 10, frankly, no matter what the government says, you know, and whether it ratifies relevant international treaties connected to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, even if they ratify those things, like Laos has done, it's quite clear that there's no real effective implementation. Thank you so much. And that does lead to the next aspect. Shuman, we thank you so much for joining us. Can you share why this issue is so important in international human rights law and share a bit of why it's central and core to your life and your work for human rights? Thank you. Thank you for letting me join this panel. I think the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is an important, important reminder that even though many countries have adopted or ratified this convention, very few in this part of the world have actually implemented it. We are talking about this Article 10 and it relates very much to my own experience. Sombat Sompon, my husband, was and falsely disappearance now to come to his 11th year. Now in Laos, the rule of law actually does not exist. It's as Phil say, it's ruled by law and most people don't even know what their rights are under the law. Even though the government has the constitution and has the judiciary, it is not functioning. It just does not work. And in the specific case of my husband, he doesn't even have a chance to even appear in a court for whatever law he has broken because he has just disappeared. And this makes even things even worse and makes even a greater mockery of the issue of the rule of law. And therefore Article 10, 11, and all the actually all the articles under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Laos have just ignored it. And for ordinary people, ordinary citizens in Laos, those articles don't apply to them. And my husband is a victim, a victim of this violation of his rights. He's not even given a chance to even stand up and speak for himself, even in a kangaroo court. He cannot even talk about it. He is not even given that right. And therefore, for me, talking about Article 10, while it is I think important and relevant for me, it is very painful to think about that all this years, my husband does not even have that right. And the worst part is under enforced disappearance, we don't even know where he is. And that unknown is a major, major actually act of torture. It's an act of torture against Sombat himself, who has been disappeared. But it's also an act of torture to me, as his wife, and to the family members. I'll leave it at that. And if you have other questions, please continue. Thank you. Phil, could you share with us a bit of why Sombat Sompon's case is so important to all the people of Laos, but also of Asia and the entire world? Well, Sombat Sompon was really an innovative development leader. And we're still searching for him. We're hoping that we will ultimately find what has happened to him and be able to return him to Xuemeng and the family. But it's gone on 11 years now. We're coming up on the 11th anniversary of his enforced disappearance. He was taken at a police checkpoint in one of the main thoroughfares in the downtown of the capital city, Bianchan. We know that the police took him because there's CCTV, which Xuemeng was able to unearth, which is actually government CCTV. She actually got it from a police station. And he was last held by these police. You know, the government certainly knows what happened to them, but they're engaged in a massive cover up. And when you talk about enforced disappearance, it is, as Xuemeng mentioned, it is torture. It is torture for the person involved. It is person for the family. Even putting someone through a kangaroo court is preferable to a person just being disappeared by government officials and never seen. There's so many unanswered questions. So when we talk about Sombat, Sombat, as I mentioned, was a real innovative grassroots development leader, someone who was focused on the whole issue of rural development, which is what the Lao people so desperately need and involved in sort of innovative agricultural practices. He has so much to give to Laos. And those contributions were recognized by in the region. He was awarded the Raymond Magsaysay award, which is the sort of Asian Nobel Prize. And so I mean, this is someone who is as senior as you can get within Laos civil society. And for this sort of thing to happen to him indicates very clearly how lawless the government of Laos is, how it operates completely outside any sort of international human rights law. And, you know, again, prompts us all to recognize that we have to do more to demand that Laos tell us where somebody is and also to comply with its international human rights standards. I mean, Laos has ratified these various different international human rights conventions of its own accord. You know, no one forced the law government to ratify these conventions. But, you know, once you ratify something, you need to comply with it. And quite clearly, Laos has not even lifted a finger to comply with the international covenant on civil political rights, which contains the various fleshed out guarantees on rights that were contained in Article 10 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Thank you, Phil. And it really reminds me of his important contribution, really in sustainable development, the UN Global Goals. He was a pioneer actually doing that, rooted in the culture of his people and guarantee that everyone would have the right to food, to end poverty. And this story that began for both of you, Shiming, it was actually in Hawaii, right? Could you tell us where you met and how you were able to forge those beautiful bonds of love and a little bit about that beginning? Yes. Joshua, yes. Sombat was actually a graduate of the University of Hawaii. He graduated with a degree in agriculture. And the reason why he chose to study agriculture was because he wanted to use the knowledge and skills he learned in agriculture from a well-known university to go home, to be able to impart that knowledge and skills to most of the people of Laos, like his parents. They're all farmers, they live off the land and they need to improve their livelihoods to better production techniques, storage, and eventually to make a better living out of agriculture. That was his intention. And that's why he spent time studying at University of Hawaii for the degree in agriculture. And while he was studying, he also specifically did research on using organic fertilizers because he knew that poor people like his family and most of the farmers in Laos, they cannot afford chemical fertilizers. And so his intention was to promote a system of agriculture that is organic and sustainable and will not also be harmful to the environment. He returned to Laos after he graduated with his degree and he worked with farmers and he experimented using organic agriculture in his own farm, his parents' farm, and also with other communities. And he learned a lot. He always said that knowledge is nothing without practice. And he actually did a lot of real-life practical work with the farmers, first in the area of agriculture, but then he also realized that agriculture is only one part of the livelihoods of people. There are also other people, the women who are doing hand crafts. And so he went into holistic, sustainable community development. And he also realized in Laos, where the education level is quite low, where people don't have a lot of access to information under the communist government rule. They only told what to do. He decided that one entry point to change the situation is actually to work with young people. And his work brought him from agriculture to community development and then later focusing on developing young people to be able to resolve issues or challenges in their own lives. So he worked really hard with involving young people and he got them to think about their own issues. His focus is to get young people to analyze the challenges they face. And then he used a lot of kind of activity, taking them to young people during school holidays to the villages to get them experience and taking young people from the villages to come and experience the life of the more urban areas and have exchanges and youth camps so that the young people of Laos can exchange and talk about their own experiences and the issues and the problems they face in their own lives, in their families, in the communities. So he was doing a lot of that. And I think that might be one of the reasons that the government is concerned because like really encouraging people to think and encouraging people to try and resolve their own problems and to ask questions is something that an authoritarian government does not like. I assume and I speculate that this is probably the reason why he was taken. He was too much of a symbol of a person, an ordinary person in Laos who can take action and try to mobilize people to resolve their own problems. Thank you so much. And Bill, coming back to Article 10, which NGOs do you think are champions to create a culture of human rights? And what other major heroes or sheroes of this right are there that you see in Asia and around the world? Well, I mean, I think there are many NGOs and social society movements that are working on issues related to fair and public hearings and independent partial tribunals. You know, these are groups that range from environmentalists to development practitioners to human rights activists to people who are working on land rights issues. You name it, across the region. This actual right under Article 10 really sort of cuts across so many different areas. I was thinking about what Shui Meng has said about Sombat's work with the youth and that encouraging them to think independently and question may have been one of the reasons that the Laos government took him away. You know, we see it, for instance, in Vietnam, major issues connected to the environmental movement there, where over the past two to three years, most of the main people working on climate change and trying to decarbonize that economy through ending the use of coal-fired power plants have now been hit with bogus politically motivated charges by the Vietnam government, claiming that they're involved in tax evasion. This is just manufacturing charges that are, of course, rubber stamped by the judiciary, which is not independent and partial as a clear violation of Article 10 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and sentencing them to prisons. Going after people who encourage society to think in a different way, the kind of people who are reformers. In this case, in the case of Vietnam, these are issues now they're going to be coming up at the COP 28 meeting because Vietnam is in line to receive as much as $15.5 billion in loans and in grants for their just energy transition program. And we've been saying all along that how can you have a just energy transition program, even fact the people who are working on that program and the people who are the civil society leaders who are engaged most in trying to lay out why Vietnam needs to change its energy matrix are behind bars. It makes no sense. So we've called in fact for a delay in the implementation of the JetP program for Vietnam until all these civil society activists are released. And so far Vietnam is just stonewalling both us and the international community in claiming that there was nothing political about these arrests. When in fact we know that this is all about the Vietnamese Communist Party viewing these activists as some sort of threat to their power. So across the region, we see time and time again that authoritarian governments claim that they're all about the rule of law, but really it's rule by law. And it's the law being whatever they say it is and then expecting the courts to essentially rubber stamp this political decisions that have been made by the authoritarians going after civil society activists who are trying to reform and make lives better for the ordinary people in those countries. That's a great point. And you can see that with the cop coming up with the first ever global stock take on nationally determined contributions, but also we know next year Laos will be reviewed with their sustainable development goals under the voluntary national review to make maybe you can share but he was also using technology in great ways to make this knowledge accessible to make sure more people could participate and really popularizing human rights to make sure that everyone knows their rights and that they can be part of their positive future. Yes, some bad knowing that he works in a situation where there is really no free media, the media is highly controlled and information flow is highly controlled. So he tried to find more innovative ways of getting information out to the people, so he made a lot of videos. Some of these videos are just tank of videos about, you know, how to improve the agriculture production, how to improve storage and did a lot of that. And then also together with the videos accompanied them with small manuals and modules that even people with limited literacy can follow. And he did a lot of that, but he also did a lot of things about working in the schools and getting the schools to be more child friendly as a way to enter the school and to work with the teachers and to get them not to be so afraid of trying anything new. So he did a lot of work around his issues, but he also did a lot of work around the environment. He would go to the communities and then use even 10 years ago when Google map was first in, he would ask the people to say, look, you know, do you want to see how your land looks like? And he would use Google map and they would zoom in and then they'll be able to see their own village and also the land they work on. And he also uses the law to encourage the people to register their own land. Say that now the government has law to register your land and encourages them to register their land. So all this, it brings to his work and also getting the young people to be like volunteers to go from home to home and use simple methods to teach the people how to protect their own soil by, you know, and grow trees. And he takes the young people out to plant trees. So like in Xiangguang, which has been an area which was bombed and denuded, he then mobilized the community working with young people to reforest entire hillslopes. Many people thought that this is a joke. How can you really try and reforest entire hillslopes? But he did partly because he asked the people what kind of plants were used to grow there, what kind of plants would thrive there. And then he asked the community to also pitch in to prepare the saplings. And then he will have, you know, use the government's own propaganda about tree planting and so on, but not just one day. He will mobilize them to go out and replant whole hill sites. And you can see 10 years later that he's gone for more than 10 years. Those hill sites are all reforested, reforested. And that is one way. He always tried to do something which is practical. Somebody knew that he cannot challenge the government's authority, but he tried to use practical ways to get the people to think that they can resolve their own problems. So talking about forest deforestation in a more positive way, talking about restoring water systems in a positive way, and how to protect the environment. And somebody in his writings also say the people of Laos depend a lot on nature. And if they destroy nature, they will actually undermine their own livelihoods. And this is one way he demonstrate and work with the people to, you know, to address their access to land, their issues about understanding their own situation, not in a confrontational way. And he doesn't even talk about the word human rights, knowing that the word is taboo here because rights is supposed to be given to you by the government. And the rights that you get is only what is endorsed by the authority. So he uses practical means. But I guess even in that very try to be in non-confrontation where working, it might have annoyed some people. Or some people probably think that this could lead to him being considered a leader. And nobody can be a leader in Laos except the authority. No, and you really brought up the points that we feel here in Hawaii as well, Malama Honua, to take care of each other and our earth and understanding that our faiths are intertwined as we stand up for one another and take care of each other, but also for our planet. And it's a very fragile planet. Really, the UDH article 10 ensures full equality regarding hearings related to any charges. And the UDH outlines the opportunities for a new way forward for our world. And the UDH serves as a valuable vision rooted in rule of law with basic rights and fundamental freedoms. Phil, could you share with us maybe your vision for the future of this right? Well, I think ultimately, we need to be pressing very hard for effective judicial reform that takes judiciaries out of the control of these political parties and these governments. I mean, what we want to see is we want to see an independent judiciary that is able to uphold rule of law, that is able to be appealed to by poor people, by people who have lost their rights, and to be able to demand justice. And when people are being accused of crimes, that they should be adjudicated fairly and independently and not just become a rubber stamp. I mean, it creates cynicism around issues of rule of law when these courts are not independent. Thank you, Phil. And Shiming, your final vision for the future of this important right? I think, you know, for many people in Laos, having an independent judiciary is, of course, one of the most important right they have. But we are so far away from it that getting information out to people in whatever form. And, you know, we should be talking about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, not as a once a year event, but to make it real into our everyday life. And that depends very much on people on the ground. We have to be protectors of our own rights. And we have to talk about our rights and also educate our friends, neighbors, if they are ignorant about what their rights are, to stand up for them. For me, in Laos, that's the only way that we can get the information out. Go at it day by day, stand up for it, be an example for it. And even though, I mean, in the case of somebody, it's such a tragedy, I hope that he will remain a strong symbol of how an ordinary person can work and do what they need to do to stand up for their own rights and also the rights of the families and the communities. Thank you so much. And I know that so much of what definitely inspired me, but also an entire generation of people in Laos and around the world to really achieve the Paris Agreement and the UN 2030 agenda ahead of his time. And we thank you so much for all the work that you both do to ensure Article 10 and all 30 articles of the UDHR. Mahalo. Thank you. Mahalo. Thank you.