Focus on Minorities
Minority rights, as applied to ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities and indigenous peoples, are an integral part of international human rights law. Like children and migrant workers rights, minority rights require a legal framework designed to ensure that a specific group that is in a vulnerable, disadvantaged or marginalized position in society is able to achieve equality and is protected from persecution. Minority rights cover protection from discrimination and persecution, protection and promotion of identity, and participation in political life.
In Southeast Asia, there are varied experiences regarding minority issues within different countries dependent on specific historical, economic, social, political, geographic and other factors. Despite this reality, common problems affecting minority communities are identifiable. Often these are related to the existence of structures or systems that have the effect of either perpetuating the marginalization of minority communities from decision-making or of unfairly benefiting majority populations or dominant groups in the economic, social and political life of the country.
What SEARCH is Doing
SEARCH, through FORUM-Asia, seeks to work with partner organizations in the region to strengthen their capacity to build awareness and protection of minority rights among ASEAN nations. Key activities have focused on personal legal status and restorative justice for indigenous people, including:
- Developing the skills of ethnic youth to undertake digital social networking;
- Establishing deep social networks for ethnic youth in the Philippines, Thailand and Cambodia;
- Implementation of pilot projects to test strategies which bring both concrete solutions to human rights issues, and at the same time, educate actors and stakeholders, and contribute to possible policy reform;
- In cooperation with the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples of the Philippines, implementation of a civil registration project in the Philippines for indigenous people, including training of deputized Barangay Registration Agents;
- Implementation of pilot project on personal legal status for highland peoples in Thailand. The results from this project will provide inputs to the collective work of the Thai- based Statelessness and Birth Registration Working Group;
- Testing an innovation on restorative justice for the Meuang People with the Vietnam Lawyers' Association through a community workshop and an action plan focusing on training 'conciliators' to enable them to effectively address commune issues. Training was informed by research on ethnic minority practices in dispute resolution, part of which focuses on juvenile justice.
- Mainstreaming concerns of ethnic minorities and/or indigenous peoples increasingly in ASEAN wide human rights initiatives led by SAPA, the Working Group for an ASEAN Human Rights Mechanism, ASEAN and/or ASEAN Governments;
- Training on CEDAW monitoring for ethnic and indigenous women, conducted in cooperation with the UNIFEM and the Asian Indigenous Women's Network (AIWN);
- Building capacity for human rights monitoring and advocacy amongst member groups and networks.