Militarized approach to protests raises risk of violence – UN expert

MANILA, Philippines — A militarized approach to policing peaceful protests only increases the risk of violence, a United Nations human rights expert has warned, seeing countries are increasingly deploying military personnel to quash protests.

In a report presented to the Human Rights Council, Clément Voule, UN Special Rapporteur on the right to peaceful assembly and association, said civic space is shrinking, together with a rise in human rights violations during peaceful protests worldwide, while governments adopt an increasingly militarized approach to policing demonstrations.

“Rather than seeing peaceful protest as a democratic means of participation, too often governments resort to repression to suppress protests and silence people’s voices,” Voule said.

The expert said a global trend towards militarizing protest-policing tactics had led to an escalation of violence and human rights abuses.

Governments around the world were deploying military personnel and using military-style tactics to quash peaceful demonstrations, while also in some cases using military courts to prosecute peaceful protestors, his report added.

The special rapporteur warned that this approach was resulting in an escalation of violence and tensions, human rights abuses and increased impunity in the context of peaceful protests.

Militarized policing of protests, he said, also has a particularly intimidating effect on women protesters, who sometimes face sexual abuse as a weapon to silence them.

The report highlights disturbing trends in response to peaceful protests in crisis situations, including the widespread stigmatization of protest movements.

The special rapporteur’s report was deeply critical of the growing use of unlawful and excessive force while policing protests, including the use of lethal force.

He called on states to ensure people are not persecuted, unlawfully arrested, criminalized, tortured, killed or harmed, merely for exercising their fundamental freedom to peaceful assembly.