Three Commonwealth Nobel Peace prizewinners - the Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Nobel Peace laureate Nadine Gordimer, and Nobel literature winner Wole Soyinka, have slammed the newly proposed Commonwealth charter as "repetitive rhetoric", and called on the UK and other countries not to sign it.
In an open letter, the trio asserted that the charter fails to detail the consequences of member states violating such core principles, and said,
“We ask those responsible not to sign any charter which fails to include a credible, authoritative and specific mechanism to verify serious breaches of these principles and recommend healing and redress,”
“The Commonwealth in the 21st century must leave behind its repetitive rhetoric. It has to do more to realise its principles for the benefit of citizens. A charter which lacks improved implementation will be a service sheet for the Commonwealth’s funeral.”
Commenting on the letter, The Times, said:
'The issue is particularly divisive at present because of the long-standing accusations of human rights abuses by several larger member states, including Pakistan and India in Kashmir. The repressive measures against the Tamil minority in Sri Lanka following the end of the civil war have produced almost no response from the Commonwealth Secretariat or Mr Sharma, the former Indian Ambassador to London. Sri Lanka is to host the next Commonwealth summit in 2013.'
The charter was the key outcome of the last summit in Perth, Australia in 2011, and was to encompass the core principles and values of the Commonwealth, in terms of democracy, rule of law and human rights.
