There isn't a country in the world where a married couple has monopoly of the only armed institution in the country and of the central immigration office. This only happens in Panama. No government in the states that comprise Latin America would think of denying that fundamental Human Rights "are those which belong to each individual by virtue of his human dignity." Only the Panamanian government does that through declarations from the ministers of Government and Justice and Foreign Relations.
Equally, not one chief of police in any country in Latin America (regardless of how repressive), nor a public servant with the rank of director of a state institution, would forget or deny that those fundamental rights "are inherent to human beings and precede the existence of the state, therefore they are above the state."
The displaced is a person forced to migrate, not because of catastrophic events of nature or humanitarian measures as protection from hostile acts, but because of brutal acts of terrorism that affected his original rights.
How do we make this clear to the Barés couple and the ministers over which Mireya Elisa Moscoso Rodriguez presides along with Arturo Vallarino and Dominador Kaiser Bazan, assisted by Carlos Alvarado and Adan Arnulfo Arjona from the Legislative Assembly and the Supreme Court, respectively, assisted by Alvin Weeden and Jose Antonio Sossa from the Comptroller and Attorney General offices?
How can Panamanian citizens, respectful of human dignity and its inalienable rights, make it clear to this type of officials that rule over Panamanian state institutions that the Inter-American Institute of Human Rights, in its technical meeting over Permanent Consultation About Internal Expatriation in the Americas, held in San Jose on April 15, 1993, stated: "forced expatriation is all migration due to causes related to situations in which violence injures or endangers the essential nucleus of fundamental rights to life, integrity, individual liberty, and personal safety." Or is it that their protégé at the International Penal Court, Elizabeth Odio, didn't explain this to them during her tourist visit to force out any Panamanian from the position as judge in the new UN Court?
Defense Counsel for the Panamanian People and Colombia (see El Panama America, April 29, 2003) decided to form a joint commission to clarify the acts of aggression denounced by the United Nations' High Commissioner for Refugees in view of the physical abuse, harassment and torture suffered by 109 Colombian expatriates who were forced by Panamanian authorities to abandon Panamanian territory. This is further evidence that police and migration authorities in Panama are inclined to violate the international agreements on Human Rights to which protégé Panama subscribes and are Law of the Republic.
Carlos Barés, director of the National Police, has criticized the Panamanian Ombudsman as "irresponsible" because he acted according to the law and initiated an investigation of the events. As if that weren't enough, Barés "said that the Ombudsman, as well as any other Panamanian authority, regardless of its position, must protect and defend the sovereign and national interests of the Republic of Panama." In other words, in the present state of the world in which fictitious state boundaries are crumbling to benefit the rights of the people; when the international community multiplies its organized efforts to assist more than 27 million refugees in the world; at a time when governments should not stop the consecration of the internationally recognized right to humanitarian access; the attention to vulnerable sectors of the displaced population such as women, children, elderly and indigenous people, Panamanians have to shoulder the embarrassment and shame of the caveman vision of the director of the National Police, the national immigration director and other high officials when it comes to matters of human rights.
The forced repatriation practiced by the Panamanian government against displaced Colombians is a multiple transgression. This conduct violates international humanitarian and human rights law because it attacks the rights acknowledged by Articles 6, 7, 9, and 26 of the International Convention for Civil and Political Rights (adopted by Panama in Law 15, October 28, 1976).
The acute violence in neighboring Colombia and the attitude of Panamanian authorities toward displaced Colombians remind us of Bertold Brecht's teaching: "...Each one of us, walking through the multitudes with torn shoes, gives testimony of the shame that today covers our country. But not a single one of us will remain here. The last word remains to be said."
Miguel Antonio Bernal is a law professor at the University of Panama, a radio and print journalist and a political activist.
Also in this section:
CFP, Proposed tax hike for Americans working abroad
Bernal, How Panama treats displaced Colombians
Jackson, Mireya's ban on investigating corruption
Gutman, School of the Americas was THAT bad
Girvan, The Greater Caribbean This Week
HRW, Ashcroft attacks human rights law
