The Fremantle Declaration by the State Attorneys General reiterates Australia’s obligations under international human rights treaties.  Australia is a party to those treaties.  They set out the baseline measure of decent treatment of human beings.  The Fremantle Declaration is a clear statement of values which are basic to Australian society.

Mr Ruddock is not a signatory to the Fremantle Declaration.   He, and the Howard government, are in flagrant breach of its principles.  The Howard government has done nothing to help Hicks despite credible, repeated claims that he has been held in solitary confinement for years and has been repeatedly  subjected to ill-treatment including sleep-deprivation.  The Howard government has done nothing to help Hicks even though he has not broken any Australian law, any American law or any Afghan law.  The Howard government has abandonned David Hicks to his fate, despite overwhelming evidence that the ‘trial’ to which Hicks will be subjected falls below the standard required in ordinary criminal trials. 

Notoriously, the Howard government has held people in immigration detention, sometimes for many years, even though those people have committed no offence.  This has involved gross traumatisation of refugee children and adults.  This policy has repeatedly been criticised by international authorities as breaching Australia’s human rights obligations.  The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission reported that the treatment of children in Australia’s detention centres was ‘cruel, inhumane and degrading’.

The Howard government’s anti-terror legislation, administered by Mr Ruddock, provides for people to be gaoled without trial and without the person being told the evidence against them.  It provides for people to be placed under house arrest for up to 12 months, without knowing the evidence against them.  It allows people who are not suspected of any offence to be ‘disappeared’ for up to a week.

The Fremantle Declaration sets out principles which should be embraced by all civilised people.  We call on the Federal government to sign it.