Drafters slam watered-down bill banning torture and enforced disappearances

Academics and legal experts criticised the edited version of the bill at an academic seminar at the Faculty of Law at Thammasat University yesterday, concluding that “improvements” to the bill by the Rights and Liberties Protection Department were inconsistent with international accords and likely to fail to provide justice.

The so-called improvements were done at the suggestion of the National Legislative Assembly (NLA).
The new version of the bill had many serious issues, such as limited punishment for officials who order torture and enforced disappearances, the omission of the non-derogability principle, and vague definitions and punishments, which would cause problems for law enforcement, the forum heard.
The non-derogability principle refers to certain human rights that are considered to be absolute.

The seminar was arranged on the 14th anniversary of the disappearance of human rights lawyer Somchai Neelapaijit, who was allegedly abducted by government officials in Bangkok.
Ronnakorn Bunmee, a lecturer at the faculty and member of the bill’s legal drafting team, said the first draft had been turned down by the NLA and revised by the Rights and Liberties Protection Department, incorporating several problematic changes in the content.

“One prominent problem of this version of the law against torture and enforced disappearance is Article 32, as the command responsibility for crimes is limited, as only direct supervisors of offenders in the enforced disappearance cases will also be guilty in their subordinate’s crime,” Ronnakorn said.
“This issue in the bill will make it impossible to punish higher-ranking officers who order the torture and abductions of other people and seriously obstruct litigation. It is difficult to identify offenders in torture cases, as in reality many victims of torture do not know the assailants or even remember their faces.”
Moreover, he said the non-derogability and non-refoulement principles in the first version of the law were removed in the new version, which would prevent law enforcement in emergency situations and allow the refoulement, or the return of refugees, of people to places where they risk torture and enforced disappearances.
He added that definitions in the bill such as “torture” and “serious practices” were vague and could lead to legal interpretation problems.

Sanhawan Srisod, a human rights laws expert at the International Commission of Justice, also said it would be harder to litigate enforced disappearance cases, as Article 6 of the edited version specified that offenders had to fit both criteria of depriving people of their freedom and hampering their actions.
Rights and Liberties Protection Department deputy director-general Nongporn Roongpetchwong said the bill was currently in the process of public hearings, which would finish in the next 30 days.
Nongporn added that after the public hearing, the department would submit the bill and comments from the hearing to the Cabinet and NLA.
She also said the bill would become law soon, as Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha had said he favoured a law to deter torture and enforced disappearance, while the government had recently announced human rights protections as a national agenda.