The Most Repressive Regimes of 1998

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The Most Repressive Regimes of 1998 

Introduction

 
    Each year, freedom House appears before the United Nations Commission on
Human Rights at its session in Geneva to present our findings and to
highlight areas of concern.  This year, we are again placing emphasis on the
most repressive regimes in the world. 
    The "Most Repressive" reports that follow are excerpted from the 1998-99
Freedom House survey, Freedom in the World.  The ratings and accompanying
essays are based on information received through the end of December 1998.
The countries we have judged to be the "worst violators" of basic political
rights and civil liberties are: Afghanistan, Burma, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea,
Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Turkmenistan,
and Vietnam.  These 13 states are joined by the territories of Kosovo and
Tibet.  These states and regions received the Freedom House survey's lowest
rating: 7 for political rights and 7 for civil liberties.  These are
societies in which state control over daily life is pervasive and intrusive,
where independent organizations and political opposition are banned or
suppressed, and where fear of retribution is rooted in reality.  Many of
these states violate the basic rights of women, suppress independent trade
unions, and restrict property rights.  In many cases, these worst violators
are guilty of systematic religious persecution, often directed at minority
faiths. 
    Unspeakable crimes continue to take place in nearly every part of the
world.  Indeed, of the 191 countries in the world, only a minority, 88, are
Free and can be said to respect basic human rights and political freedoms; a
further 53 are Partly Free, with some abridgments of basic rights and weak
enforcement of the rule of law; and 50 countries (over a quarter of the
world total) are Not Free and suffer from systematic and pervasive human
rights violations. 
    In the report to the UN, you will find information on brutal repression,
and unspeakable crimes against human dignity.  But the grim reality depicted
in this report stands in sharp contrast with the gradual expansion of human
liberty that has been progressing for the last twenty-five years.  Today,
there are more Free countries than at any time in history.  As
significantly, there are 117 electoral democracies, representing 61 percent
of the world's countries, up from 40 percent just 15 years ago.  This
progress is in no small measure the consequence of a growing global
pro-democratic and pro-human rights consciousness, which has been given
impetus by the values enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 
    However, while dictatorship and tyranny are losing their grip on much of
the world, nearly 2 billion people still live under dictatorial and
repressive regimes (including 1.2 billion people in the People's Republic of
China).  It is the hope of Freedom House that by distributing information
about the "Most Repressive" states and bringing these cases to the attention
of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, we will be aiding those
inside these countries who are engaged in a struggle to win their human
dignity and freedom and, through their courageous work, are hastening the
day when dictatorships will give way to genuine pluralism, democracy, and
the rule of law. 

Adrian Karatnycky 
President, freedom House 
April 1999

 SOURCE:FREEDOM HOUSE