Immigration Minister Sean Fraser rises during Question Period, in Ottawa, Dec. 10, 2021. Fred Chartrand/The Canadian Press
Six months after the federal government promised to help thousands of Afghan women leaders, human- rights activists and journalists flee to Canada, the first planeload has landed.
Immigration Minister Sean Fraser announced the arrival of 252 Afghan refugees on Tuesday, including the first 170 admitted through a special program for people the government deems to be human-rights defenders.
“It is a privilege to welcome today this cohort of Afghan refugees, who face persecution as a result of their work to protect the human rights of others,” Mr. Fraser said in a statement.
“I am grateful for their work to document and prevent human rights abuses and proud that they now call our country home.”
The Liberal government launched the special program in July after weeks of criticism from angry Canadian veterans upset Ottawa wasn’t doing more to help Afghans facing possible Taliban reprisals for having worked with Canada in the past.
Mr. Fraser’s office said the 170 who arrived through the special program had been referred to Canada by the Ireland-based human-rights organization Front Line Defenders, which has been working to identify those most at risk.
The Liberals have promised to resettle 40,000 Afghan refugees to Canada, but nearly all of those are expected to be people living in UN camps in Pakistan and other neighbouring countries.
With Monday’s arrivals, the government says it has so far resettled about 6,750 Afghan refugees in Canada. Fraser suggested last month that it could take up to two years for the government to meet its promise of bringing in 40,000 Afghans.
Veterans and refugee groups aren’t the only ones who have lamented the pace of the government’s efforts when it comes to helping Afghans escape to Canada, with opposition parties also joining the chorus of criticism in recent months.
Egypt’s government has engaged in a widespread crackdown on dissent for years that has stifled many of the country’s civil society groups and jailed thousands
The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information [ANRI], an Egyptian organisation, was founded in 2003 by a team of lawyers and activists. It documented violations against citizens, journalists and political prisoners in Egypt and the region. It also followed the increasing government intimidation and targeting of human rights workers and others. But laws that made many of ANHRI’s operations illegal have forced the organisation to shut down, Executive Director Gamal Eid said in the statement on Monday. See e.g. https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/12/31/egyptian-human-rights-defender-gamal-eid-assaulted/. As a lawyer, Eid represented some of the most prominent secular detainees. A court ordered his assets frozen and has banned him from travelling since 2016.
He said the group’s workers had been arrested, intimidated and physically assaulted by security forces.
“We continue to be lawyers who have a conscience, and as individual, independent human rights defenders will work side by side with the few remaining independent human rights organisations, independent human rights defenders and the entire movement calling for democracy,” he wrote.
On 8 January 2022 the Iranian poet Baktash Abtin died in Tehran after contracting COVID-19 in Evin Prison. Abtin, who died after being put into an induced coma while hospitalized, is the second known political prisoner to die in Iran in the first week of 2022. On January 1, Kian Adelpour died after going on hunger strike to protest being imprisoned without a fair trial.
“This is a preventable tragedy and more prisoners’ deaths are inevitable because there is no accountability in the Iranian government,” said Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI). “Abtin was imprisoned in Iran because the government wanted to muzzle him with a jail cell; the state killed him.” Abtin had been serving a five-year prison sentence on the charge of “assembly and collusion against national security.”
A group of main NGOs had addressed a joint letter to Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei on 7 January repeating their call that Abtin be given access to the best possible medical care as he battles for his life. In addition, we urge that: he and all those unjustly detained for their writing or expression be immediately and unconditionally released; that authorities refrain from summoning political prisoners to serve their sentences while the conditions inside Evin and other Iranian prisons remain unsafe; and that any who do contract COVID-19 or other serious illnesses while in jail be granted speedy access to all needed medical care or a medical parole on humanitarian grounds.
While offering condolences to Abtin’s family and friends, the Iranian Writers Association (IWA) where Abtin, 48, was a board member, released a statement on January 8 on the “injustice that was committed against Abtin”: “Baktash Abtin is alive because the spirit of freedom-seeking and the fight against tyranny and injustice is alive,” said the statement.
Fellow IWA board member Reza Khandan Mahabadi was also sentenced to five years in prison and Keyvan Bajan to three years and six months. An international chorus has condemned the IWA writers’ imprisonment, with dozens of high-profile writers and artistic figures including Nobel laureates calling for the writers’ acquittal.
At least 11 writers are known to be either currently imprisoned or living with an unserved prison sentence hanging over their heads in Iran as they await an appeal or to be summoned to jail, according to a list compiled by CHRI.
In an interview with CHRI in May 2019 after his trial, Abtin forcefully said the charge of “assembly and collusion against national security” was for statements published by the IWA, articles in the organization’s internal newsletter, and holding memorial ceremonies for IWA members Mohammad Mokhtari and Mohammad Jafar Pouyandeh, who were murdered in 1998 as part of a concerted state policy to eliminate political and cultural dissidents inside and outside of Iran.
“Nowhere in the world is it necessary to get a permit to gather around someone’s grave,” Abtin told CHRI. “But that’s what we’ve been charged with.”
When she faced domestic violence from members of her family, including her father, and government institutions failed to provide her with any protection, she fled her country to Britain after using her father’s phone without his knowledge to obtain permission to travel. In a television interview on August 4, 2020, she spoke of her November 26, 2019 escape from Qatar to Britain, via Ukraine.
Upon arriving in Britain, she applied for asylum. During her stay in Britain, Al-Maadeed introduced herself as a defender of Qatari women’s rights and explained how male guardianship prevents women from working or traveling without a male family member’s consent, as well as how women victims of domestic violence are left with little protection.
Al-Maadeed withdrew her application for asylum in Britain after receiving assurances from the Qatari authorities that she would be protected if she returned to her home country. On October 6, this year, Al-Maadeed posted on her Instagram account a video in which she explained the details of her return from London on September 30 to the capital, Doha, where she arrived the following day.
What happened next is incomprehensible. Qatari authorities, who pledged to protect her, as it should with to all citizens, reneged on all their promises and left her alone trying to survive domestic abuse. In a video posted on her Twitter account on October 12, Al-Maadeed said that she had been subjected to three failed assassination attempts by her family. She also described her father’s coming into the lobby of the hotel where she was staying, despite being one of her main opponents and the reason for her running away from home. Perhaps the following tweet, dated October 12, honestly sums up the torments she suffered upon her return: https://platform.twitter.com/embed
My family, and those who I count as my own, want to slaughter me.
Shortly thereafter, she posted the following tweet: “Sheikh Tamim is the only one who can stop the danger to my life with his own hands.” On October 13, Al-Maadeed completely disappeared from social media, and her whereabouts have not yet been known. The Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad, on whom Al-Maadeed relied for protection and pleaded for support, was not able to provide the necessary protection for a citizen who did not commit any violation and voluntarily returned to her country based on many promises from the authorities that they’ll keep her safe.
Since her disappearance, there have been conflicting reports, with regards to what has happened to the 23-year-old. According to some reports, Al-Maadeed was killed by her family, while others reported her forcible detention in a psychiatric hospital under heavy sedation, Meanwhile, the Qatari government refuses to provide documented information to prove that she is alive, which raises many suspicions.
The Gulf Center for Human Rights cannot confirm any of the above-mentioned reports but holds the authorities, who have pledged but failed to protect Noof Al-Maadeed, responsible for any harm done to her. At present, all information indicates that Al-Maadeed is facing serious risk to her life and freedom. If not killed, then it is a fact that she may be facing a lengthy incommunicado detention, which puts her life at imminent risk.
The GCHR, once again calls on the international community, particularly UN institutions, and governments with influence in Qatar—including members of the European Union—to take immediate action to pressure the Qatari authorities to ensure that Al-Maadeed is safe and can live freely in Qatar.
The government of Qatar cannot continue to ignore international opinion that is searching for the truth, and its absolute silence will be a sure condemnation, as it bears full responsibility for preserving the safety of its citizens, including Nouf Al-Maadeed.
The head of the North Caucasus region of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, long accused of grave human rights abuses, has been named “distinguished human rights defenders” by the regional human rights ombudsman.
Ombudsman Nurdi Nukhazhiyev, at a ceremony in Grozny on December 30 that was not attended by Kadyrov, said the Kadyrov family had made an “enormous contribution…to securing human rights and strengthening the state.”
In addition to Kadyrov, the medals were awarded to his father, former Chechen President Akhmad Kadyrov, and his mother, Aimani Kadyrova.
Akhmad Kadyrov was president of Chechnya from 2003 until his assassination in May 2004.
Earlier in the month, Kadyrov’s daughter, Aishat Kadyrova, who serves as Chechnya’s culture minister, was awarded the medal For the Defense of Human Rights.
Russian and international human rights monitors have for years accused Ramzan Kadyrov of overseeing grave human rights abuses including abductions, torture, extrajudicial killings, and the persecution of the LGBT community.
On 2 January 2022 AFP reported that Britain’s Prince Charles urged people in a New Year message to “take a moment” to recognise those “standing up for freedom and human rights” around the world.
The heir to the throne paid tribute to people in places such as Afghanistan, Syria and Myanmar facing political and religious persecution and insecurity alongside increasingly dire humanitarian situations.
“As we start a New Year, we might take a moment to remember the many people around the world who are standing up for freedom and human rights,” he said on Saturday.
“In the face of such adversity, incredibly brave individuals, local communities and international organisations are responding to great needs by providing vital assistance.
“I pray for peaceful resolutions to these conflicts and that we might all be blessed with the courage to support those in need, wherever they may be.”
As feared in November (see blog post below) Russia’s Supreme Court on Tuesday 28 December 2021 ordered the closure of Memorial International, one of the country’s most respected human rights organizations, wiping out three decades of work to expose the abuses and atrocities of the Stalinist era. Memorial is the winner of at least 7 international human rights awards: https://www.trueheroesfilms.org/thedigest/laureates/BD12D9CE-37AA-7A35-9A32-F37A0EA8C407
The court ruled that Memorial International had fallen afoul of Russia’s “foreign agent” law. But the group said the real reason for the shutdown was that authorities did not approve of its work.
The ruling is the latest blow to Russia’s hollowed-out civil society organizations, which have gradually fallen victim to Putin’s authoritarian regime.
Videos posted on social media showed Memorial supporters shouting, “Shame, shame!” in the court’s hallways and at the entrance to the building shortly after the ruling. Seven people were detained outside the courthouse following the proceedings, according to independent monitoring group OVD-Info. The organization said three of them are believed to be instigators whose sole aim was to cause havoc, not support Memorial.
Memorial International’s lawyer, Tatiana Glushkova, confirmed the ruling to CNN and said the group would appeal the decision. “The real reason for Memorial’s closure is that the prosecutor’s office doesn’t like Memorial’s work rehabilitating the victims of Soviet terror,” Glushkova told CNN.
The Prosecutor General’s Office of Russia requested Memorial International be liquidated in November. The group was accused of repeatedly breaking the law for failing to mark all its publications with a compulsory “foreign agent” warning. The Justice Ministry had designated the group a foreign agent in 2016, using a law targeting organizations receiving international funding.
Memorial’s representatives argued there were no legal grounds for the group’s closure, and critics say the Russian government targeted Memorial for political reasons.
Oleg Orlov, a member of Memorial International’s board, said the court’s decision was “purely ideological” and “a demonstrative, blatant, illegal decision.”
“Allegedly, we do not assess the Soviet Union and Soviet history the right way. But this is our assessment, we have the right to do it,” Orlov told CNN.
Memorial was founded in the late 1980s to document political repressions carried out under the Soviet Union, building a database of victims of the Great Terror and gulag camps. The Memorial Human Rights Centre, a sister organisation that campaigns for the rights of political prisoners and other causes, is also facing liquidation for “justifying terrorism and extremism”. One of the group’s co-founders was Nobel Peace Prize winner Andrei Sakharov, who went on to be the first honorary chairman of the Memorial Society.
Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, who was post-apartheid South Africa’s moral compass and the driver of its troubled reconciliation process, has died. He was 90 years old.
He is the laureate of at least 10 human rights awards: For the complete list, see:
Andrew Donaldson in News24 of 26 December 2021 published an interesting obituary: A tireless social activist and human rights defender, Tutu not only coined the term “Rainbow Nation” to describe the country’s ethnic diversity but, after the first democratic elections in 1994, went on to become its conscience, using his international profile in campaigns against HIV/Aids, tuberculosis, poverty, racism, xenophobia, sexism, homophobia and transphobia, among others…
His was a powerful, forthright voice, one that irked both the Nationalist government and its successor, the African National Congress and its allies. He was, an activist noted, “given to expressing his opinion in ways that are guaranteed to be outside the realm of comfortable politics”. As Tutu himself put it, in 2007, “I wish I could shut up, but I can’t, and I won’t.“..
Both at home and abroad, Tutu’s opposition to apartheid, which he often likened to Nazism, was vigorous and unequivocal. The Nationalists twice revoked his passport, and he was briefly jailed in 1980 after a protest march. Many felt that his increasing international reputation and his advocacy of non-violence had spared Tutu from more harsh treatment by the government…
He was a born orator and, according to the journalist Simon Hattenstone, “a natural performer [with] his hands and eyes flying all over the place, his voice impassioned and resonant; a tiny ball of love.”
Tutu would often play down such adulation. “I was,” he once said of his reputation, “this man with the big nose and the easy name who personalised the South African situation.”…
Following the Soweto riots in 1976, Tutu became an increasingly vocal supporter of economic sanctions and a vigorous opponent of US president Ronald Reagan’s “constructive engagement” with the Nationalist government.
In 1978, he was appointed general secretary of the SACC, a position he used to further rally support, both local and international, against apartheid. He was just as harsh in his criticism of the violent tactics later used by some anti-apartheid activists, and was unequivocal in his opposition to terrorism and communism.
Tutu’s finest hour came when he chaired the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was set up to bear witness to, record and in some cases grant amnesty to the perpetrators of apartheid-relation human rights violations, as well as rule on reparation and the rehabilitation of victims…
He is survived by his wife, four children, seven grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Desmond Tutu was responsible for countless notable quotes throughout his life as an activist and elder. TimesLive (Ernest Mabuza) of 26 December 2021 in “In his own words: Desmond Tutu’s unwavering stance on human rights” published 12 of his best:
The long-time president of the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights, doesn’t rule out the possibility of being jailed by the Ortega-Murillo regime. Re-published on 11 December in Havana Times:
Vilma Nuñez learned about Nicaraguan jails when she was just a child. She was eight years old when they took her to visit a political prisoner – her father. He had been imprisoned by Somoza’s National Guard, the same repressive body that years later would also jail and torture her.
In the course of over six decades of work, she’s become the veteran defender of Nicaraguans’ human rights. Founder and current president of the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh), she confesses that she decided to study Law to fight against the outrages she’d experienced since childhood. Her law career has spanned 63 years, although she was very seldom the prosecutor, but almost always worked on the side of defense. See also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2018/12/02/nicaragua-moves-against-women-human-rights-defenders/
Through Cenidh, Nuñez continues her struggle for the liberation of the Ortega regime’s political prisoners, just as she did in 1958, when she formed part of the Leon student movement. Through that organization, she became involved in the Committee for the Liberation of the Political Prisoners during the the Somoza regime. On one occasion, she recalls, they requested and received an audience with Luis Somoza Debayle, effectively Nicaragua’s dictator from 1956–1967. Together with university chancellor Mariano Fiallos Gil, she met with the man who had inherited the Somoza dynasty. The dictator became enraged when they demanded the release of the prisoners.
Twenty-one years after that meeting, Nuñez was jailed and tortured with electric shocks by order of the dynasty’s final successor, Anastasio Somoza Debayle. It’s not surprising, then, that the current situation of the political prisoners brings her back to the days of that other terrible dictatorship that – like the current regime – wouldn’t tolerate criticism.
In addition, Nuñez is a survivor of the student massacre of July 23, 1959. She has felt in her own flesh what it means to be jailed for false crimes because of having protested. At 83, it’s been her destiny to once more live under attack from a new dictatorship.
At the end of 2018, the Ortega regime ordered the Sandinista-dominated National Assembly to strip Cenidh of the non-profit status it had held since its founding in 1990. It also confiscated its offices.
“They’ve struck us a blow, but it doesn’t hurt us,” the Cenidh president declared defiantly. “A serious human rights organization can’t be dissolved by a resolution from a political organ with no autonomy or independence; nor can they dissolve our commitment and accompaniment of the Nicaraguan people,” she affirmed, in reference to the legislature’s decision…
According to Nuñez, all the attacks are because they won’t forgive her for having accompanied the case of Zoilamerica Narvaez, Daniel Ortega’s stepdaughter. In 1998, Narvaez filed formal accusations of 19-years of rape and sexual abuse and harassment against Ortega.
The issue most disturbs Dr. Nuñez at present is not being able to accompany the victims at the site where the human rights violations are occurring. She can’t even file an appeal, because the entire state apparatus is controlled by the Ortega regime.
“No one listens or does anything, which generates a situation of powerlessness. You can’t protest, or do anything, and for that reason I’ve said that I feel I’m a prisoner in Nicaragua,” she explains.
Nevertheless, she insists that she won’t cease in her struggle for the defense of human rights and the search for justice. “Fear has been one of the most powerful weapons wielded by the dictatorship, and I won’t let it dominate me,” she declares.
The human rights defender doesn’t rule out the fact that they may want to jail her. Every day, she says, she once again conquers that fear. “The authentic defense of human rights isn’t restricted to the use of the Law. Although the national and international statutes are always useful, they go hand in hand with less formal mechanisms, and one of the most effective of these is the public denunciation,” Nuñez notes.
“I’m going to continue on in Nicaragua. My commitment is to keep standing beside the people, denouncing and defending human rights as long as I can. It’s always been my lot to be standing on the sidewalk, right in the nose of the tyrants and human rights violators,” Vilma Nuñez says.
Antonia Urrejola, president of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights: “Ever since I first met her, [Dr. Nuñez’] strength has impressed me (…) if there’s a person who’s always been present in the denunciations of human rights violations in Nicaragua, it’s her. She’s an example of strength and courage.”
Gonzalo Carrion, Nicaragua Nunca + Human Rights Collective: “The history of the human rights movement in the last sixty years in Nicaragua chronicles a people suffering and resisting two different dictatorial dynasties. Whoever writes [that story] will inevitably have to tell of Vilma Nuñez’ activism and commitment.”
Gioconda Belli, Nicaraguan writer: “Who hasn’t seen Doña Vilma traveling to the most remote places to accompany victims whose rights have been violated? No one, more than you knows how to be at the side of the Nicaraguan people.”
Patrick Zaki after his release on Wednesday 8 December 2021 (Screengrab/EIPR) By Areeb Ullah
Human rights activist Patrick Zaki was freed on Wednesday 8 December 2021, a day after Egypt’s Emergency State Security Misdemeanour Court ordered his provisional release.
Zaki, a 28-year-old researcher at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), had been studying at Italy’s Bologna University when he was taken into custody upon his return to Cairo in February 2020. Despite his release, he still faces a range of charges, including “calling for protests without permission”, “spreading false news” and “inciting violence and terrorism”. His trial will resume on 1 February 2022.
Tuesday’s hearing was the second time Zaki’s trial has been adjourned since the first session, on 14 September 2020. Human Rights Watch (HRW) told Middle East Eye that Zaki was subjected to physical torture in the days after his arrest.
Commenting on the court’s ruling for his release, Amr Magdi, Egypt researcher for HRW, described it as “rare happy news” for Patrick and his family. “Its a win with a bitter taste,” Magdi told MEE on Tuesday, pointing out that Zaki is technically still on trial as he has not been acquitted.
Zaki had been an outspoken campaigner for the truth about the 2016 murder of Italian student Giulio Regeni in Egypt. Zaki’s arrest sparked a solidarity campaign in Italy, with politicians and activists urging Egyptian authorities to release him. Italian human rights campaigners have expressed concerns that Zaki could be at risk of torture and ill-treatment in Egypt’s notorious prisons, drawing parallels with the torture of Regeni. Regeni’s family has also expressed solidarity with the detained activist.
In April, the Italian senate voted to approve a proposal by two lawmakers urging the government to grant Zaki Italian citizenship. Meanwhile, more than 50 Italian cities have announced the granting of “honorary citizenship” to Zaki. This was done, EIPR said, in order to show their appreciation for him as a human rights defender and to demand his immediate release in a campaign called 100 Cities with Patrick, launched by a group of human rights activists in Italy.
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Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 