SEANF Paper on Migrant Workers I. Rationale for Engagement by the South East Asia National Human Rights Institutions Forum (SEANF) on Issues of Human Rights and Migration With the adoption of the ASEAN Charter and the creation of the three ASEAN Community Councils and their associated blueprints, ASEAN is rapidly moving to fulfill its vision of full economic integration by 2015. The support of the people of ASEAN will be critical to the success of this integration, a fact recognized by H.E. Surin Pitsuwan who said upon taking up the office of ASEAN Secretary-General that “…to be successful and meaningful in building the ASEAN Community our 560 million people must be part of this historic mission. This is, in fact, clearly stated in the ASEAN Charter.”1 The Charter calls for “facilitated movement of business persons, professionals, talents, and labour” yet the regional frameworks for regulating labour mobility and managing migration are still in nascent stages. On January 13, 2007, at the 12th ASEAN Summit in Cebu, the Philippines, the ASEAN leaders adopted the ASEAN Declaration on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of Migrant Workers, thereby establishing that treatment of migrant workers is a preeminent human rights challenge for ASEAN. Article 22 of the Declaration tasks the governments to “develop an ASEAN instrument on the protection and promotion of the rights of migrant workers, consistent with ASEAN’s vision of a caring and sharing Community…” The ASEAN Foreign Ministers subsequently agreed to set up an ASEAN Committee on the Implementation of the ASEAN Declaration on the Protection and Promotion of Rights of Migrant Workers (ACMW) to carry forward the regional work on migration. ACMW has created a Drafting Committee on the ASEAN Instrument for the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of Migrant Workers composed of representatives of four governments (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand). The Drafting Committee is now working on a first draft of the ASEAN Instrument called for in Article 22 of the Declaration. During 2010, the Drafting Committee may decide to hold national consultations and make several rounds of revisions to the draft Instrument, and in fact, the SEANF strongly urges the Committee to do so. The SEANF hopes that clear and continuous 1 H.E. Surin Pitsuwan, Statement at ASEAN Secretary-General office transfer ceremony, Jakarta, Indonesia, January 7, 2008, downloaded at www.aseansec.org 10