Posts Tagged ‘Africa’

Africa: Strong Stand Taken By the African Court on Human and Peoples Rights

May 22, 2012
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The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) welcomes the strong stand taken by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) on the political, security and humanitarian confllicts and crises raging on the continent, at its 51st Session. FIDH now urges African Union (AU) Member States to give immediate effect to the recently adopted resolutions. The document published by allAfrica.com refers to the recent conflict between Sudan and South Sudan  the unconstitutional changes of government that lately occured in Mali and Guinea-Bissau, the territorial integrity of Mali and a West African region where several armed groups, like in Nigeria, still perpetrate violations. On HRDs the document of FIDH states the following:

“The African Commission considered with a particular attention the civil and political rights’ violations happening in several countries. The Commission condemned the recurring impediment to Human rights defenders’ action in countries like Ethiopia – where the Charities and Civil Societies Proclamation adopted in 2009 continues to place excessive restrictions on Human rights organisations’ work – Swaziland – where authorities keep opposing the fundamental rights to freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and freedom of association – and Somalia, where journalists are taken in the grip of the ongoing armed conflict and are openly murdered. The FIDH welcomes the African Commission’s clear call for the amendment of the Ethiopian Charities and Civil Societies Proclamation, for the respect of the rights to fundamental freedoms in Swaziland and for justice to be rendered to the murdered journalists in Somalia. All these recommandations were supported by our organisation.”

for the full document go to: allAfrica.com: Africa: Strong Stand Taken By the African Court On Human and Peoples Rights On the Crises Situations Raging On the African Continent.

Amnesty publishes video on forced evictions in Africa

May 17, 2012
List of Nobel Peace Prize laureates

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Amnesty International shows its ‘new’ broadened mandate with this short video on forced evictions in Africa. In 4 languages on YouTube: video by AI on forced evictions in Africa. It highlights the kind of human rights violations that the 2012 nominee of the MEA in Cambodia is dealing with: see short film on the multimedia monk on http://www.martinennalsaward.org

Multitude of NGOs express concerns about the proposed expansion of jurisdiction of African Court

May 14, 2012

49 organisations have signed this open letter which makes a good case against the idea to add to the African Human Rights Court an international penal dimension.

Joint letter: concerns about the proposed expansion of the jurisdiction of … – ProtectionLine.

Don’t cut but re-direct aid say African Human Rights Defenders

November 3, 2011

Fifty three Human Rights groups have petitioned the British government, pleading not to cut its foreign aid to countries such as Uganda for the actions of their tyrannical leaders and corrupt governments but rather direct the aid to non-governmental organisations. This followed the announcement by British Prime Minister David Cameron’s to withhold aid going to governments that do not reform legislation interdicting homosexuality. Sweden’s SIDA, Canada and the US made similar threats in the context of the homophobic bill in Uganda this year.  The organisations called on the UK government not to cut aid because of the persecution of LGBT people but instead support African social justice activists. 

This is of course not a simple issue as there are degrees of violation that are so severe that a donor can simply not continue to (be seen to)assist a country while the capacity of the NGO sector to process and spend a huge amount of money remains insufficient. Besides, the aid given to the Government may be in a sector that is not touched at all by the violations in question (think of medical supplies to hospitals). Moreover, NGOs are not the panacea of all aid and are themselves sometimes involved in mismanagement. Still, it is good to hear from the non-governmental community that cutting aid to their should be the last resort and that they feel confident that that the NGO channel is a viable alternative. But this is valid only where governments allow NGOs to operate freely.

For the full story see: Blackstar News, Re-direct, But Dont cut aid, over human rights abuses, Activists say.