Saudi activist Wajeha al-Huweidar’s once said: “All Arab regimes are members of the United Nations and have ratified the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, granting justice and equality, duties and rights to all human beings. However in our male chauvinist countries, women are considered a private property of the family. In all Arab countries, without exception, there is open discrimination against women.”
Now thanks to Valentina Colombo, Research Fellow of IMT Lucca, we get a better insight into how Muslim countries deal with human rights and violence against women.
In a recent article published in Hudson New York entitled Human Rights vs. Sharia: Violence Against Women, Valentina Colombo pointed out that Arab countries are parties to various international agreements that indicate that the relationship between Islam and human rights is cruicial. This is seen, for example, by their participation in the 1990 Declaration on Human Rights in Islam, the 1994 Charter on Human Rights, and the 2005 OIC Covenant on the Rights of the Child in Islam.
It seems, however, that when it comes to UN conferences (as opposed to conferences organized by Muslims themselves), Arab countries are more cautious. Take for example the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Violence Against Women (CEDAW). This Convention has been ratified by over 90% of the United Nations member countries, including 46 out of 57 members of the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC). However, these Muslim OIC countries ratified CEDAW with “reservations.”
Saudi Arabia, for example, signed CEDAW with the following “reservations”:
(1). In case of contradiction between any term of the Convention and the norms of Islamic law, the Kingdom is not under obligation to observe the contradictory terms of the Convention.
(2). The Kingdom does not consider itself bound by paragraph 2 of article 9 of the Convention and paragraph 1 of article 29 of the Convention.”
Paragraph 2 of article 9 reads as follows:
“States Parties shall grant women equal rights with men with respect to the nationality of their children.”
Paragraph 1 of article 29 reads:
“Any dispute between two or more States Parties concerning the interpretation or application of the present Convention which is not settled by negotiation shall, at the request of one of them, be submitted to arbitration. If within six months from the date of the request for arbitration the parties are unable to agree on the organization of the arbitration, any one of those parties may refer the dispute to the International Court of Justice by request in conformity with the Statute of the Court.”
So why does Saudi Arabia and other OIC countries insist on ratifying CEDAW with “reservations”? A former President of the National Society for Human Rights in Saudi Arabia puts it this way: “There are people considering some behaviors like a violation of human rights, while we consider them a way to safeguard human rights – for example executions, amputation of the thief’s hand, flogging of the adulteress. There are people believing that all forms of Koranic punishment violate human rights. We, in Saudi Arabia, belong to the world as far as general principles of human rights are concerned. But in our country we follow the laws of Allah, so that what for others is a violation of human rights for us is a duty against whoever has committed a crime”.
Think about it. Did Saudi Arabia and other OIC countries really sign off on CEDAW? Sure, their signatures appear on that document as countries that ratified CEDAW, but wouldn’t their “reservations” (or qualifications) effectively nullify their ratification? In the first place, why would any conference organizer agree to a “with reservation” ratification? Should participants sign off if they agree with the text of the declaration, or if they don’t agree, shouldn’t they just don’t sign off? By allowing “with reservation” ratifications, wouldn’t there be confusion all round, even among Muslim countries where interpretation of Sharia (or Syariah) laws differ from place to place? And where do Muslim women and children stand in these countries that ratified CEDAW “with reservations?” Is Saudi activist Wajeha al-Huweidar correct in saying that “in all Arab countries, without exception, there is open discrimination against women?” If so, what can be done to end such discrimination?
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