UN body condemns death of activist Swamy in custody
JESUIT PRIEST, 84, DENIED BAIL FROM PRE-TRIAL DETENTION DESPITE SUFFERING FROM PARKINSON’S
THE United Nations said on Tuesday (6) it was deeply disturbed by the death in pre-trial detention of Father Stan Swamy, an 84-yearold Indian rights activist and Jesuit priest.
Swamy, who was detained for nine months without trial under Indian anti-terror laws, died on Monday (5) ahead of a bail hearing.
The priest, who campaigned for marginalised tribal communities, was arrested last year for allegedly inciting violence between different Indian castes in 2018. “We are deeply saddened and disturbed by the death of 84-year-old Father Stan Swamy,” Liz Throssell, a spokeswoman for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, told reporters in Geneva.
Swamy was denied bail despite suffering from Parkinson’s disease and other ailments. He was admitted to hospital in May with coronavirus and suffered a cardiac arrest last weekend. The priest had been detained under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), which effectively allows people to be held without trial indefinitely.
India’s prime minister Narendra Modi’s government has made use of the law to have campaigners, journalists, students and others arrested, in what critics say is an attempt to silence dissent. In February, the government said that almost 6,000 people were arrested under the UAPA between 2016 and 2019 and that 132 were convicted. After Swami’s arrest along with academics, lawyers, scholars and a poet, his lawyers had to fight to get him a straw to drink with since he was unable to hold a glass because of his condition.
Swamy’s lawyer Mihir Desai said the priest had not been healthy at the time of his arrest. “Both the state and central governments are to be blamed for his death through their respective agencies that handled the case,” Desai said.
Hemant Soren, chief minister of Jharkhand state where Swamy worked closely with tribal communities, said he had been “strongly opposed to his arrest and incarceration”. The federal government “should be answerable for absolute apathy and non provision of timely medical services, leading to his death,” he tweeted.
Throssell said given the severe impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, countries – India included – should release everyone detained without a sufficient legal basis, including those held simply for expressing dissenting views.
“We stress, once again, the high commissioner’s call on the government of India to ensure that no one is detained for exercising their fundamental rights to freedom of expression, of peaceful assembly and of association,” the spokeswoman said.
“High commissioner Michelle Bachelet and the UN’s independent experts have repeatedly raised the cases of Father Stan and 15 other human rights defenders associated with the same events with the government of India over the past three years, and urged their release from pre-trial detention,” said Throssell. “The high commissioner has also raised concerns over the use of the UAPA in relation to human rights defenders – a law Father Stan was challenging before Indian courts days before he died.”
Eamon Gilmore, European Union Special Representative for Human Rights, tweeted Swamy was jailed “on unfounded charges”.