Norway’s human rights dialogues

Norway has started to cooperate more closely with countries where there are human rights challenges but at the same time potential for improvement through dialogue and contact. Currently, Norway is engaged in formal human rights dialogues of this kind with China, Indonesia and Vietnam.

The overriding aim of these bilateral human rights dialogues is to strengthen the dialogue partner’s adherence to the international human rights framework. Contacts at political level are a key part of the dialogues, together with the building of networks between the civil service, judicial system, academia and NGOs in the two countries. Mutual trust between the partners is a prerequisite for successful dialogue.

 

The purpose of the dialogues

The purpose of the dialogues is to improve the human rights situation in the dialogue partner countries by forging links between actors at various levels. Contacts at political level are a key element in the dialogues. Equally important is the work to facilitate network building between the countries’ civil service, judicial system, academia and NGOs. Such networks together with contact between experts facilitate exchange of information, concerns and criticism against a backdrop of mutual trust and respect. It is also important to implement joint projects in the areas covered by the dialogues, with a view to making a difference in concrete terms. 

Mutual trust is a prerequisite for the dialogues; the aim is not to impose the Norwegian societal system onto our dialogue partners. We must listen to our partners and find out what they themselves consider to be the most pressing human rights problems and which measures they believe will be most effective.

Engaging in talks and discussions, and posing critical questions regarding the human rights situation stimulate reflection and may give rise to ideas about what measures can be taken by both sides. Having said this, an important principle is that having a human rights dialogue with a country must not prevent Norway from being able to voice its disapproval of human rights violations in that country, for instance in multilateral forums.

Human rights dialogue is just one of a number of measures that can be used to improve the human rights situation in a country. The working methods, level of intensity and choice of topics may vary from one dialogue to another. Cooperation in multilateral forums has become an increasingly important part of the dialogue efforts in recent years. This means that it is no longer just the human rights situation within the partner country that is the subject of dialogue, but also international cooperation on human rights issues.

On the basis of an independent evaluation (in May 2002) of the human rights dialogue with China, Norway’s human rights dialogues have been altered so as to focus on fewer topics. In time, this will make it possible to go into more depth on individual topics. Emphasis has also been placed on developing good, targeted project activities in the priority areas to ensure continuity of dialogue and better results.