The recognition and protection of human rights can trigger “conflict and division” that end up dragging a country “into chaos and anarchy.” Among the limitations, there is also the control of the “practice of a cult or a religion” that must comply with the laws of a nation in which “the rights of the state ‘outweigh’ freedoms and rights of individuals.”

This is what emerges from a draft of the ASEAN Declaration on Human Rights, drafted in January during the first meeting of the Intergovernmental Commission and published exclusively by a Burmese dissident website (based in India) Mizzima News.

Among the ASEAN countries – the association that brings together 10 nations of South-east Asia, from Myanmar to Brunei – it reveals the attempt of Laos to “water down” the Bill of Rights, invoking a number of limitations in the underlying principles, in contrast, the governments of Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines want to promote a more progressive and modern version.

The draft document testifies to the hard-line request from Vientiane, which intends to impose a series of pre-conditions on the exercise of human rights and religious freedom. For the Lao government, “the application of universal human rights” must take account “of national and regional particularities” and the words “regardless of the political, economic and cultural systems” should not be inserted.

Full Story: ASEAN, Laos and Vietnam: no to human rights and religious freedom because they create chaos

Source: AsiaNews.it