We have just received a copy of an open letter from Amnesty International Canada to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper in advance of his upcoming trip to the forthcoming APEC meeting in Singapore, followed by a visit to India. The letter urges Prime Minister Harper to uphold Canada's well-known reputation as a staunch human rights supporter by raising concerns with and presenting recommendations to Singapore authorities regarding the case of Dr. Chee Soon Juan and other civil society representatives and to address ongoing human rights challenges in India. Below is an excerpt from the letter, followed by a link that will allow you access to the letter in full.

Singapore has two realities: its appearance as a progressive country with regular elections and economic success; and its record of human rights violations designed

...

Amsterdam and Peroff have a new white paper discussing the case of opposition leader Dr. Chee Soon Juan in Singapore. The introduction of the executive summary of the report is below, followed by a link for downloading the full paper.

Introduction

This White Paper documents the repression of political freedoms in Singapore. It reviews how the Government of Singapore, under the leadership of the People's Action Party (PAP), has monopolized the state's apparatus to its own benefit. The result has been the denial of democratic rights and freedoms and the muzzling of domestic and international media.

The case of Dr Chee Soon Juan is examined in detail. Being the leader of one of Singapore's most important opposition parties - the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP)

...

An interesting piece in Asia Times Online highlights the recent efforts on behalf of Dean Peroff and Robert Amsterdam to gain observer status for the Singapore Democratic Party, led by dissident Dr. Chee Soon Juan, from the Liberal International.  With the pressures of the economic crisis stirring protests in many countries, the authoritarian rulers of Singapore have clamped down even further on the population with the passage of the Public Order Act (POA), allowing virtually any arrest for any public demonstration.

The SDP's nomination was championed by Dean Peroff, from the international law firm Amsterdam & Peroff. In passing the unanimous motion, Peroff maintained that Singapore's political order was authoritarian, autocratic, run by a one-man system and that SDP's new observer status to Liberal International ...

Somebody out there in academia should really do a study of how various authoritarian states throughout history have continued to organize elections, despite a glaring lack of democracy.  For some, the election has always been an exercise in mockery - leaders such as Fidel Castro, Robert Mugabe, and Saddam Hussein always seemed to enjoy impossible margins of victory with over 90% of the vote in their favor.  Other countries, which may be described less as authoritarian and more like adjective-laden democracies, practice a much more subtle manipulation of the process - often focused on barring any competition and other measures to skew the level playing field - and end up with more reasonable, yet always predictable, margins of victory.Hugo Chavez's regime in Venezuela, for example, may have mastered ...

Robert Amsterdam has a letter published in today's Telegraph on the Singapore case. Democracy in Singapore Sir – This week, the Singaporean opposition party leader Dr Chee Soon Juan and 17 others are standing trial on unlawful assembly charges, which are likely to result in punitive prison sentences. These charges are unconstitutional, given the right to freedom of assembly outlined in Singapore’s constitution.

As noted, the Singaporean opposition leader Dr. Chee Soon Juan is appearing before court this week to fight preposterously trumped up charges of having participated in a protest without a permit - only the latest in a series of ruinous lawsuits and legal actions aimed at depriving him and his political party of their constitutionally guaranteed rights to free speech. I am assisting Dr. Chee with his international legal defense, along with many others. Below is his dramatic, landmark speech presented in court today before District Judge Chia Wee Kiat. Your Honour, My associates and I have been charged under the Miscellaneous Offences Act (MOA) for participating in an assembly as well as a procession on 15 March 2008. We had assembled outside Parliament House to mark World Consumer Rights Day (WCRD) which is celebrated by an organisation called the Consumers ...

Today Diane Francis writes about Robert Amsterdam's work in Singapore defending Dr. Chee Soon Juan. Fortunately, a team of lawyers, led by Canadian law firm Amsterdam & Peroff in Toronto, has been set up in order to help Dr. Chee defend himself in court and to embarrass Singapore before the world for its failure to uphold the rule of law. The team is headed by Bob Amsterdam (who defended Mikhail Khodorkovsky and other high-profile Russians against the oppressive Putin regime), U. K. defamation expert Anthony Julius (who represented Lady Di) and American law professor William Burke-White. "The Singaporean authorities are using the law to repress political rivals and as punishment," Amsterdam said in a phone interview from his headquarters in London. "It's a myth that Singapore is a democracy, a complete myth."

This afternoon and evening I have put in a number of hours working on the case of Dr. Chee Soon Juan to prepare for the events of next week (read more here and here). I've been doing a lot of reading, and making many calls to various contacts, and I've discovered that many in Singapore believe that this man's tireless and heroic efforts somehow impairs the image of the country. There are some who express open distaste in what he is doing based on the "cultural relativism" argument, and others who are openly afraid to be involved in any way in his defense. Both arguments I have encountered before in other contexts and in other countries. I can only say that respect for opposing views is not the property of any one single culture. Further, ...

Many readers of this blog are already familiar with the Singaporean pro-democracy activist and opposition politician Dr. Chee Soon Juan, who has published a number of essays on this blog. His organization's tireless struggle to assert basic constitutional rights has direct parallels to the struggle for justice in Russia, and the similarities between these two illiberal authoritarian capitalist systems are clear and abundant. Like many in Russia, Dr. Chee's efforts have brought about a severe and unjust crackdown from the state, who appear to be seeking to jail him once again following an upcoming trial on Oct. 22nd. I'm pleased to announce that my law firm has agreed to represent Chee Soon Juan and his party on a pro bono basis, to assist him in every way possible to continue his good work to bring democracy to Singapore. I ...