HRC must investigate DIRCO's failure to protect South Africans abroad
The execution of Janice Linden by Chinese authorities raises serious questions about whether the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) has done enough to protect the human rights of South Africans abroad.
I will today be writing to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) to ask that DIRCO's protection of the rights of South African citizens outside of the country be investigated.
The Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, said today in a reply to a parliamentary question that South Africa's foreign policy decisions are informed by a "desire for a just, humane and equitable world".
And yet her Department repeatedly fails to protect the human rights of South Africans on foreign soil, particularly when it involves countries that are deemed to have strategic importance for South Africa.
Other examples include the following: