I hope that this reaction by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights was widely disseminated. For those who missed it – and to illustrate why an independent Office is needed [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2015/04/07/joint-inspection-unit-on-human-rights-not-so-innocent-as-it-sounds/] – here is how Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein has criticised the UK tabloid Sun for allowing Katie Hopkins to describe migrants as ‘cockroaches‘ in a recent column. Read the rest of this entry »
Archive for the 'human rights' Category
UN Human Rights Commissioner speaks out over Katie Hopkins ‘cockroaches’ column in the Sun
April 27, 2015Killings of environmental human rights defenders up again compared to last year!
April 24, 2015Jeremy Hance – writing in Mongabay on 20 April, under the title “Killings of environmental activists jumped by 20 percent last year“ confirms again the terrible truth that it is in the countryside, away from monitors, and in disputes over land issues that the most gruesome repression takes place and the leader is..Brazil! [for last year’s report see: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2014/04/16/environment-deadly-for-human-rights-defenders-says-global-witness/]
Soy field in the Brazilian Amazon. Photo by: Rhett A. Butler.
The assassination, murder, and extrajudicial killing of environmental activists rose by 20 percent last year, according to a new grim report by Global Witness. The organization documented 116 killings in 2014 across 17 countries with the highest number in Brazil, which saw 29 environmental and land defenders killed. Still, the report is a major understatement of the problem as data across much of Africa, China, the Middle East, and Central Asia remains scarce to non-existent.
“Across the world environmental defenders are being shot dead in broad daylight, kidnapped, threatened, or tried as terrorists for standing in the way of so-called ‘development’,” said Billy Kyte, a campaigner with Global Witness. “The true authors of these crimes—a powerful nexus of corporate and state interests—are escaping unpunished. Urgent action is needed to protect citizens and bring perpetrators to justice.”
Most of the deaths last year—116 of them—were related to disputes over land. But mining was linked to 25 deaths, and hydroelectric dams and agribusiness to 14 each. Indigenous people also remain among the most targeted.
“In 2014, 47 indigenous people were killed defending their natural resources, 40 percent of the total deaths of environmental and land defenders,” reads Global Witness’s new report, entitled How Many More?. This year’s report follows a landmark document last year that tracked environmental activist killing—all 908 of them—over a dozen years.
Environmental activist killings by sector. Image courtesy of Global Witness.
Human rights defenders are stigmatized (as ‘anti-development’) and criminalized in order to silence their opposition.
While Brazil had the highest number of environmental activist murders in 2014, the most dangerous place to be an environmental activist was actually Honduras, according to Global Witness. During the last five years (2010-2014), Honduras lost 101 activists, giving it the highest rate of environmental activist killings per capita.
“A UN Human Rights Council resolution addressing the heightened risk posed to environmental and land defenders would be a start,” Kyte said. “But, in the end, governments themselves have to take responsibility and ensure impartial, exhaustive investigations into killings of these activists. And they have to bring perpetrators to account. Many targeted assassinations of activists are being passed off as ‘common’ murders and are going unnoticed.”
Environmental activist killings by country. Those in red were indigenous people. Image courtesy of Global Witness.
Read more: http://news.mongabay.com/2015/0420-hance-activist-murder-rise.html#ixzz3XxWqLdTV
Killings of environmental activists jumped by 20 percent last year.
Essex county (USA) proud of students for winning award with human rights video
April 24, 2015An example of how (making) film can teach young people to become human rights defenders. This comes Essex county in the USA.
The Speak Truth To Power student video competition encourages school students to become engaged in human rights. The video contest is sponsored by New York State United Teachers and the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights and is based on Kerry Kennedy’s book Speak Truth To Power. Students who participate in the contest must choose one of the individuals identified by the RFK Center Human Rights and create a three- to five-minute short film. The contest is looking for student films that utilize creative storytelling to teach others about a human rights issue. The format is open to documentary, stop motion, narrative, digital photo essay or other innovative explorations that involve filmmaking components.
Two Bloomfield Tech students, Christopher A. Rodriguez and Julio Villegas, won the first place in the video contest with a five-minute film about genocide and focused on Holocaust survivor and human rights activist Elie Wiesel. This feat was proudly reported in the local media on 21 April:
“Essex County Executive Joseph N. DiVincenzo, Jr. and the Essex County Vocational Technical School District …… are all very proud of Chris and Julio for winning the top prize in the RFK Human Rights Center’s student film contest. ……..It was important to share their film with our Essex County audience to raise awareness of this emotional issue and to highlight the exceptional work of our students”.
The first public premiere of the film was made Tuesday, April 21st during the afternoon celebration in Newark. In addition, the will be shown at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City on Thursday, April 23rd.
Elected and school officials shared their pride about the students’ accomplishment:
“I want to thank our students for their courage and their hard work,” Essex County Vocational Technical School Board President Father Edwin Leahy said. “Every time you speak the truth, you don’t get a crowd like this. You have to continue to do what is right even if you don’t have a lot of support”.
“Today is an amazing celebration of education,” said Bloomfield Tech Social Studies Teacher Jennifer DaSilva, who gave the students’ the assignment. “Both students have flourished in our Diaspora class. Their film is extraordinary and helps raise awareness about the tragedies taking place in the world today”.
Also sharing words of encouragement were Assemblywoman Sheila Oliver, Freeholder Patricia Sebold, Sheriff Armando Fontoura and Chief of Staff Phil Alagia.
‘The Interview’ Sequel plays at the Korean Border
April 21, 2015The Hollywood Reporter (THR) of 20 April 2015 contains an interesting and detailed piece by Paul Bond who went with the Human Rights Foundation on a trip to South Korea, to see how defector send films, television shows, books, and offline versions of Wikipedia into North Korea. The experience inspired nine articles, all of them published on THR’s website, but the centerpiece is this one: ‘The Interview’ Sequel: Inside the Frightening Battle Raging on the North Korean Border’. The articles all together give an interesting picture of the powerful role that film can play in the case of closed societies where there is hardly any internet (here North Korean), but also how the South Korean authorities out of fear for retaliation limit the human rights defenders’ actions.
Left: U.S. resident Thor Halvorssen filled bags with The Interview,leaflets and American music to be ballooned into North Korea but was stopped April 9 by South Korean police. Right: Lee Min Bok prepared a balloon with Interview,Zero Dark Thirtyand U.S. dollars but was prevented from launching it by two guards.
To trick North Korean authorities, Interview begins with state propaganda clips before switching abruptly to a 12-minute subtitled edit of Interview — a bit from the beginning, middle and end, with the more vulgar parts removed.
For the full article please go to: ‘The Interview’ Sequel: Inside the Frightening Battle Raging on the North Korean Border – Hollywood Reporter.
Nobel Women’s Initiative: “Defending the defenders!” 24-26 April 2015
April 20, 2015The conference “Defending the defenders!”, hosted by the six women Nobel Peace Prize Laureates, will bring together 100 women human rights defenders and organizations working to support them in order to advance the global agenda to protect women’s human rights defenders. During two days, participants will examine trends of threats that women all over the world face, and the strategies they employ to address these threats.
The conference is designed for maximum interaction, learning from each other, open dialogue and strategizing. It will include panels, participant-led discussions, skill-related workshops and strategy sessions. Participants will be able to showcase their work, including relevant films and documentaries, and have time to socialize and reconnect with each other. Invited participants will be women who are:
• Civil society activists and women human rights defenders from at least 20 different countries
• Academics
• Government officials
• Corporates
• Donor organizations and philanthropists
• Media (including journalists, filmmakers, writers and social media experts)
From 24-26 April 2015 in Duin & Kruidberg, Netherlands
Participation is by invitation only!
Defending the defenders! Building global support for Women Human Rights Defenders – WO=MEN.
Human Rights Defenders must shift their framework, to earn the public’s support
April 20, 2015Open Democracy carries regularly interesting pieces related to human rights defenders (e.g. https://www.opendemocracy.net/5050/daysi-flores/hope-as-survival-strategy-for-defensoras-in-honduras), but I draw your attention to a particular pertinent one on the ‘framing’ of the human rights debate. This blog has always taken a special interest in this aspect of human rights work [see e.g. https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/media-framing-and-the-independence-of-the-judiciary-the-case-of-water-boarding/]. This post by Rachel Krys focuses on the United Kingdom but much is relevant to other European countries where similarly there are sustained efforts – with the media leading or at least being a conduit – to give ‘human rights’ either a bad name or at least portray it as something ‘foreign’, ‘European’ [!!] and only necessary for others. Read the rest of this entry »
Vietnamese blogger Mother Mushroom gets Civil Rights Defender of the Year award 2015
April 20, 2015
Stockholm-based Civil Rights Defenders announced earlier this month that its Civil Rights Defender of the Year award for 2015 has gone to Ms. Nguyễn Ngọc Như Quỳnh. She is Coordinator for the Vietnamese Bloggers Network and well-known for her use of social media to speak out against injustices and human rights abuses in Vietnam. Quỳnh has been blogging under the pseudonym of Me Nam (Mother Mushroom) and has openly criticised the Vietnamese government over human rights abuses and corruption. She began blogging in early 2006 when she paid a visit to a hospital and witnessed many poor people in the hot sun desperately waiting for treatment, but ignored because they lacked money to bribe hospital officials.
Civil Rights Defenders reported about bloggers and the human rights movement in Vietnam in: We will not be silenced.
For further information on the award: http://www.brandsaviors.com/thedigest/award/human-rights-defender-year-award
Civil Rights Defenders – Civil Rights Defender of the Year 2015 – Nguyễn Ngọc Như Quỳnh.
China and Azerbaijan: champions in sentencing of human rights defenders
April 19, 2015
I tend not to refer to all cases of human rights defenders detained or sentenced. Sadly there are too many, but also they are often covered by many human rights NGOs and other media. I make an exception for two recent cases which were done by serial offenders China and Azerbaijan:
– A Chinese court sentenced 71-year old journalist, Gao Yu, to 7 years in jail, accusing her of ‘leaking’ an inner Communist Get together document to an overseas site. Many NGOs, human rights defenders and media outlets have condemned the harsh sentence, as well as several States and the EU.
See more at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gao_Yu_(journalist)
– The other case is Rasul Jafarov, a human rights lawyer In Azerbaijan, who has been an outspoken critic of the government’s crackdown of media freedoms that have resulted in the arrests of prominent journalists in Azerbaijan. Despite protests, on 16 April a Baku court sentenced Jafarov to six and a half years imprisonment. [He actively participated in the ‘Sing for Democracy <https://www.ned.org/30years/rasul-jafarov-azerbaijan/> movement in the build-up to the Eurovision Song Contest in Baku in May 2012. He is the Head of the Human Rights Club <http://www.civicsolidarity.org/member/551/human-rights-club>. For more see: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/rasul-jafarov/]
Some of the sources:
Events in memory of Alison Des Forges at Buffalo University
April 19, 2015
Alison Des Forges (1942-2009) was a well-known human rights defender and one of the world’s leading experts on the Rwandan genocide. She was senior adviser of Human Rights Watch at the time of her death in the crash of Continental flight 3407. HRW named its human rights award after her [see: http://www.brandsaviors.com/thedigest/award/alison-des-forges-award-extraordinary-activism]. Now the Alison L. Des Forges Memorial Committee in her native Buffalo (NY) is organizing three events in Buffalo on 23 and 24 April 2015 with as focus “Islam, Islamism, and Human Rights in Africa”:
- An international symposium on April 23 featuring talks by university researchers and representatives of human rights organizations working in Africa. This event is free and open to the public.
- A scholarship dinner and discussion on April 23. [reservation is required, and tickets are $100 per person. Proceeds go to the Alison Des Forges Memorial Scholarships]
- A community roundtable on April 24, where university researchers will reflect on the previous day’s symposium topics: “The Interplay of Politics, Religion, Terrorism, Modernity and Human Rights”.
“In an effort to address issues of intense public concern, these events will explore in depth the recent rise of violent extremist groups in Africa,” said Dussourd, co-chair of the Alison L. Des Forges Memorial Committee. “In so doing, we will go beyond sensational media headlines to the historical roots of this phenomenon as we examine groups such as Boko Haram, Seleka and Al-Shabaab.”
For information about the events contact Ellen Dussourd dussourd@buffalo.edu)
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 