Archive for the 'Human Rights Defenders' Category

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Helen Nolan on Human Rights Defenders

March 28, 2022

On March 25, 2022 the Stimson Centre published a wide-ranging piece by Helen Nolan on Human Rights Defenders and what their possibilities are in an international environment: “Protecting Those Who Protect Human Rights: Opportunities and Risks for Action at the UN“

The extensive article starts with the adoption by the UN General Assembly of the Declaration on Human Rights Defenders in 1998. Then it examines possibilities for further state action at the UN to increase the safety and security of human rights defenders. It outlines major trends, gives an overview of UN efforts, and sets out key instruments and state commitments in relation to human rights defenders. It then explores key risks and opportunities for strengthening UN action, offering recommendations for member states to advance this agenda and better ensure that human rights defenders everywhere are able to freely and safely undertake their vital work.

Helen Nolan is an international human rights lawyer. Through the International Service for Human Rights and ILGA World, as well as working for Front Line Defenders and the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Helen Nolan has expertise in human rights defender protection. Helen Nolan has in-depth knowledge of the UN human rights system and advocacy before its mechanisms. She worked most recently with the United Nations Development Programme in Viet Nam. Helen Nolan holds degrees from Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, and Essex University, United Kingdom.

See the full article in the link below:

Protecting Those Who Protect Human Rights: Opportunities and Risks for Action at the UN

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Bolsonaro’s “indigenous medal” is giving awards a bad name.

March 26, 2022
Jair Bolsonaro

Indigenous leaders said Jair Bolsonaro had spent three years promoting legislation that would open their territories to commercial development. Photograph: Adriano Machado/Reuters

Tom Phillips on 17 March 2022 reported how the Brazilian Government honours a president who activists accuse of undermining Indigenous protections.

Brazilian activists are outraged after Jair Bolsonaro – who has been accused of spearheading a cataclysmic attack on Indigenous rights – was honoured by his own government for his supposedly “altruistic” efforts to protect Indigenous lives.

Bolsonaro was granted the Medal of Indigenous Merit on Wednesday in recognition of what the justice ministry called his attempts to defend Indigenous communities in the South American country.

The same honour was bestowed upon key Bolsonaro allies, including his health, defence and agriculture ministers and the hardline institutional security chief, Augusto Heleno, who has accused Indigenous activists of committing crimes against the state by criticising the government’s policies overseas.

Indigenous leaders reacted to the award with disbelief and exasperation, noting how Brazil’s far-right president had spent three years undermining its Indigenous and environmental protection agencies, Funai and Ibama, and promoting legislation that would open Indigenous territories to commercial development.

The Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil criticised the government’s “contemptuous gesture”. “They want to destroy us at all costs and, as if that wasn’t enough, they now want to pay tribute to themselves in our name?” the group said, claiming Bolsonaro deserved only “the medal of Indigenous genocide”.

Alessandra Korap, an activist from the Amazon’s Munduruku people, said Bolsonaro needed to be arrested, not honoured “for all the destruction he has inflicted on Indigenous people and the forest”. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2020/10/14/brazilian-alessandra-korap-munduruku-wins-2020-robert-f-kennedy-human-rights-award/]

“Now he wants to use the Ukraine war [as justification] for allowing mining, oil and gas exploration, hydroelectric dams and soy plantations on Indigenous lands,” Korap added, in reference to recent moves to fast-track draft legislation allowing such activities.

Alessandro Molon, the lower house leader of Brazil’s opposition, urged Congress to strip Bolsonaro of the medal. “It’s a mockery that the same government that is trying to legalise mining on Indigenous lands – endangering the existence of these utterly persecuted and mistreated people – has the nerve to award itself medals of ‘merit’ for all of the harm it has caused over the past three years,” Molon told the magazine Veja.

“If Congress doesn’t overrule this absurdity it will be associating itself with this unprecedented assault on Indigenous people,” Molon said.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/17/contemptuous-anger-in-brazil-as-bolsonaro-given-indigenous-merit-medal

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Sudanese Fadia Khalaf, Defender of the Month of March

March 25, 2022

DefendDefenders’ regulary chooses a Defender of the Month. Here an example:

Fadia Khalaf was not meant to be an activist. By her own admission, she was born into a conservative Muslim family – the first of six siblings. In Saudi Arabia where she was born and raised, the ruling ideology in the Kingdom was wahabbism – a puritanical version of Islam in which women are strictly expected to stay in the background and not play any public role. Yet even in that conservative setting, she managed to nurture a political consciousness:

“I think reading at young age helped build my awareness on concepts like justice and rights in general. I was exposed to concepts around human freedom, and that nurtured the rebel in me,” she says. Fadia Khalaf Tweet

Now aged 25, Fadia is the Co-founder of Missing Initiative, a volunteer, youth organization dedicated to documenting all persons that are reported missing during Sudan’s ongoing political crisis. The initiative was started in the aftermath of the Khartoum massacre, when armed forces of the Sudanese Transitional Military Council attacked a protest outside the country’s military headquarters, killing at least 127 people.

“From the start of protests to remove Bashir (Sudan’s long-serving President deposed in April 2019), we would always report people who we would realize never returned home after the protests. This was our way of looking out for each other. But after 3 June 2021 (the day of the Khartoum massacre), the situation was terrible. People were killed, women were raped, while many others were disappeared. All of a sudden, because of our past work, I started getting tens of phone-calls of people letting me know that their persons were missing, asking me to do something about it. I had to post all these missing cases on my social media platforms(Twitter & Instagram via @SlayKaiii) in addition to reporting to police, to try to find them. It was from that crisis that I and five other friends decided to start Missing initiative to continue searching for these people,” Fadia Khalaf Tweet

The initiative helps document persons announced missing, liaises with the police to conduct a search process, follows up on those in police detention to ensure the progress of their cases and helps some of those arrested find legal representation. To date, Missing Initiative has documented over 100 cases of missing persons, and helped locate about 60, from prisons to hospitals. Among these, at least five were found dead in city morgues.

“It’s horrifying, the conditions in which we find some of these people, if we find them at all. Some are in urgent need of medical attention from all forms of torture, others are imprisoned without charge. Others, we find, have died. But at least, it gives closure to their families,” she says. Fadia Khalaf Tweet

As a result of their work, Fadia says that Sudanese now recognise forced disappearances as a state crime, and have gradually developed a consciousness and vigilance to look out for each other against state-inspired violence.

These efforts have not been without consequences. Fadia says she and her colleagues have been threatened together with their families, and that she continues to be randomly followed and her phones tapped. She says as women human rights defenders (WHRDs) in a deeply patriarchal society, they’re even more endangered because the society does not believe they should have any rights at all, much less a voice.

“The day women rise in Sudan, patriarchy will fall because it thrives on subjugating women. And that’s why those like us are harassed because the system fears that we will awaken and empower other women to rise up and refuse to be dominated,” she says. Fadia Khalaf Tweet

Nonetheless, Fadia is optimistic, the growing women and youth agitation is unstoppable: “This spirit and desire for change, I have never seen it before. Young people are willing to die for a better country every day!  It is inspiring. All they need is to be empowered more,” she notes.

https://defenddefenders.org/human-rights-defender-of-the-month-fadia-khalaf-2/

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Myanmar: no impunity for the military leaders

March 23, 2022

On 23 March 2022 the above-mentioned NGOs issued a Joint Press Release: “Hold the Myanmar military accountable for grave crimes”

“UN must explore all possible ways to prosecute Myanmar military leaders and hold them accountable for genocide and atrocity crimes” said Human Rights Defenders from Myanmar in an online event as they engaged with the UN Human Rights Council following a series of reporting on Myanmar during the Council’s 49th Regular Session.

Nearly 14 months after the military launched its nationwide campaign of violence and terror in an attempt to illegally seize power, the military has killed over 2,000 people, including women and children and detained over 12,000. See also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2022/02/02/myanmar-one-year-after-the-coup-only-getting-worse/

Having so far failed to impose its rule over the territory and population, the military continues to intensify its cruel and brutal attacks against the people of Myanmar with indiscriminate airstrikes, shelling, massacres, burning down of villages, torture, and sexual and gender-based violence. In addition, the military continues to block humanitarian aid to over 880,000 displaced people across the country while attacking medical facilities and medical and humanitarian workers.

Despite the brutal violence, the Myanmar people have continued to resist the military, steadfastly demonstrating their courageous will and defense of their democracy.

Over 400,000 civil servants who have joined the Civil Disobedience Movement refuse to work under the military, while others carryout general strikes and street protests. Boycott of military products and refusal to pay electricity bills continues and self-defense forces and formation of new autonomous local administrations alongside the existing parallel administrations in ethnic areas mar the military’s desperate attempts to assert administrative and territorial control.

Responding to calls made by civil society organizations for the UN to explore avenues to prosecute Myanmar military leaders and hold them accountable for grave crimes in Myanmar, His Excellency Aung Myo Min, National Unity Government’s Minister for Human Rights expressed his support during the online event, stating, ‘The UN Secretary-General should explore the feasibility of the establishment by the General Assembly or the Human Rights Council of an ad hoc tribunal to support accountability for alleged violations of international law in Myanmar.’

Following Minister Aung Myo Min’s remarks, Marzuki Darusman of Special Advisory Council for Myanmar and Former Chairperson of the Indpendent International UN Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar stated during the event, ‘To complement the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, that has been in operation for the last few years, it is only logical that an entity needs to be set up that is precisely a jurisdiction that would allow the IIMM – that was established by the Human Rights Council – to undertake its next step, and that is, on the basis of preparing the ground for criminal prosecution, for the Council to decide on a jurisdiction where those prosecutions can take place.’

Human Rights Defenders also called on the UN to seek pathways for accountability.
‘International community must rally to end cycle of impunity enjoyed by the military, and call on the Human Rights Council to explore all options to establish a jurisdiction to prosecute Myanmar military for committing war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, and stand with the people of Myanmar in their defense of democracy,’ said Khin Ohmar of Progressive Voice.

‘We welcome US designating the brutal violence committed against the Rohingya as genocide, but this must translate into action to hold the perpetrators accountable. Failure to act on the grave crimes being committed against the people of Myanmar, past and present, will only serve to embolden the military junta,’ said Razia Sultana of RW Welfare Society.

‘The military junta continues to conduct fierce airstrikes against civilians in Karen State, as well as in Karenni, Chin, and Sagaing with total impunity. CSOs and other human rights organizations have already provided, and continue to provide, the necessary evidence of atrocity crimes committed by the Myanmar military to UN bodies. It is time for active steps to be taken by the Human Rights Council to ensure that justice mechanisms move forward without delay.’ said Naw Htoo Htoo of Karen Human Rights Group.

‘Myanmar military is burning villages to the ground, conducting mass scorched earth campaigns in towns such as Thantlang, Chin State and using rape as a weapon of war. Without concrete action to stop this military’s campaign of terror, including an arms embargo and targeted sanctions, whole villages will continue to be reduced to ashes,’ said Salai Za Uk of Chin Human Rights Organization.

‘The price of inaction is surely clear to the Members of the Human Rights Council, which has documented military’s crimes for over 15 years. Through its various mandates and mechanisms such as the Fact-Finding Mission and Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, the Council has amassed vast amounts of evidence of Myanmar military’s atrocities including the genocide against Rohingya. It is time for the Council to build on this work and explore all possible avenues to hold the military leaders accountable through criminal prosecutions,” said FORUM-ASIA.

The online Side Event during the 49th Regular Session of the Human Rights Council “Justice and Accountability for Myanmar: Expectations and Possibilities”, which took place on 22 March 2022 can be viewed here: https://www.facebook.com/progressivevoice/videos/2137679243064231

***

For a PDF version of this press release, click here

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Late alert: Panel on gender rights: 24 March

March 23, 2022

On Thursday 24 March 2022, from 1:30pm – 2:30pm (CET) will take place the panel “Fighting for equality: Working together to combat violence and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity“

Over the last two decades, UN human rights bodies and mechanisms have been at the forefront of promoting equality and fair treatment of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, gender-diverse and intersex (LGBTI) people.

These contributions have led to considerable progress regarding decriminalisation of same-sex consensual acts and diverse gender identities, enactment of progressive laws and the promotion of international standards on the rights of LGBTI persons.

While these advances have been, and continue to be, integral in the promotion and protection of equal rights for LGBTI persons, the stories of those relentlessly fighting for that progress often remain untold. Indeed, everywhere around the world human rights defenders working on issues of sexual orientation and gender identity and expression (SOGIE) play a central role in the fight for equality for LGBTI persons.

This side event aims to shed light on the success stories of human rights defenders working to combat violence and discrimination based on SOGIE, bringing together defenders as well as two UN mandate holders that focus on human rights defenders and on SOGIE. The panel will reflect on opportunities and risks for LGBTI human rights defenders, nation-level developments towards equality for LGBTI persons, progress of the current UN standards on these issues, and what can be done to address challenges.
SPEAKERS: 

Victor Madrigal-Borloz, Independent Expert on violence and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity

Mary Lawlor, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders

Other speakers will be confirmed soon

Welcoming and closing remarks by the Permanent Mission of the Netherlands and the Permanent Mission of Mexico

MODERATOR: Julia Ehrt, ILGA World’s Executive Director 

You are welcome to join this discussion, which will be held in English with simultaneous interpretation in Spanish. Click here to register to the event. 

https://mailchi.mp/ishr/749qlxejj6-33453?e=d1945ebb90

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India sinking in civic freedoms survey

March 21, 2022

While the world’s attention is understandably focused on the war in Ukraine, other major countries should not stay outside the limelight, e.g. India (conspicuously absent in the condemnation of the aggression) which continues to flaunt human rights. [See e.g. https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2022/01/28/anti-terror-laws-in-india-keep-being-used-against-human-rights-defenders/].

On 10 March 2022, The Wire in New Delhi reported that India has been added to CIVICUS’ watchlist of countries that have seen a “rapid decline” in civic freedoms by an independent monitor, highlighting the drastic measures taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to silence critics of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

India and Russia were added to CIVICUS Monitor’s Watchlist. CIVICUS Monitor is an online platform that tracks the latest developments to civic freedoms, including the freedoms of expression, association and peaceful assembly, across 197 countries and territories.

India has remained a “repressed” nation in the ‘People Power Under Attack 2021’ report by the CIVICUS Monitor, along with 48 other countries including Afghanistan, Russia and Hong Kong. Its rating was first downgraded in 2019, “due to a crackdown on human rights activists, attacks on journalists and civil society groups, and the assault on civic freedoms in Indian administered Jammu and Kashmir”.

This rating is typically given to countries where civic space is heavily contested by power holders, who impose a combination of legal and practical constraints on the full enjoyment of fundamental rights.

In its report, CIVICUS highlighted several developments that it saw as cause for concern.

In January, the Central Bureau of Investigation conducted raids on Madurai-based human rights watchdog, People’s Watch. The raid came against the backdrop of 6,000 other civil society organisations, including Oxfam, losing their foreign funding licenses under the controversial Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act. Greenpeace and Amnesty International are among the civil society groups that have had to close their offices in India.

Meanwhile, scores of human rights defenders and activists remain in detention under the draconian Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and other laws. They include the 15 human rights defenders linked to the 2018 Bhima Koregaon incident who have been accused of having links with Maoist organisations, based on evidence believed to be “fabricated”.

Waiting for bail, 84-year-old tribal rights activist Stan Swamy, who remained in custody since October 2020 in the Elgar Parishad case under UAPA, died in July last year. [Update on this case: The death of Jesuit priest and Adivasi rights activist Stan Swamy in judicial custody will “forever remain a stain on the human rights record of India”, says a new brief by the United Nations’ Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. The group had formally adopted its opinion on Swamy’s death during its 92nd session on November 16, last year but made its comments public just this week. The Working Group transmitted to the Indian Government a communication concerning Swamy on May 12 last year, but did not receive any response. India is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [ICCPR]. In its communication, the Working Group urged the Government to prioritize the use of non-custodial measures at all stages of criminal proceedings, including during the pretrial phase, in the current context of a global pandemic. Furthermore, its source submitted that placing Father Swamy in prison increased his risk of contracting COVID-19 and thus put his life at risk. The failure of the Government to heed these prescient warnings led to his avoidable death in custody, the opinion states.] [https://theleaflet.in/un-working-group-asks-india-to-accord-stan-swamys-family-with-compensation-and-reparations-under-international-law/]

Further, at least 13 activists who were arrested under the UAPA for their work against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) 2019 remain in detention. The slow investigative processes and extremely stringent bail provisions ensure that those detained under the law are held in pre-trial detention for long periods.

“The office raids and foreign funding bans are part of the government’s strategy to harass and silence their critics,” said Josef Benedict, Civic Space Researcher for the CIVICUS Monitor. “The use of broadly worded anti-terrorism laws against activists, journalists, academics, and students, reflect a multi-year decline in the state of civic and democratic freedoms in the country.”

Journalists have continued to be targeted in India for their work in recent months and there have also been concerns about the widespread surveillance of activists, journalists and others critical of the Modi government following the Pegasus spyware expose.

“The government must release all human rights defenders detained and come clean about its surveillance of activists and journalists as well as establish an independent and effective oversight mechanism to monitor all stages of interceptions of communications,” said Henri Tiphagne, national working secretary of HRDA – India.

…

In a letter addressed to Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi, 21 members of European Parliament stated, “We, the undersigned Members of the European Parliament, are writing to express our concern over the treatment of human rights defenders (HRDs) in India.” “We have followed cases of HRDs being jailed for their peaceful work, targeted under anti-terror laws, labeled as terrorists, and facing increasing restrictions on their ability to safely mobilize and access funds due to restrictive legislation. We are especially concerned about the safety of unjustly jailed defenders with emphasis on 15 HRDs accused in what is known as the Bhima Koregaon case and 13 defenders currently in jail for their campaign against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).”

They expressed worry that the prominent human rights defender Khurram Parvez remained in detention under the UAPA in one of the most overcrowded and unsanitary prisons in the country for his documenting of rights violations in Indian-administered Kashmir.

Echoing calls by UN experts, they viewed their case as emblematic of the way the Indian government “continues to use the UAPA as a means of coercion to restrict human rights defenders’ fundamental freedoms in the country.” [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2021/11/23/india-arrests-khurram-parvez-again/]

See also 31 March: https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/31/human-rights-watch-submission-universal-periodic-review-india

https://thewire.in/rights/for-rapid-decline-in-civic-freedoms-india-added-to-civicus-monitors-watchlist

EU concerned over treatment of human rights defenders in India

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2022 Women of Courage awards announced by USA State Department

March 18, 2022

On Monday, 14 March, 2022 Secretary of State, Antony J. Blinken, hosted the annual International Women of Courage (IWOC) Awards in a virtual ceremony at the U.S. Department of State. The 2022 IWOC Award ceremony honours a group of twelve extraordinary women from around the world.  The First Lady of the United States, Dr. Jill Biden, delivered remarks in recognition of the courageous accomplishments of this year’s IWOC awardees. For more on this award and its laureates, see: https://www.trueheroesfilms.org/thedigest/awards/A386E593-5BB7-12E8-0528-AAF11BE46695

Out of an abundance of caution due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and in order to practice safe social distancing, the ceremony was live streamed on www.state.gov.

Now in its 16th year, the Secretary of State’s IWOC Award recognizes women from around the globe who have demonstrated exceptional courage, strength, and leadership in advocating for peace, justice, human rights, gender equity and equality, and the empowerment of women and girls, in all their diversity – often at great personal risk and sacrifice.  U.S. diplomatic missions overseas nominate one woman of courage from their respective host countries and finalists are selected and approved by senior Department officials.  Following the virtual IWOC ceremony, the awardees will participate in an International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) Virtual exchange to connect with their American counterparts and strengthen the global network of women leaders.  The 2022 awardees are:

Rizwana Hasan – Bangladesh [see: https://www.trueheroesfilms.org/thedigest/laureates/48B5C07A-458C-4771-97F9-FAD0CA89F478]

Simone Sibilio do Nascimento – Brazil

Ei Thinzar Maung – Burma

Josefina Klinger Zúñiga – Colombia

Taif Sami Mohammed – Iraq

Facia Boyenoh Harris – Liberia

Najla Mangoush – Libya

Doina Gherman – Moldova

Bhumika Shrestha – Nepal

Carmen Gheorghe – Romania

Roegchanda Pascoe – South Africa

Phạm Đoan Trang – Vietnam Vietnam’s official reaction: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/vietnam-irked-by-unsuitable-us-prize-jailed-dissident-2022-03-17/

See also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2021/03/09/state-department-hands-out-21-international-women-of-courage-awards-2021/

https://www.state.gov/2022-international-women-of-courage-award-recipients-announced/

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Call for Nominations for the 2022 North-South Prize of the Council of Europe

March 18, 2022
Call for Nominations for the 2022 North-South Prize of the Council of Europe.

You can now propose nominations for the 2022 North-South Prize of the Council of Europe. For more on this and similar awards, see: https://www.trueheroesfilms.org/thedigest/awards/8FA97F67-9D63-4D8D-B00D-B260262A61E2

The candidates (activists, personalities or organisations) must have distinguished themselves in the following areas:
 protection of human rights,
 defence of pluralist democracy,
 public awareness raising on issues of global interdependence and solidarity.


Nominations can be submitted through the online form available on the North-South Prize webpage.
The deadline for presenting nominations is 15 September.
The Jury of the North-South Prize, composed by the members of the Bureau of the Executive Committee of the North-South Centre, will meet in the last quarter of 2022 to select this year’s Laureates.

https://www.coe.int/en/web/north-south-centre/-/call-for-nominations-for-the-north-south-prize-2022-

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Civil Rights Defenders’ Emergency Fund gives insight over 2021

March 18, 2022

Zinaida Muradova, Head of Rapid Response at Civil Rights Defenders

Defending human rights has become increasingly dangerous in many parts of the world. Many of those who do, face numerous risks and threats on a daily basis. When a threat towards a human rights defender escalates, Civil Rights Defenders’ Emergency Fund provides rapid assistance to strengthen the defender’s security as quickly as possible. 

On 7 March 2022 it provided a breakdown of its use. The fund can, for example, provide legal aid or temporarily relocate people who suffer persecution, as well as provide preemptive efforts such as security trainings and digital security solutions. In 2021, the fund supported a total of 1421 human rights defenders in 30 countries. 

Emergency support doubled in 2021

In 2021, Civil Rights Defender’ Emergency Fund has received and processed the largest number of applications since the inception of the fund in 2012. We have supported a total of 1.421 Human Rights Defenders (HRD:s) and/or members of their families at risk through a total of 171 grants in 30 countries. The number of applications and granted support have thus both doubled compared to 2020.  

The world is becoming an increasingly dangerous place for human rights defenders, which is a significant explaining factor behind this increase. The CRD Emergency Fund has seen and reacted to the global backsliding of democracy and a number of emerging conflicts in 2021. The aftermath of the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the military coup in Burma, the spring protests in Colombia, the witch-hunt on civil society in Belarus, the civil war in Ethiopia and the Taliban’s takeover in Afghanistan are only a few of the conflicts that have deteriorated the security situation for human rights defenders in 2021. Many human rights defenders cannot continue their work for human rights and democracy without the support of the outside world.

Although the number of applications has doubled, so has the number of Emergency Fund applications granted. This increase is much thanks to the additional resources that Civil Rights Defenders has been able to put into processing fund applications. 

“We are humbled to have been able to support so many human rights defenders in 2021. The need for emergency support is greater than ever, with the war in Ukraine the number of applicants is likely to keep increasing in the immediate future”, says Zinaida Muradova.

Emergency support to Burma and Asia has significantly increased in 2021, although the majority of human rights defenders who received emergency support continued to be from Africa. Additionally, the Emergency Fund continued to expand its global reach in five more regions – Eurasia, Europe, Africa, Latin America and MENA. In total, support was provided to human rights defenders in 30 countries during the course of 2021. 

Further advancing gender sensitivity 

The Emergency Fund continued to build on gender work started in 2019 to ensure a good gender balance and representation amongst the beneficiaries of support. We have been working to increase the accessibility of the mechanism for the most vulnerable groups. We see an improvement in gender balance, for example the percentage of non-conforming people supported doubled compared to 2020.

An increasing demand for legal aid and psychological support  

Despite the Covid 19 pandemic and continued strict restrictions on travel around the world, temporary relocations, where human rights defenders can reside safely for a short period, remained by far the most requested type of support in 2021. The majority of relocations were related to the major crises in countries mentioned above. Requests for preventive security measures to improve home, office or digital security, such as installing security cameras or digital security software, remained to be in high demand as well. Many HRD:s needed so called combined interventions, meaning a combination of several of the above mentioned support types. 

In 2021 The Emergency Fund has seen a noteworthy increase in requests for humanitarian and psychological support. Many HRDs also request legal aid due to an increasing trend of arbitrary arrests and charges.

“Democracy and human rights cannot be achieved without human rights defenders. Through the Emergency Fund we ensure that they feel safe enough to continue their work which ultimately helps ensure that the fight for democracy can continue worldwide”, says Zinaida Muradova. 

See also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2020/12/11/civil-rights-defender-of-the-year-award-2020-goes-to-naw-ohn-hla/

Emergency Fund – 2021 in Numbers

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UN experts urge Bangladesh to end reprisals against human rights defenders

March 17, 2022

On 14 March 2022 a group of UN human rights experts today called on Bangladesh to immediately cease reprisals against human rights defenders and relatives of forcibly disappeared persons for their activism and co-operation with international human rights bodies and UN mechanisms.

Following the announcement of sanctions imposed by the United States of America against top Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) officials on 10 December 2021, Bangladeshi authorities have reportedly launched a campaign of threats, intimidation and harassment against relatives of forcibly disappeared persons, human rights defenders, and civil society actors. See also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2014/05/12/bangladesh-chains-of-corruption-strangle-nation-asian-human-rights-commission/

In the period between December 2021 and February 2022, the homes of at least 10 relatives of forcibly disappeared individuals were reported to have been raided late at night.

“During the raids, relatives were intimidated, threatened and forced to either sign blank sheets of paper or pre-written statements indicating that their family member was not forcibly disappeared and that they had deliberately misled the police. This is unacceptable,” the experts observed.

The experts noted with concern the increasingly challenging situation relatives, human rights defenders and civil society are facing in Bangladesh. Repeated accusations by senior Government officials against some civil society organizations of providing “false information” to the UN mechanisms risk undermining the civil society’s key role.

“Bangladesh must ensure that relatives and human rights defenders are able to carry out their legitimate work in a safe and enabling environment without fear of threats, intimidation or reprisals of any kind,” the experts stressed. They expressed their concern that the reported reprisals may have a chilling effect and deter others from reporting on issues of public interest, including human rights, and from cooperating with the UN, its representatives and mechanisms.

Since 2009, the RAB has reportedly been involved in the perpetration of the majority of cases of enforced disappearance in the country, as noted in several reports by the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances.**

“Bangladeshi authorities are obliged under international law to promptly launch ex officio, independent, impartial and thorough investigations into these serious allegations, complemented by a thorough and comprehensive search for disappeared persons. At the same time, the RAB and other security agencies should not be shielded from scrutiny and criminal responsibility.”

The experts also reiterated their request to the Government of Bangladesh to take effective steps to protect and uphold the rights of victims and their families to truth, justice, reparation, and guarantees of non-recurrence.

On 17 March HRW stated that the Bangladesh government should meaningfully respond to United Nations concerns regarding grave allegations of torture, enforced disappearance, and extrajudicial killings in the country.

https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=28281&LangID=E

https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/17/bangladesh-stop-flouting-un-rights-concerns

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