With this short video clip, the Brussels-based NGO Protection International announces that one can now registerfor the online course “Security and protection management for human rights defenders and social organisations”mainly addressed to NGOs, social organizations and persons interested in the security work for HRD, their organizations and/or communities. The main aim is for human rights defenders to develop various skills, capacities and strategies to allow them to improve the level of security and protection, both for themselves and also for the people they work with. Read the rest of this entry »
reports that on 8 April 2016 that human rights defender He Xiaobo (not to be confused with Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo) was released on bail after over four months in custody in Guangzhou, Guangdong province. The workers’ rights campaigner had been detained on 3 December 2015 along with a number of colleagues and on 8 January he was formally charged with ’embezzlement’. Two other human rights defenders detained at that time, Zeng Feiyang and Meng Han remain in detention and are facing charges of “gathering a crowd to disrupt social order”. He Xiaobo runs Nanfeiyan Social Work Service Centre, an NGO campaigning for compensation on behalf of workers who have been injured during the course of their work. The centre’s registration was rescinded in 2015. https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/case/case-history-he-xiaobo.
It is not a breakthrough in the treatment of human rights defenders in China (https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2015/01/19/the-plight-of-chinas-human-rights-lawyers-worsened/) but even small good news is welcome. On the other hand, also today Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD人权捍卫者@CHRDnet) reports that 6 human rights defenders collectively received 20.5 years in prison for exercising their rights to free speech, assembly and association
Human rights lawyer and activist Ni Yulan became one of the 2016 recipients of the International Women of Courage Awardsconferred by the U.S. Department of State on 29 March. The wheelchair-bound human rights lawyer Ni Yulan from China was not present; she he told the BBC that her passport was withheld. Yulan Ni won the Dutch Human Rights Tulip in 2011.[https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/chinese-human-rights-defender-ni-yulan-freed/]
Azerbaijan’s Supreme Court has commuted a seven-and-a-half-year prison sentence against prominent human rights lawyer Intigam Aliyev, paving the way for his release after nearly a year in prison
On 7 April 2016 Azerbaijan human rights lawyer Intigam Aliyev was awarded the Civil Rights Defender of the Year Award in Stockholm by the NGO Civil Rights Defender. Released in March (see: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2016/03/28/human-rights-defender-intigam-aliyev-freed-in-azerbaijan-today/) his son Najmin Kamil came to accept the award and said, “My father dedicated his tireless and selfless work to the promotion and protection of human rights, and sacrificed his freedom for the freedom of others – just because it is important for him to stand strong for what he believes in, no matter the circumstances”.
For the second consecutive year, the FIDHhas put some of its key actions and impacts in a comic strip. These cartoons have been created in partnership with the association Cartooning for Peace, founded by Plantu. [for more posts on Cartooning for Peace see: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/cartooning-for-peace/]
A remarkably large and diversified group of some 500 film makers, writers, professionals in the area of art & culture, academics, activists and social organisations demand the release of Indian filmmaker and human rights defender Deba Rajan Sarangi in an open letter published on 3 April 2016.
They state that they are deeply shocked to hear about his arrest on 18 March, 2016, by plainclothes policemen from the Kucheipadar village of Rayagada District, Odisha. Debaranjan was in Kucheipadar to attend a funeral. He was arrested with a non-bailable warrant issued by the court of JMFC, Kashippur in pursuance of a case registered in Tikri police station of Rayagada district in 2005, when Debaranjan was actively involved in the struggle of the Adivasis in Kashipur to protect their lands from the invasion of the bauxite mining companies…
Deba Ranjan Sarangi has highlighted and critiqued policies of destructive development, unbridled mining practices, displacement, police impunity, atrocities on Dalits, Adivasi issues , growth of communal fascism in Odisha, violence on women and farmers’ suicide in the context of acute agrarian. Deba Ranjan has been put behind bars because he had the courage to show what he witnessed to the world through his expressions of film making, writing and speech. He is neither a Maoist nor a terrorist. We call upon the Odisha government to address the issues raised by the human rights defenders in the State of Odisha rather than imprisoning them and crushing the voices of film makers. We call upon the Odisha government to desist from such disgraceful attempts of violating the Indian Constitution and Indian democracy.
The link below gives a partial list of signatories:
German President Joachim Gauck (left) and Chinese President Xi Jinping are shown during the former’s recent visit to China. Photo: Reuters
Stephen Vines published a piece in on 29 March 2016 under the title “Why China acquiesced to German leader’s human rights lecture”. I think it is an excellent read that makes the case for continued ‘human rights interference” in China and not just there. I save you the trouble of finding it by copying it below:
When writing about human rights awards, I often talk about better-known international awards [https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/oxford-university-press/human-rights-awards-for-the-protection-of-human-rights-defenders-qqq8FI0qeN]. However, there are quite a few local ones that can play an important role in shaping the work of human rights defenders. Here the case of Moldova where the “Promoting Human Rights in Moldova” competition was established by the United Nations in 2004. The prizes are awarded annually to journalists or human rights defenders who have made a genuine contribution to the promotion and protection of human rights in Moldova. The prizes were awarded by the Association for Independent Press in Moldova, with the financial support of Civil Rights Defenders in Sweden.
Radio Free Europe reported proudly on 23 March 2016 that their journalists working with RFE/RL’s Moldova Service were recognized for excellence in audio and video reporting on local community and human rights issues. Reporters Mihaela Gherasim and Eugenia Pogor took first and third place in the television program category, with programs on HIV and LGBTI questions.
On 28 March 2016 the New York based Human Rights Foundation strongly condemned the convictions and sentences handed down by a court in Angola against a group of 17 youth activists for reading a book that advocates nonviolent resistance to dictatorship. The court declared the activists — including prominent Angolan rapper Luaty Beirão — guilty of “rebellion against the president” and “planning a coup,” sentencing them to prison terms that range from two to eight years. Beirao, also known by his stage name Ikonoklasta, has been an outspoken critic of the government, calling for a fairer distribution of the southern African state’s oil wealth. His term is five-and-a-half years.
Having paid so much attention to Azerbaijan in the past years [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/azerbaijan/] it would be almost unfair not to mention that the Supreme Court in Baku today released Azerbaijan’s leading human rights lawyer, Intigam Aliyev. The court converted his seven-and-a-half year prison sentence to a five-year suspended term.
[Aliyev, an award winning human rights lawyer is also chair of the Legal Education Society, which litigated human rights cases in Azerbaijan. He was one of the first Azerbaijani lawyers to bring cases to the European Court of Human Rights and has mentored a new generation of human rights lawyers in the country. In April 2015, Baku’s Grave Crimes Court convicted Aliyev on politically motivated charges of tax evasion, illegal business activities, embezzlement, and abuse of authority.]
Photo U.S. Department of State/Flickr
Source: Vice News
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 