By Hyo-Jin Paik
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

NEW YORK, United States – According to the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), the Japanese government has violated a series of human rights by detaining Greenpeace activists who uncovered corruption in the Japanese’s government’s whaling program.

While investing corruption allegations regarding Japan’s whaling program, two Japanese men, Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki, learned that although the program is referred to as a “scientific research,” boxes of whale meat were being shipped to whaling crews’ homes and then sold for personal profit.

Sato and Suzuki reported the embezzlement to the Japanese authorities.  Soon afterwards, the two men were arrested for theft and trespassing and were detained for a month.  Their trial is set to begin next Monday, and both men face up to ten years in prison.

The UN claims that the detention violates international covenants on human rights.  The UNHRC concluded that “[t]he rights of these two environmental activists not to be arbitrarily deprived of their liberty…freedom of…expression…as well as their right to engage in peaceful activities without intimidation and harassment has not been respected by the [Japanese] [j]ustice system.”

Specifically, UNHRC stated that Articles 18, 19 and 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and Articles 18 and 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political (ICCP) rights have been violated.  Japan is a party to both the UDHR and the ICCP.

Sato and Suzuki were detained without charge for 23 days, denied access to a lawyer, and interrogated for up to 12 hours a day while being tied to a chair.

Head of Greenpeace, Kumi Naidoo, said that the Japanese prime minister should order a re-examination of the allegations made against Suzuki and Sato.

Sato said, “We were investigating the corruption in the whaling industry that is funded by taxpayer’s money.  So we wanted to show the real face of the whaling industry, how corrupt this industry is, to the Japanese public.”

The stakes are high for both Sato and Suzuki being that Japan has a 99.8% conviction rates for criminal cases.  However, their lawyer said that they do have a strong argument since research activities done by NGO members based on whistleblower evidence are given the same degree of freedom and rights as activities done by investigative journalists.

For more information, please see:

ABC News – Anti-whaling activists to front court – 8 February 2010

Common Dreams – United Nations: Japanese Authorities Breached Human Rights of Greenpeace Anti-Whaling Activists – 9 February 2010

The Huffington Post – UN: Japanese Authorities Breached Human Rights of Greenpeace Anti-Whaling Activists – 8 February 2010

TreeHugger – UN Says Japan Violated Anti-Whaling Activist’s Human Rights – 10 February 2010