By EuAsiaNews,
Brussels : There have been great threats to rights of civil society and human rights post 9/11, particularly in light of actions taken in the name of security, the United Nations Human Rights Commissioner Navanethem Pillay warned here Wednesday.
Speaking to reporters at the end of a conference commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights hosted by the European Parliament, she said “there is a great need for intervention by my office, human rights activists and the media to guard against the trampling of fundamental rights.”
A South African national of Indian origin, Pillay was appointed as the world body’s human rights chief on 1 September.
She called for “moderation” in anti-terrorism laws and said the definition of terrorism should be focussed and a broad definition avoided.
Pillay criticised the lengthy periods of detention of terrorism suspects saying “they remind me of the terrible laws we had in apartheid South Africa which allowed 90 day period of detention.”
“I am watching out for these kind of incursions in human freedom that appear to now be prevalent post 9/11, ” she stated.
Pillay served as a judge on the International Criminal Court at the Hague before her new appointment and had earlier served both as judge and president on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.