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FIGHT THROUGH CARTOONS – ZUNAR

July 18, 2019

Zunar’s latest book (July 2019), entitled Fight through Cartoons: My Story of Harassment, Intimidation & Jail (Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Editions, 2019) is a stark departure from his previous books. Indeed, this is not a collection of cartoons, but a narration of his creative process, a reflection on the impact of his cartoons, as well as a contemplation of his journey as a political cartoonist in Malaysia, particularly during the critical political era between 2009 and 2019. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/04/04/satire-as-a-weapon-malaysian-cartoonists-showed-the-way/]

Organized in a chronological manner, this book presents the development of the artist’s works on the background of the important events, issues and political crises that have influenced his creativity.. threats, intimidation and imprisonment, for himself and his assistants; arrests; the confiscation of his books; the rummaging of his office by the authorities; pressure placed on his publisher and printer; as well as the mental and physical attacks led by supporters of the previous government on his exhibitions, his works and his person.

Starting with an introductory chapter about Malaysian politics by Sukhbir Cheema, the writer, cartoonist and co-founder of Eksentrika who helped Zunar to publish this book, readers are exposed to important issues in Malaysia such as the history of government, laws related to the media and publication, such as the Printing Presses and Publication Act and the Sedition Act, self-censorship as well as the Malaysian political background as the context of Zunar’s works and its impact on freedom of speech in this country…

In the following chapters, Zunar describes his creative process in detail by focusing on the publication of several political cartoon magazines with his cartoonist friends, such as Gedung Kartun (2009); Perak Darul Kartun (2009);and Isu Dalam Kartun (2010), as well as his major books 1 Funny Malaysia (2009); Cartoon-O-Phobia (2010); Even My Pen Has A Stand! (2011); Pirates of the Carry-BN (2012); The Conspiracy to Imprison Anwar (2014); Lawak & Lawan (2012); Ini-Kartun’Lah(2013); Ros in Kangkong Land (2015); Wasabi (2016); Sapuman: Man of Steal (2015); and his most popular book to date,  Ketawa Pink Pink (2018).  Beforehand, he briefly mentions his previous jobs, revealing that he once worked as a construction labourer, a factory worker and a laboratory assistant in a government hospital before finding success as a political cartoonist.

……the book describes in detail how each of his cartoons and books became controversial as a result of actions taken by the authorities, who stopped their distribution and their sale, despite early titles such as Gedung Kartun (2009) having received permission to be published by the Home Ministry. His other books have received the same treatment, because his cartoons expose the corruption scandals that are rampant in the country, involving in particular former Prime Minister Najib Razak and his extravagantly rich wife Rosmah Mansor. They also touched on critical issues such as the mysterious death of opposition activist Teoh Beng Hock; Anwar Ibrahim’s imprisonment; the murder of Altantuya, and the 1MDB scandal. Zunar’s cartoons have been considered a threat to public order. They were therefore declared illegal and he was dragged to the police station, detained, sentenced in court and thrown into jail. All of this is described carefully by Zunar in this book…Just as he is detailed and systematic in his creative process, Zunar also adopts the same attitude to overcome all the threats and obstacles he and his assistants had to face as a result of his cartoons. Just as he prepared his cartoons carefully, he also prepared his strategy and faced each arrest with calm, contacting his friends in the media in order to publicize his arrests, especially through the Internet and the social media. Zunar’s case shows the importance and power of the Internet and social media to influence the new political scenario in a global world, and in this country. Zunar’s strategy can serve as a guide for any cartoonists, writers or artists facing similar threats and situations.

Zunar’s philosophy is captured in the sentence: “How can I be neutral?  Even my pen has a stand”…..Zunar’s book also shows that he is not alone in his fight. His assistants, his friends, his supportive wife, his lawyers, the media, international cartoonist associations and his faithful supporters from all around the world have all contributed to Zunar’s success and played a role in his “fight through cartoons”.

The book can be purchased here.

https://www.zunar.my/news/fight-through-cartoons-a-book-with-historical-fight-and-smartly-cartooning-strategy/

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Important Report to help you understand Human Rights Grantmaking

July 18, 2019

785 foundations in 43 countries made  23,000 grants totaling  $2.8 Billion in 2016

The Advancing Human Rights initiative is a research project to document the landscape of foundation funding for human rights and track changes in its scale and priorities. It uses grants data to map the human rights issues addressed, funding strategies used, and populations and regions served. For those considering human rights-related grantmaking for the first time, this website offers an introduction to the field.

With limited resources and immense challenges, now more than ever human rights grantmakers and advocates are asking critical questions about the human rights funding landscape: Where is the money going? What are the gaps? Who is doing what? The Advancing Human Rights initiative is a collaboration between Human Rights Funders Network and Candid, in partnership with Ariadne and Prospera, to track the evolving state of global human rights grantmaking by collecting and analyzing grants data. The goal is to help human rights funders and advocates make more informed decisions, discover opportunities for collaboration, and work more effectively.

It is a very well structured and easily accessible document. Remarkable is that human rights defedners as a category receive only 1% of all grant money while – perhaps predictably – youth and women together score some 46%. However, it is likely that human rights defenders are the recipients of many of the grants but that these are categorised differently.

https://humanrightsfunding.org/

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‘Lost Childhoods’ – an interactive graphic novel exposing child abuse in Nigeria – awarded at BAFTA

June 20, 2019
On 18 June 2019 Al Jazeera – with understandable pride – reported that its AJ Labs has won a ‘One World Media award‘ for “Lost Childhoods”, an interactive graphic novel exposing child abuse in Nigeria.
Journalist-photographer Marc Ellison receiving the award in London on Monday evening [One Media World]
Journalist-photographer Marc Ellison receiving the award in London on Monday evening [One Media World]

The winning entry – Lost Childhoods: How Nigeria’s Fear of Child ‘Witchcraft’ Ruins Young Lives – was praised on Monday for its interactive investigation into the practice of branding children and young adolescents as “witches”. “Combining graphic novel imagery with film, this highly accessible piece effectively covers a major human rights issue,” One World Media organisers said from the awards gala at London’s British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA).

Blamed for family illness, sudden financial loss or other misfortunes, the children are often beaten, locked into cages, branded with hot knives or made to undergo costly “exorcisms” performed by so-called “prophets” in local churches. With little choice but to flee, many children end up as drug addicts and living in rubbish dumps or on the streets.

AJLabs teamed up with journalist-photographer Marc Ellison and Nigerian illustrator Samuel Iwunze to unearth the facts of this under-reported story. Working meticulously with local fixers, NGOs and child psychologists, Ellison was able to expose the practice that has taken hold in parts of the Niger Delta and that has partially been fuelled by myths propagated by the Nigerian film industry.

Lost Childhoods employs a mix of visual and textual formats, including comic/graphic novel illustrations to preserve anonymity and portray past events. Carlos Van Meek, Al Jazeera’s director of Digital Innovation and Programming, said, “This story, in particular, is a skilful weave of investigations, videos, photos and illustrations that brings to light disturbing physical, emotional and religious abuse against children. Our goal is – and always will be – to make an impact that leads to positive change at the local and international level.”

As further testament to the production, AJLabs worked with NGOs to translate the graphic novel into local languages for distribution within communities, schools and churches in Nigeria, in an attempt to educate people and end the practice of scapegoating innocent children and branding them as witches.

Nigeria witchcraft

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FORUM-ASIA: human rights defenders face severe risks in Asia

June 4, 2019
The latest report by the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA) found that human rights defenders in Asia are at high risks. “In Asia, we are witnessing more and more human rights defenders being subjected to increasingly severe forms of violations, particularly killing, simply for defending human rights,” said Sejin Kim, Programme Manager of FORUM-ASIA.

The report titled “Defending In Numbers: Resistance in the Face of Repression” exposes 688 cases of human rights violations affecting 4,854 people across 18 different countries in Asia, and analyses current and emerging trends of violations against human rights defenders, including journalists, civil society organisations, advocates and their family members, throughout 2017-2018.

Besides that, the report also reveals that “violations have become more extreme, and the safe space in which human rights defenders can work have increasingly shrunk”. State and non-state actors openly threatened these defenders, something which played a key role in creating a dangerous climate for them. In fact, according to the report, there were 164 cases where physical violence was used against human rights defenders, and 61 of these cases resulted in death. The majority of these cases occurred in the Philippines (48 per cent) and India (25 per cent). Concerningly, most of the perpetrators of these killings remain unknown, a reality which perpetuates impunity in the region…. In the period under review, a staggering 327 cases of judicial harassment were recorded across 17 countries which include the (arbitrary) arrest and detention of human rights defenders; the misuse of the law and the passage of repressive laws aimed at criminalising human rights defenders; and the denial of a fair trial.

..

Although threats and harassment endanger all defenders, but certain groups are particularly targeted like prodemocracy defenders, who are vocal critics of state repression; and land and environmental rights defenders, who are targeted by state and non-state actors competing to access natural resources and/or implement mega-development projects. Women human rights defenders, who challenge gender norms and power structures, also ranked high among the most affected groups. Gender-based violence, including online attacks and harassment, were common tactics used against women human rights defenders.

Human rights defenders face severe risks including killing in Asia, says FORUM-ASIA

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UN High Commissioner to present her Human Rights Report 2018 to Civil Society

May 29, 2019

On 14 June 2019 the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Ms. Michelle Bachelet will present the UN Human Rights Report 2018 to Civil Society. The event wil take place from 14:00 to 15:00 on Friday, 14 June, in the Ground Floor Conference Room at Palais Wilson. Please note that the meeting is limited to NGOs holding annual accreditation with UNOG (confirm by 11 June to zghanem@ohchr.org).
However the electronic version of the Report is already available on the Office’s website: https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Publications/OHCHRreport2018.pdf

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Ethiopia: a progress report by DefendDefenders made public on 7 May

May 7, 2019

In a new report launched 7 May 2019, Turning the Page: Rebuilding Civil Society in Ethiopia, the regional NGO DefendDefenders examines the challenges faced by Ethiopian human rights defenders amid the ongoing reform process and makes concrete recommendations for rebuilding a robust and inclusive civil society ahead of elections planned for 2020. Despite some positive developments, serious gaps remain, the report concludes and rights-based organisations in the country currently lack the capacity to keep pace with these developments. This report outlines several avenues donors and international organisations can use to help effectively rebuild civil society in Ethiopia, such as capacity-building activities, and areas of focus like psychosocial support.

“I believe that the role of HRDs and civil society is prescient in ensuring that ideals of democracy and open civic space are not only achieved in Ethiopia, but offer a roadmap to other African countries,” says Hassan Shire, Executive Director of DefendDefenders. “This report should not only highlight the many achievements of Ethiopia in the last year, but also acknowledge the uneasy road ahead and make concrete recommendations to mitigate potentially negative outcomes.”

After a 13-year crackdown on civil society (hundreds of killings and the arrest, arbitrary detention, and torture of thousands of peaceful protesters), amid internal pressure, Dr. Abiy Ahmed was appointed as the new Prime Minister In April 2018 and began a series of reforms aimed at opening political and civic space in the country. This has been accomplished by releasing thousands of political prisoners and granting them amnesty, and accepting previously banned groups back into the Ethiopian political mainstream, in addition to the appointment of prominent women to positions of power within the government. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/02/12/human-rights-defender-yared-hailemariam-back-in-his-homeland-ethiopia-after-13-years/]

However, concerns remain over the top-down nature of the reforms, as well as gaps in the economic, security, health, and legal sectors. This report also contains a detailed analysis of the new Civil Society Organisations Proclamation, with commentary on the provisions that mark an improvement, as well as remaining concerns.

Questions over how to achieve accountability for past and ongoing human rights violations remain, with concerns regarding civil society’s lack of capacity to effectively support such endeavors, as well as the state’s ability to constructively handle this process.

While the majority of the country’s media remains state-owned, small publications and online outlets have flourished since the reform process began. The ongoing liberalisation of the media sector raises concerns over the rise of online hate speech spurred by ethnic nationalism.

Women HRDs remain at risk in the country, with rigid social norms often preventing their active participation in public life or human rights organisations. Women also often lack access to justice, especially in cases of female genital mutilation and sexual and gender-based violence, as well as access to positions of power in the government.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and other sexual minority (LGBT+) HRDs remain a critically unaddressed group within Ethiopia’s burgeoning human rights movement, partially rooted in the country’s religious and conservative value systems, in addition to lack of prior experience and sensitisation. Mainstreaming LGBT+ organisations into the wider rebuilding of Ethiopian civil society will be paramount to addressing these gaps.

Forthcoming elections scheduled for May 2020 offer a critical test for the country with questions over what role civil society will be ready to play ahead of, and during, a free and fair poll, and whether there is sufficient capacity to conduct effective democratic sensitisation campaigns and monitor polls.

A properly functioning national coalition of HRDs is paramount to effectively rebuild civil society, however, issues remain with regard to the inclusion of previously marginalised groups. If these efforts are successful, Addis Ababa also bears the potential to become an important Ubuntu Hub City for HRDs from across Africa, with welcoming policies regarding migration, refugee rights, and institutional support from international organisations and diplomatic missions. For more information, please contact communications@defenddefenders.org.

https://www.defenddefenders.org/publication/turning-the-page-rebuilding-civil-society-in-ethiopia/

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Report “Indigenous World 2019” launched on 24 April in NY

April 24, 2019

On 24 April 2019, at the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in New York, IWGIA released The Indigenous World 2019, an extensive yearbook presenting a comprehensive, global overview of the developments indigenous peoples experience. The book documents an increasing trend towards the harassment and criminalization of indigenous peoples and communities. It also highlights the rising tensions between states and indigenous peoples, shrinking civil society space, loss of land rights and lack of access to justice for indigenous peoples to enjoy their rights.

“Indigenous peoples make up 5% of the world’s population, yet they represent 15% of the world’s poorest, and in 2017, half of the approximately 400 environmental and human rights defenders killed. The numbers for 2018 are as-yet-unknown, but this troubling trend hasn’t seemed to stop,” Julie Koch, IWGIA Executive Director, says. “We need to do more to protect, learn from and support indigenous peoples and their traditional, sustainable practices as key actors in ensuring a safer and more equitable world.”

In 2018, there has been an increase in the documentation and reporting of illegal surveillance, arbitrary arrests, travel bans preventing free movement, threats, dispossession and killings of indigenous peoples. We have witnessed instruments meant to protect indigenous peoples being turned against them, through the use of legislation and the justice system, to penalize and criminalize indigenous peoples’ assertion of their rights. [see e.g. https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2017/08/08/9-august-international-day-of-the-worlds-indigenous-peoples-un-experts-see-increasing-murder/]

“The intensification and exploitation of natural resources is leading to a global crisis for indigenous peoples’ rights,” Koch says. Many indigenous peoples live in the Earth’s last remaining biodiversity hotspots and are often called the “guardians of the forest”. Several studies have shown that tree cover loss is significantly reduced on indigenous land compared to non-indigenous controlled land.

See also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2017/07/15/documenting-the-killings-of-environmental-defenders-guardian-and-global-witness/

Tensions are rising between states and indigenous peoples

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The 2019 World Press Freedom Index launched on 18th of April

April 20, 2019

Published every year since 2002 by Reporters Without Borders (RSF), the World Press Freedom Index is an important advocacy tool based on the principle of emulation between states. Because it is well known, its influence over governments is growing. Many heads of state and government fear its annual publication. [for 2018 see: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/01/30/world-press-freedom-index-2018-is-out-colorful-but-disheartening/]

The Index ranks 180 countries and regions according to the level of freedom available to journalists. It is a snapshot of the media freedom situation based on an evaluation of pluralism, independence of the media, quality of legislative framework and safety of journalists in each country and region. (It does not rank public policies even if governments obviously have a major impact on their country’s ranking. Nor is it an indicator of the quality of journalism in each country or region.)

Along with the Index, RSF calculates a global indicator and regional indicators that evaluate the overall performance of countries and regions (in the world and in each region) as regards media freedom. It is an absolute measure that complements the Index’s comparative rankings. The global indicator is the average of the regional indicators, each of which is obtained by averaging the scores of all the countries in the region, weighted according to their population as given by the World Bank.

The degree of freedom available to journalists in 180 countries and regions is determined by pooling the responses of experts to a questionnaire devised by RSF. This qualitative analysis is combined with quantitative data on abuses and acts of violence against journalists during the period evaluated. The criteria used in the questionnaire are pluralism, media independence, media environment and self-censorship, legislative framework, transparency, and the quality of the infrastructure that supports the production of news and information. Click here for more information

The press freedom map, which is distributed in print and digital versions, offers a visual overview of the situation in each country and region in the Index. The colour categories are assigned as follows: good (white), fairly good (yellow), problematic (orange), bad (red) and very bad (black).

https://rsf.org/en/ranking

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Hurst Hannum wants a “radically moderate approach” to human rights

April 20, 2019
Hurst Hannum in his Fletcher School office
Hurst Hannum. Photo: Alonso Nichols
A piece by Taylor McNeil in TuftsNow of 19 April 2019 is about Hurst Hannum and his latest book Rescuing Human Rights: A Radically Moderate Approach (Cambridge University Press). Disclaimer: he and I are old acquaintances but have not seen each other for decades. I agree with much of what he says.

Hannum, a Fletcher School professor of international law, argues for bringing human rights back to the center of law and politics, while at the same time trying to define their role more carefully. Too often, he says, human rights are linked to just about everything, from punishing international crimes to seeking redress for nefarious corporate behavior and environmental degradation. “Human rights have come to mean almost anything to anyone,” Hannum said. “If something means everything, it means nothing. What we risk losing is a much narrower but more universal approach, focusing on the basic rights—civil, political, economic, social, and cultural—that government should be responsible for.”

Since the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights was set forth as “a common standard of achievement” every country in the world has ratified at least one human rights treaty, and most have ratified a half-dozen or more. Hannum is aware that implementation leaves much to be desired, but said that “continued emphasis on ensuring those rights that a country has already recognized is most likely to be the best way forward.”

….“While the contemporary world may seem bleak, apartheid is gone, authoritarian regimes have largely disappeared from eastern Europe and Latin America, and rights are more widely respected in countries as different as South Korea, Nepal, Tunisia, Taiwan, and Mongolia,” he said. “Many of these changes can be attributed at least in part to greater awareness of and demands for human rights, even though progress is often slow and difficult.” ..

Beginning with the Carter administration in the late 1970s, human rights became a focal point for U.S. foreign policy, “although they were never the only or most important factor in determining policy,” Hannum said. Since the Clinton presidency, the U.S. has focused increasingly on promoting democracy, not human rights per se. Hannum thinks that’s a mistake. “Obviously, democracy and human rights are related—all of the things that go into making a democracy are human rights,” he said. “But since the end of the Cold War, we’ve been pushing democracy as the solution to all problems, and it turns out that it’s not.” 

Unrealistic expectations of what democracy or a free-market economy can achieve “may help to explain the recent success of nationalists and populists, who often define democracy simply as elections, ignoring the essential human rights components of freedom of assembly, association, and expression that give such elections legitimacy,” Hannum said.

He also takes aim at human rights advocates who claim more for human rights than they can deliver—especially those who “confuse human rights with outsiders intervening in all sorts of way to fix other countries,” he said. “Human rights are about persuading governments to institute reforms within their own countries, not about imposing them from the outside.”

While he fully understands the desire to expand human rights efforts to deal more directly with contemporary problems, “we can achieve more if the goals are modest,” Hannum said. Of course, he knows that “Let’s try to achieve moderate success!” is not going to be a popular rallying cry, but he argues that such an approach seems radical these days “only because it seeks to retain the consensus and universality on which human rights are based.”

https://now.tufts.edu/articles/reviving-human-rights

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Council of Europe’s Dunja Mijatović presents her first annual report

April 9, 2019

Dunja Mijatović

Dunja Mijatović

Today the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović, presented her first annual activity in a debate before the Parliamentary Assembly of the organisation. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2018/04/03/dunja-mijatovic-starts-her-term-as-council-of-europe-commissioner-for-human-rights/]

While the report covers a variety of the most pressing human rights issues in the Council of Europe member states, the Commissioner highlights migration, women’s rights, human rights of persons with disability, the protection of human rights defenders and the safety of journalists as the most recurrent topics of her work.

“Migration is among the most pressing human rights issues on my agenda”, she says. “National authorities should improve the treatment of immigrants, asylum seekers and refugees, and put human rights and the principle of responsibility sharing at the centre of their migration and asylum policies”.

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