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President of Association of World Citizens, Rene Wadlow, in discussion with scholars and experts to reveal the truth of violations of taxpayer’s rights
On the 7 th day of human rights watch trip to Taiwan , Rene Wadlow, president of Association of World Citizens, visited human rights activists in Taiwan on December 12. Rene met with the well-known international law firms and experts and scholars, sharing his experiences of promoting human rights in the UN system. The experts included Attorney Lin Tian-cai, chairman of Commission of Taxpayer's Rights Protection of Chinese Association for Human Rights, Professor Chih-lung Chen, director of Taiwan Criminal Law Association for Financial Study, and Professor Lukas Lien from Chinese Culture University . President Wadlow, who has been promoting human rights over forty years, pointed out that the law enforcers should have a heart of kindness and mercy to avoid repeated accounts of human rights violations.
Lin Tian-cai, chairman of Commission of Taxpayer's Rights Protection of Chinese Association for Human Rights, stated that many initiatives were made by private sectors and non-governmental organizations to promote taxpayer's human rights. The initiatives included conducting the survey of taxpayer's human rights, setting up the website of Taiwan's taxpayer' s human rights watch, making the indicators of Taiwan's taxpayer's human rights reform, pointing out the top ten most serious alarms of human rights violation and holding the press conference of endorsement for ending unjust tax cases, etc. In order to promote the idea of human rights protection, the association has held academic conferences regularly or irregularly and cooperated with schools to provide law education about taxpayer's rights. Besides, Attorney Lin is the chairman of the Taipei , Kinmen and Matsu branches of Legal Aid Foundation, taking care of the issues, such as Children's and women's human rights and human trafficking. He hopes that collective efforts could be made for human rights development.
Dr. Lukas Lien pointed out that it is common in Asia that governments commit structural crimes by law. Taiwan is not an exception. He suggested that Taiwan Criminal Law Association for Financial Study could cooperate with the United Nations and form a research team which conducts investigations of the human rights infringement cases. The research conclusions could serve as a memorandum. Moreover, the members of AWC comprise more than fifty nations. They could make reports of the situations in their countries as references to help human rights promotion.
President Wadlow stated that when the UN members present the human rights reports, they should be criticized openly by the civil organizations, and academic researchers are allowed to attend the conference. It is so in Geneva . The committee members invite some representatives of private sectors, scholars and experts to the discussions. During this trip in Taiwan , President Wadlow read all national reports about the two international covenants and the shadow reports. He found that a great deal of statistics was included in the reports; yet, he pointed out that the statistics are like the structure of a body. The reports still need flesh for supplement. Public opinions could be adopted as the flesh of the reports. President Wadlow also suggested Taiwan to listen to people's voice when implementing the two covenants and to allow experts to participate.
President Wadlow pointed out that “ban of overseas travel” is against the two covenants. It violates right of travel and freedom. In Taiwan , it matters a lot because people have a lot of opportunities to go abroad for study or business trips. Ban of travel should be decided by judges and should be used carefully. He read a report which noted that more than twenty thousand people are banned from making overseas trips.
President Wadlow not only shared his experiences in the UN, but showed his passion of human rights promotion. The human rights crusader at the age of 70s make the trip of human rights watch all the way from Geneva to Taiwan with deep passions, devotions and commitments. His passion never diminished by the tight schedule, which touched many human rights organizations, scholars and experts. He also pointed out that countries and societies need law to uphold justice, but besides the law, mercy and compassion are also needed. If the law enforcers and even all of us could treat others with compassion and mercy, we will have much less human rights violations.
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