二、关于公民权利和政治权利 II. On
Civil and Political Rights
美国政府肆意监控民众，震惊世界；监所滥用酷刑引发关注；选举弊端和权力掣肘积重难返，损害公民利益。
The U.S. government took liberty
in monitoring its citizens, which shocked the world. Tortures in the U.S.
prisons raised concerns. Elections and the checks-and-balances systems were
plagued by malpractices and inefficiency, impairing civil interests.
政府对民众实施大规模监控肆无忌惮。前中央情报局雇员爱德华·约瑟夫·斯诺登揭露了一项由美国国家安全局实施的电子监听计划——“棱镜计划”。根据这个计划，美国情报机构利用微软、谷歌、苹果、脸书、雅虎等9家互联网公司及一些大型通信服务商提供的数据，肆意追踪民众的私人关系与社会活动。（见注9）
The U.S. government exercises
massive and unrestrained information tapping on its own citizens. Edward
Snowden, a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) employee, revealed a
tapping program carried out by the National Security Agency (NSA), code-named
PRISM. Under the program, the U.S. intelligence, by virtue of data provided by
nine Internet companies, including the Microsoft, Google, Apple, Facebook, and
Yahoo, and other major telecom providers, tracked citizens’ private contacts
and social activities recklessly (www.washingtonpost.com, June 7, 2013).
《华盛顿邮报》网站2013年6月7日披露，美国国家安全局和联邦调查局通过接入一些网络公司的中心服务器，直接接触用户数据，实时跟踪用户电邮、聊天记录、视频、音频、文件、照片等上网信息，全面监控特定目标及其联系人的一举一动。《纽约时报》2013年9月29日披露的政府文件显示，美国国家安全局从2010年11月开始，允许情报官员利用该局搜集的大量美国公民个人资料，辨识他们的来往对象、特定时间点所在的位置和旅伴等个人信息。这项监视行动通过分析美国人的电话和电子邮件记录，将电话号码和电子邮件串连成一条“联络链”，把大量美国公民的个人隐私暴露在政府面前。英国《卫报》网站2013年6月6日披露，美国最大通信服务提供商之一韦里孙通信公司每天都必须向美国国家安全局提供其系统内所有电话通话的信息，包括通话双方的电话号码、地点、通话时长等。德国《明镜周刊》网站2013年9月7日报道称，美国国家安全局内部文件显示，美国情报机构有能力监听苹果手机用户数据、安卓系统设备以及曾被认为非常安全的黑莓手机。美国国家安全局通过开发破解程序，可以获取三大智能手机平台的用户数据，包括联系人列表、短信流量和用户位置数据等。美国国家安全局对一款苹果设备进行电脑同步跟踪后，其脚本程序至少可以代理访问苹果手机的38项功能。
The website of The Washington Post revealed on June 7,
2013, that the NSA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) were tapping
directly into the central servers of some Internet companies, and users’ data,
extracting their emails, chats, audio and video data, documents and photos in
real time, and putting certain targets and their contacts under full
surveillance. According to a government document disclosed by The New York Times on September 29,
2013, the NSA, since November 2010, had been exploiting its huge collections of
U.S. citizens’ data to identify their associates, their locations at certain
times, their traveling companions, and other personal information. The scrutiny
program, which links U.S. citizens’ phone numbers and e-mails in a “contact
chain”, exposed large amount of citizens’ privacy to the government. The
website of the Guardian, a British newspaper, revealed on June 6, 2013, that
one of the largest U.S. telecommunications providers, the Verizon Business
Network Services Inc, was required to provide to the NSA all the telephony
metadata within its system, including telephone numbers, locations and call
durations. Germany’s Spiegel Online
reported on September 7, 2013, that internal NSA documents showed that the U.S.
intelligence has the capability of tapping user data from the iPhone, devices
using Android as well as BlackBerry, a system previously believed to be highly
secure. The NSA developed cracking programs and tapped users’ data held on the
three major smart phone operating systems, including contact lists, SMS
traffic, and location information about where a user has been. The NSA is able
to infiltrate the computer a person uses to sync their iPhone, and the script
programs enable additional access to at least 38 iPhone features.
《新闻报》2013年6月14日的报道称，九大主要国际公民自由联盟发表联合声明，认为美国联邦政府开展的秘密情报监视项目“棱镜计划”违反国际人权公约。联合声明指出“如此庞大而无孔不入的监视行为违反了隐私权和言论自由权两项最基本的人权。”
The journal.ie reported on June
14, 2013, nine major international civil liberties groups issued joint
declaration that the U.S. federal government’s secretive scrutiny program,
PRISM, is a breach of international conventions on human rights. The joint
declaration said, “Such vast and pervasive state surveillance violates two of
the most fundamental human rights: the right to privacy and to freedom of
expression.”
美国联邦禁毒人员及其他特工通过与美国电话电报公司合作，不仅可以获取该公司所有客户的电话记录，而且可以获取所有通过该公司交换机的电话记录。（见注10）《洛杉矶时报》网站2013年9月26日报道，美国联邦调查局在国内调查时长期使用无人机对美国民众进行秘密监控。美国司法部在2012年初长达2个月的时间里，秘密获取了美联社编辑和记者20条电话线的通话记录。（见注11）
The U.S. federal narcotics officers
and other agents, in cooperation with American Telephone & Telegraph, can
not only gain access to all the clients’ phone records, but also all the phone
calls made through the company’s telephone exchangers (The Huffington Post,
December 20, 2013). The Los Angeles Times’
website, www.latimes.com, reported on September 26, 2013, the FBI has long used
drone aircraft in domestic investigations, exercising clandestine surveillance
over the public. The website also reported, the U.S. federal prosecutors secretly
obtained records of telephone calls from more than 20 telephone lines belonging
to The Associated Press and its journalists in a two-month period in early 2012
(www.latimes.com, May 13, 2013).
监狱对囚犯实施非人道待遇。单独囚禁服刑人员的现象极为普遍。据报道，在美国监狱中，单独囚禁的服刑人员被关在缺乏通风和自然采光的狭窄牢房内，很难与其他囚犯接触，身心受到严重损害。（见注12）在美国，被单独囚禁的囚犯有8万人，仅加利福尼亚州就有1.2万人。位于加州的佩利肯湾监狱有超过400名囚犯单独囚禁的时间超过10年。这些囚犯一天中有23个小时被单独囚禁在长3.5米、宽2.5米的牢房内。（见注13）有的甚至被单独囚禁达40年以上。（见注14）纽约州监狱中每天有3800名囚犯被单独囚禁。（见注15）49岁的囚犯威廉·布莱克在仅有一张铁床的牢房内竟然被单独囚禁26年。（见注16）2013年，联合国人权理事会酷刑问题特别报告员门德斯多次就单独囚禁酷刑问题向美国发出指控函。他指出，即使较短时间的单独囚禁也可能构成酷刑。（见注17）加利福尼亚州监狱3万名囚犯从2013年7月8日开始绝食，要求监狱改变单独囚禁政策，绝食抗议持续了2个月。（见注18）
Inmates treated inhumanely in
prisons. The use of solitary confinement is prevalent. According to news
reports, in U.S. prisons, inmates in solitary confinements are enclosed in
cramped cells with poor ventilation and natural lights, isolated from other
prisoners, a situation that will take tolls on inmates’ physical and mental
health (www.bbc.com, June 12, 2013). About 80,000 U.S. prisoners are in
solitary confinement, including nearly 12,000 in California. The California’s
Pelican Bay prison has more than 400 prisoners who have been in isolation for
over a decade. In many cases, the inmates are isolated for up to 23 hours per
day in cells measuring 3.5 by 2.5 meters (www.reuters.com, August 23, 2013).
Some have even been held in solitary confinement for over 40 years (www.cbc.ca,
October 4, 2013). In the prison system of the New York state, about 3,800
prisoners are in solitary confinement every day (online.wsj.com, Feb. 19,
2014). The then 49-year-old prisoner, William Blake, had been held in solitary
confinement for 26 years, locked in a cell furnished with only one iron bed
(www.dailymail.com, March 15, 2013). In 2013, the United Nations Special
Rapporteur on torture Juan Mendez repeatedly urged the U.S. government to
abolish the use of solitary confinement. He argued, even short-term solitary
confinement can be counted as torture (www.bayview.com, October 14, 2013). In
California state prisons, 30,000 inmates began hunger strikes on July 8, 2013
in protest of the use of solitary confinement. The hunger strikes lasted two
months (www.latimes.com. September 15, 2013).
2014年1月29日，英国《每日邮报》网络版刊登了纽约摄影师斯科特·休斯顿拍摄的亚利桑那州监狱里囚犯生产生活情况。图像显示，在该监狱，囚犯在进行劳动、吃饭时都被戴上脚链，每队5人被锁在一起，每人之间只有9英尺。休斯顿说，囚犯戴着脚链站成一排劳动的场景让他想起了过去的奴隶制时期，仿佛回到了200年前。
On January 29, 2014, the British Daily Mail’s web edition published New
York photographer Scott Houston’s photos featuring working and living
conditions of inmates in Arizona State’s prisons. The images show, inmates are
shackled together while working and eating, five on one chain, with just nine
feet between them. Houston said, he was left with the impression that the chain
gangs working together were similar to the days of slavery. “You could go back
200 years.”
选举成为部分人的游戏。大量调查结果显示，美国人对政策制定的影响力与他们的财富水平呈正相关性，70%的人在收入水平、财富等方面处于劣势，对政策制定几乎没有任何影响，相当于被剥夺了参政的权利。仅有1‰的美国人可以真正影响政策的制定，真正得到他们想要的东西。（见注19）美国公民的参政热情日渐下降。2013年5月举行的洛杉矶市长选举只有23.3%的注册选民参加投票，当选市长得到222300张选票，仅占注册选民的12.4%。（见注20）
Election becomes the game of a
few. A great number of researches showed that the American’s influence on
policy is proportional to their wealth. About 70 percent of the population, who
are on the lower wealth and income scale, have virtually no influence on policy
whatsoever. They are effectively disenfranchised. Only a tenth of one percent
essentially get what they want, i.e. they effectively influence policies
(www.salon.com. August 17, 2013). The U.S. citizens get less and less
enthusiastic about election. The mayoral election of Los Angeles in May 2013
only had 23.3 percent of the city’s registered voters cast a ballot. And the
winner got 222,300 votes, just 12.4 percent of the registered voters
(www.latimes.com, June 11. 2013).
民主制衡演变为权力掣肘。2013年10月1日，由于民主、共和两党未能就“患者保护和平价医疗法案”达成一致意见，国会没有通过预算拨款案，联邦政府除核心部门外不得不停止运作。美国斯坦福大学民主、发展与法治研究中心资深研究员弗朗西斯·福山在2013年10月4日的《华盛顿邮报》网站上撰文指出，美国的制衡制度逐渐演变成一种“否决政体”，即代表少数人立场的各种政治派别可以阻止多数派的行动，并阻止政府采取任何行动。美国政府“关门”事件正是恶性权力制衡导致的结果。一项新的民意测验显示，美国人是抱着对政府极度悲观的态度走入2014年的。他们对政府能否或者是否会解决国家的最严重的问题不抱希望。根据美联社——公共事务研究中心的民意测验，一半受访者认为美国的民主体制需要“大量的改变”，或者来一次彻底的转变。（见注21）2014年1月，美国总统在国情咨文中对美国争论不休的民主机制进行评判时表示：“当这种争论达到阻止民主的最基本功能的发挥，彼此的分歧迫使政府关门、威胁美国信仰和声誉的程度时，就说明这种做法有问题”，“成千上万的美国人也厌倦了这种陈腐的政治争论。”（见注22）
The checks-and-balances system
has become an impediment to actions. On October 1, 2013, the U.S. federal
government, except for its core functions, entered a shutdown, after Congress
failed to pass the budget bill as the Democrats and Republicans failed to agree
on the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.” Francis Fukuyama, a senior
fellow at Stanford University’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule
of Law, wrote in an article published on October 4, 2013, on The Washington
Post’s website, the American system of checks and balances gradually becomes a “vetocracy”.
“It empowers a wide variety of political players representing minority position
to block action by the majority and prevent the government from doing anything.”
The U.S. government shutdown is the very result of such vicious checks and
balances. A new poll found “Americans entered 2014 with a profoundly negative
view of their government, expressing little hope that the government can or
will solve the nation’s biggest problems.” According to the poll conducted by
the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, half respondents said American
system of democracy needed either “a lot of changes” or a complete overhaul
(www. huffingtonpost.com, January 2, 2014). The U.S. president, in his State of
the Union Address in January 2014, also criticized the U.S. democratic system
full of bickering and debates. “When that debate prevents us from carrying out
even the most basic functions of our democracy – when our differences shut down
government or threaten the full faith and credit of the United States – then we
are not doing right by the American people.” |
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