Communist Web Thursday 2nd March 2000 9.30pm gmt "It shames all of us" The Chairman of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) has called for the mandatory sentencing laws in Western Australia and the Northern Territory to be immediately overturned. "If this is not done by the States themselves, then the Commonwealth must act before more people who shouldn't be in prisons die in custody", said Geoff Clark. "It should not have taken the threat of international humiliation to provoke action on this issue, but if that's what is needed to force the Prime Minister's hand, then so be it." Mr Clark will be in Geneva next week, and hopes to speak to the United Nations Commissioner on Human Rights, Mary Robinson, "to make clear the level of opposition within Australia to these draconian laws". The news that the Mary Robinson will investigate Australia's mandatory sentencing laws has been widely welcomed but not by the Prime Minister and his Liberal Party colleagues in the Northern Territory and Western Australia, who present the investigation as "interference" in Australia's domestic affairs. The Federal Government could easily have avoided the embarrassment of the UN investigation by using its powers to override the mandatory sentencing laws which violate international law and human rights standards. The NSW Aboriginal Land Council (NSW ALC) has renewed its calls for the Prime Minister to show his support for the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. "Our Prime Minister has loudly... http://www.billkath.demon.co.uk/cw/its/its.html
