The international human rights expert who chairs Northern Ireland's Bill of Rights Forum has countered criticism of the project from the Church of Ireland Gazette.
Chris Sidoti yesterday rejected claims made in an editorial published last week by the Gazette, which argued against a new Bill of Rights specific to Northern Ireland.
Claiming the arguments in favour of a Northern Ireland Bill suffered from "an astounding lack of clarity", the Gazettesaid: "There are those in the Stormont establishment who want a Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland, as opposed to the UK as a whole, because they want Northern Ireland to relate more closely to the Republic of Ireland than to the rest of the UK."
Yesterday, however, Mr Sidoti said there were five main reasons why he believed there ought to be a Bill of Rights for the North, although he stressed that an eventual decision on whether or not to proceed was one for the people.
Mr Sidoti argued that a Bill would help "cement the peace".
"Northern Ireland is a society rising out of conflict and suffering," he said. "As the 1998 [Belfast] Agreement itself recognised, the new shared future of Northern Ireland must be one built on human rights. A Bill of Rights is the best sure means of achieving that."
The second argument in favour was based on the need to address the "legacy of conflict".
"The universal experience is that it is simply impossible to draw a line under the past and pretend that it never happened. Like it or not, societies ultimately are forced to confront their demons," Mr Sidoti said.
He argued therefore that while people in Northern Ireland can be protected under the general UK law, they could also benefit from their own Bill of Rights that addresses the legacy of their recent history.
Turning to the question of the future, Mr Sidoti further argued that a Bill of Rights could stand as a shared achievement for the local community. An agreed, short and simple document, he said, would act as a "common standard" for legislators and the governed and set the tone for the future while helping to break from the past.
The fourth argument, Mr Sidoti claimed, rested on the case that a Bill of Rights could ensure a workable mechanism for implementing domestic and international law protecting human rights.
Such a measure "must be appropriate to the constitutional, political and legal systems of Northern Ireland," he said. "That is how international standards are applied to domestic situations." Lastly, Mr Sidoti said a Bill could ensure that every member of society enjoyed their human rights equally.