A group of UN Special Rapporteurs condemned the criminal prosecution of 85-year-old human rights defender Mark Kuperman, who has a disability and uses a wheelchair.
Kuperman, a prominent Russian human rights advocate, faces severe “terrorism” charges and is being targeted for his anti-war views and human rights work. A celebrated human rights defender, Kuperman is the head of the Public Human Rights Center in Sakhalin region and in 2022, was awarded the Moscow Helsinki Group’s human rights prize.
On 4 April 2024, the Sakhalin Investigative Committee initiated a criminal case against Kuperman on charges of “extremism.” When the investigation concluded in early December 2024, the case was unexpectedly reopened on 20 December 2024, and the authorities escalated the charges to “public calls for terrorist activities” under article 205, part 2 of the Russian Criminal Code. These charges stem from a draft document Kuperman received from a colleague and allegedly shared with his team in January 2023, discussing potential scenarios for Russia’s democratic development and the role of the West in supporting future democratic institutions.
The experts voiced serious concerns about the impact of judicial harassment on Kuperman, especially considering his advanced age, disability, and deteriorating health. The court proceedings, set to start immediately, could endanger his life and well-being, particularly if he is detained.
“It is appalling to prosecute an older human rights defender with a first-degree disability on unsubstantiated charges of “terrorism”, brought against him just to punish him for his criticism of the war against Ukraine,” the experts said.
“Russian authorities rushing the case to trial and denying Kuperman adequate time to prepare his defence demonstrates once again the lack of judicial independence and instrumentalisation of the judicial system to silence the independent and dissenting voices in Russia.”
The Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk City Court set an unreasonably short five-working-day deadline for Kuperman to study the case files, without providing any procedural accommodations and ignoring his disability, cognitive decline, chronic pain, movement restrictions, and weak vision. On 24 January, the investigator arbitrarily ended the review process, hindering Kuperman’s defence preparation and blocking his ability to request case dismissal due to lack of evidence. Additionally, the Russian security services (FSB) apparently installed listening devices in his apartment, preventing his confidential communication with his lawyer, as Kuperman is unable to leave his apartment due to his physical impairment.
“This case fits the broader pattern of using counter-extremism and counter-terrorism legislation in Russia to target human rights defenders, anti-war activists, and political opponents for exercising their freedom of expression,” the experts added. “Kuperman’s private discussions and human rights work have been criminalised, undermining the integrity of legal proceedings and violating due process. All charges against Kuperman should be dropped.”
On 5 December 2023, Mary Lawlor, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders concluded her visit to Algeria with the observation: “While I welcome the evident reforms which have taken place over the past four years and the new emphasis on public consultation, I regret that some human rights defenders who work on sensitive issues face continued restrictions”.
The UN expert observed four main patterns of violations used to suppress human rights defenders: ongoing judicial harassment, dissolution of key human rights organisations, limitations on freedom of movement and intimidation and surveillance leading to severely negative impacts on their mental health and that of their families.
“I was saddened that a handful of human rights defenders who attempted to travel to Tizi Ouzou, where I was holding meetings, were prevented from doing so and detained for 10 hours,” Lawlor said.
“Given Algeria’s recent history, robust laws relating to terrorism are clearly necessary,” the expert said. “However, it is disappointing that laws designed to prevent terrorism are instilling terror in human rights defenders through overly broad and vague definitions of what constitutes terrorism in the Penal Code.”
The Special Rapporteur noted that Article 87 bis of the Penal Code was one of the most frequently cited laws used to prosecute human rights defenders.
Despite this, the expert said there were many people working to protect and promote human rights with the full support of the government and the newly created consultative bodies in areas including women’s rights, children’s rights, healthcare, poverty relief and political participation. Based on this collaboration and experience, the Special Rapporteur believes the government is now better equipped to reach out to human rights defenders working on sensitive issues.
Lawlor welcomed the acquittal of three human rights defenders, Jamila Loukil, Kaddour Chouicha and Said Boudour, of terrorism charges in Dar El Baida court on Sunday.
“I hope this acquittal will kickstart a review process of Article 87 bis, and I stand ready to assist the Algerian government in any way I can in this regard,” she said.
11 human rights NGOs had publicly expressed their wish that this visit be an opportunity to free imprisoned activists and for reforms to see the light of day.
On 6 December, following the public report of this visit, NGOs support the main measures recommended by the Special Rapporteur, namely that: • The Algerian government must view Human Rights Defenders as allies and opportunities within society, not as threats. The signatories call for the repeal of all repressive laws and legislative provisions relating to the rights to freedom of association and peaceful assembly, and the adoption, on the basis of broad consultation with Algerian society, a regulatory framework complies with international standards notably respect for human rights in Algeria. • Many civil society organizations are in danger of disappearing. This is already the case of the Algerian League for the Defense of Human Rights (LADDH) and the Rassemblement Actions Jeunesse (RAJ). Civil society organizations must have the freedom to adequately play their role. • Several articles of law must also be reformed in accordance with international standards. This is the case of articles 79 and 87 bis of the Penal Code, relating to the attack on the integrity of the national territory and the fight against terrorism which are abusively used to imprison activists. The same goes for the Ban on Exiting the National Territory (ISTN) which is today used in a punitive manner to restrict the movement of human rights defenders in Algeria.
The signatories finally call on the Algerian government to release all prisoners of conscience and human rights defenders currently in prison
Their key point is worth noting: The problem for human rights defenders in the Gulf region and neighbouring countries is that states have exploited the opportunity to align their cybercrime laws with European standards to double-down on laws restricting legitimate online expression BUT without any of the judicial safeguards that exist in that region.
Several women take part in a protest, using a hashtag, against Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman’s visit to the country in Tunis, Tunisia, in November 2018. EFE / Stringer
Governments in every region of the world are criminalizing human rights activism. They do it by prosecuting protest organizers, journalists, internet activists, and leaders of civil society organizations under laws that make it a crime to insult public figures, disseminate information that damages “public order,” “national security,” and “fake news.”
In the Gulf region and neighbouring countries, oppressive governments have further weaponized their legal arsenal by adopting anti-cybercrime laws that apply these overly broad and ill-defined offline restrictions to online communications.
In an age when online communications are ubiquitous, and in societies where free press is crippled, laws that criminalize the promotion of human rights on social media networks and other online platforms undermine the ability to publicize and discuss human rights violations and threaten the foundation of any human rights movement.
In May of 2018, for example, the Saudi government carried out mass arrests of women advocating online for women’s right to drive. Charged under the country’s cybercrime law including article six which prohibits online communication “impinging on public order, religious values, public morals, and privacy,” these human rights activists were detained, tortured, and received multi-year sentences for the “crime” of promoting women’s rights.
There is certainly a necessity to address the prevalence and impact of cybercrimes but without criminalizing people who speak out for human rights.
European countries and the United Nations (UN) have encouraged states to adopt a standard approach to addressing crimes committed with online technologies ranging from wire fraud to financing terrorist groups. The Council of Europe issued a 2001 regional convention on cybercrime, to which any state may accede, and the UN is promoting a cybercrime treaty.
Common standards can prevent the abuse of online technologies by enabling the sharing of online evidence and promoting accountability since the evidence of online crimes often resides on servers outside the country where the harm occurred or where the wrongdoers reside.
The problem for human rights defenders in the Gulf region and neighbouring countries is that states have exploited the opportunity to align their cybercrime laws with European standards to double-down on laws restricting legitimate online expression.
European countries have robust human rights oversight from the European Court of Human Rights, which ensures that limitations on freedom of expression online meet stringent international standards. There is no comparable human rights oversight for the Gulf region. Without adequate international judicial review, governments can successfully exploit international processes to strengthen their ability to stifle online expression.
The regional model cybercrime law drafted by the United Arab Emirates and adopted by the Arab League in 2004, follows international guidance. However, it incorporates a regional twist and includes provisions that criminalize online dissemination of content that is “contrary to the public order and morals,” facilitates assistance to terrorist groups, along with disclosure of confidential government information related to national security or the economy.
UN experts reviewed the UAE law and gave it a seal of approval, noting it complied with the European convention, ignoring the fact that UN human rights experts have documented repeatedly that governments use such restrictions to crack down on dissent. A UN-sponsored global cybercrime study, published in 2013, similarly soft-pedaled the threat of criminalizing online dissent by noting that governments had leeway to protect local values. Such protection does not extend to speaking up for universal rights like equality and democracy.
Actually, the universal right to freedom of expression protects online content, and limitations must meet international standards of legality, legitimacy, necessity, and proportionality. In our recent report on the use of anti-cybercrime legislation throughout the Gulf region and neighbouring countries, we found that over an 18-month period (May 2018-October 2020), there were 225 credible incidents of online freedom of expression violations against activists and journalist in ten countries: Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and the UAE. Each country has adopted anti-cybercrime laws except Iraq, where lawmakers’ drafts of proposed legislation have been met with stiff opposition from domestic and international human rights groups.
The international community needs to increase pressure on the Gulf region and neighboring countries to comply with their international obligations to protect freedom of expression off and online. Turning away from the clear evidence that oppressive governments are expanding the reach of criminal law to stifle online human rights activism undermines legitimate international efforts to address cybercrime.
How can we trust the UN to safeguard the voices advocating online for human rights and democracy in a region that so desperately needs both, if it fails to insist human rights safeguards be written into the regional and national cybercrime laws it champions?
In the age of the internet, online human rights activism needs to be supported—and protected—as a vital part of the cybercommunications ecosystem. In the Gulf region, defenders of human rights pay an untenable price for their work, risking arrest, torture, and even death. It is time to reverse the trend while there are still defenders left.
One of the women human rights defenders in Saudi Arabia said before she was imprisoned, “If the repressive authorities here put behind bars every peaceful voice calling for respect for public freedoms and the achievement of social justice in the Gulf region and neighboring countries, only terrorists will remain out.” History has proven the truth of her words, as most of the individuals who led terrorist groups with a global reach have come from this region and have caused, and still cause, chronic problems for the whole world.
The important lesson that we must learn here is that repressive governments foster a destructive dynamic of expansion and intensification of human rights violations. Repressive governments cooperate with and look to one another for strategies and tactics. Further troubling is that what we see in the Gulf region is enabled by the essentially unconditional support provided by some Western governments, especially the US and UK. This toxic template of Western support to governments that oppress their own people constitutes a threat to world peace and prosperity and must be addressed.
Lawyers have welcomed the decision by Delhi High Court stating that protesters have the right to criticise the government. They also hailed the Court’s verdict defining the lines between criticism of the government and activities that destabilize the country.
Aneesha Mathur in India Today of 16 June 2021 reports that -with the Delhi High Court rapping the government and Delhi Police over imposing UAPA on activists in connection with the clashes, following the anti-CAA protest – lawyers and jurists have said the verdict was significant since it has tried to define the line between criticism of the government, which is a Constitutional right, and activities that destabilize the country.
Former Supreme court justice Madan B Lokur welcomed the High court verdict.: “The judgment is welcome. It’s about time the courts told the State that draconian laws like the UAPA, NSA, sedition and so on may be used, if at all, very rarely and only if there is clinching evidence. Draconian laws cannot and must not be abused otherwise our braveheart judges will strike down arbitrary actions. The Delhi High Court has opened the door for interference and other High Courts should follow quickly while recognising that human rights are for humans and not the faceless State,”.
Senior advocate Dushyant Dave told India Today TV that the court had “not said anything new but laid down the law on the facts of the case.” Dave also called for “proactive and expeditious” movement from the judiciary on similar cases, and said that the activists “had lost one year of their life,” for no reason.advertisement
“We are the world’s largest democracy. We will not be able to call ourselves a democracy if such laws are used to suppress dissent.” Speaking to India Today TV, Dave said despite “rule of law”, India had “become a police state.”
“Not only is BJP government abusing UAPA, but the Congress government also abused POTA and thousands were put in jail,” said Dave.
Lawyer Vrinda Grover also said the HC verdict was “significant” since there has been indiscriminate use of the law in recent years.
“Over the last few years, we see the police frequently using UAPA and sedition to silence critical citizens’ voices by placing them behind bars under stringent anti-terror law. The High Court has pierced through the indiscriminate use of UAPA by the police and unwarranted labelling of activities as terrorism. The Court has reiterated that non-violent contestation of government policies and laws is a constitutionally protected right to protest. Finally, the court has also reminded that if the speedy trial is not possible they must be granted bail,” said Grover.
He added: “In this context, we must raise the issue of incarceration of 16 human rights defenders in the Bhima Koregaon case under UAPA for almost three years and the trial is yet to commence. The judiciary must intervene and not allow the criminal legal machinery to be used by the State to suppress fundamental freedoms of citizens, otherwise democracy is in peril.”
“Anti-terror laws are made very strict because they are meant to handle terrorism cases. The government must balance the right of the citizens to protest and criticise with the need of the state. But governments tend to treat criticism as sedition and anti-national, which is wrong. The two judges have shown courage in calling this out,” said Senior advocate Geeta Luthra.
Former Law Commission chairman, Justice BS Chauhan said that while the potential for misuse “cannot mean repeal of an act”, there is a “need to define the contours of the law, as the UAPA is a wide provision” as it was meant to combat serious threats.advertisement
“Courts need to define contours of sedition and UAPA otherwise they can cover freedom of speech and expression,” said Chauhan.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has called for the Indian government to protect the rights of human rights defenders and NGOs in India. She praised India for being at the forefront of the fight for human rights but cautioned that vaguely worded laws may put that in jeopardy.
Her Tuesday 20 October 2020 statement comes as a response to worrying uses of the Indian Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FRCA) which various UN bodies have been worried is overbroad and vague in its objectives. Additionally, it prohibits them from receiving foreign money for “for any activities prejudicial to the public interest.” This can and has had an impact on the right to freedom of association and expression and has prevented foreign NGOs from giving money to Indian causes.
“The FCRA has been invoked over the years to justify an array of highly intrusive measures, ranging from official raids on NGO offices and freezing of bank accounts, to suspension or cancellation of registration, including of civil society organizations that have engaged with UN human rights bodies,” Bachelet said. Most recently it led Amnesty international to close their Indian offices after they were raided and their bank account was frozen. [see: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2020/09/29/amnesty-feels-forced-to-shut-sown-its-india-office-amidst-govenment-pressure/]
Bachelet, also called for the Indian government to allow peaceful protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act. More than 1,500 people have been arrested because of their protests to this act and many have been charged with violations of the FCRA.
Finally, Bachelet,called for India to review the arrests of human rights defenders who have been arrested under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act for exercising their basic human rights.
The Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office on Friday 11 September issued detention warrants for 60 lawyers on terror charges, following a call by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for the suspension of lawyers accused of terrorist links in a speech on September 1, Turkish Minute reported. According to a statement released by the office, detention warrants were issued for 48 lawyers, seven trainee lawyers, four dismissed judges and a law school graduate over their alleged affiliation with the Gülen movement, a religious group inspired by Turkish cleric Fethullah Gülen.
The lawyers followed up on “the cases of Gülen-affiliated defendants,” and “tried to manipulate the trials to the benefit of the terrorist organization under the guise of the practice of law,” the prosecutor’s statement read.
Rights groups and lawyers criticized the detention warrants and claimed that the latest move was part of a broader strategy to obliterate the right to a defense for many who are jailed on terror charges.
“An assault on lawyers in Turkey was launched after the failed 2016 coup. This assault started with the arrest of the chair of the Konya Bar Association and 20 lawyers and has been ongoing since then,” said Barış Çelik, a lawyer who spoke to Turkish Minute. “Up until the present day, nearly 1,600 lawyers have been detained, more than 600 have been arrested and 441 have been convicted over activities related to the practice of law.”
Another law practitioner, Ömer Turanlı, told Turkish Minute that even though lawyers visited the courthouse regularly, they were rounded up by 1,500 police officers.
“Due process was ignored, case files the lawyers had worked on were gathered as evidence and the lawyers were denied the right to choose their legal representatives, restricted instead to a special lawyer assigned by the prosecution,” Turanlı said. “All this unlawfulness aims to silence lawyers.”
The detentions come in the aftermath of the news that Turkey’s governing party has started working on an amendment to the law on lawyers following Erdoğan’s call on September 1 for the suspension of lawyers accused of links to terrorism
“We should be discussing whether methods such as expulsion from the profession should be introduced for lawyers,” Erdoğan had told judges and prosecutors at a ceremony in Ankara.
Just as thieves should not be called on to defend burglars, “a lawyer who defends terrorists should not be a terrorist,” he had said.
In March 2020, ahead of an anticipated – but since postponed – verdict hearing, Ali spoke with IFEX Regional Editor Cathal Sheerin about how his experience being arrested in Turkey and jailed for four months has affected his life and informed his work. “While I breathe, I hope: In conversation with Ali Gharavi of the #Istanbul10″(interview published through a partnership between Global Voices and IFEX).
Ali Gharavi. Credit Annie Game
CS: How do you feel about the upcoming hearing? I feel a combination of anticipation and anxiety. It’s been a roller coaster of emotions over the last almost three years and the verdict was supposed to have been reached at the last hearing. In terms of realistic outcomes, we’ve talked about two or three possibilities with our families, lawyers and the authorities in Sweden. I’ve been trying to keep my wits about me and not putting all my eggs in one basket, but we’re pretty optimistic that the outcome could be acquittal.
What makes you optimistic for acquittal? I’m only nominally optimistic really because these things can turn on a dime. At the hearing before the last one, the prosecutor said that – of the ten of us plus Taner Kılıç – he would accept acquittal for five because of lack of evidence, but the rest he wanted to convict. I was in the acquittal group. All of us are quite adamant, however, about not having this ‘split’ decision.
Why do you think you were divided into two groups? It’s really hard to say. Two of us in the acquittal group – Peter Steudtner and I – are not Turkish, so it’s possible that they want to remove the international angle from all of this. However, that’s just my speculation. It’s actually quite arbitrary, and I think this is partly because they have no evidence. It might even be a way to ramp this down: Let’s acquit half of them now and then acquit the rest in a trickle.
….. How aware were you when you were detained of the advocacy that was taking place on your behalf? What impact did it have on your morale? Maintaining my morale was one of the biggest challenges for me. I was held at four different sites. At one point, they transferred us to the anti-terrorism headquarters for interrogation, which sounds like – and was – quite a harrowing experience. ……
I’ve done letter-writing campaigns in the past, and I never knew for sure if they had any effect on the people who were in jail, but having been on the inside, I can say that those moments were life-saving. Sometimes my lawyer would search for my name on Twitter and print out all the tweets that had been posted that week about me; there was also this Twitter campaign, #haikusforAli, and demonstrations in Brussels, sit-ins in front of embassies. All of those moments reminded me that people on the outside were thinking of me and mobilising. I’m not exaggerating when I say that those were the things that saved me when I was in the depths of an abyss.
How has the experience affected how you work? The kind of work I’d been doing was intended exactly for this kind of situation, where you need to pay attention to the whole person, not just their devices or the organisation’s activities. Because of my incarceration, I now understand that at a molecular level. For me, the whole experience has placed a higher premium on understanding people – who they are, where they are – as a big part of how we can actually help them regardless of whichever aspect of their work we’re trying to assist them with. One thing the experience revealed was how inadequately resourced and researched care and crisis response is: how do you care for not just the person incarcerated, but also his family, the community around him, his colleagues?
Once the crisis is ‘over’ the assumption is that life goes on as usual, whereas there’s actually recovery that needs to be done. Often there’s also a massive financial burden due to legal costs and the inability to work for a while. After my release I went to Berlin and arrived into a very supportive debriefing environment. It’s a very privileged situation to be in – those ten days were very helpful in making me understand that I’d be going through this trauma and recovery and that it’s not just business as usual. There was a crowd-funder created for me so that I didn’t just have to drop back into work, and there was physical and psychological therapy too. I knew it intellectually, but now I know it viscerally, that just because you get released the trauma doesn’t just go away. It takes years to be functional again. People assume that when you recover you’re going to go back to being who you were, but that’s not true.
Would you ever return to Turkey? It would be very difficult for me to feel safe there, but I would go, if only in order to ‘get back on the horse’. If the verdict doesn’t go the way we expect, then I’d be incarcerated if I turned up there, so I obviously wouldn’t return. I love Turkey – the people and the environment – and I feel like a big part of my life and friends is now off-limits to me. But I dream of when I’ll be able to go back, hug the people who were inside with me and eat baklava with them. As Cicero said: ‘While I breathe, I hope.’
The humanity of what I experienced in detention was humbling. Regardless of why those people were incarcerated with me, they – that young 19-year-old who spoke to me in German, and others – were an amazing source of inspiration and support. During the toughest times I’d be angry with them, but they were amazingly unwavering. I’ve heard via word of mouth that those two supposed ISIS members are now back with their families and all is well. I owe them a big debt of gratitude.
Most of the time I was incarcerated alongside political prisoners who faced trial on specious charges, or who had been (and continue to be) detained for years on end as they wait for an indictment. And now we hear that despite the mortal threat of COVID-19 sweeping through the prison system, those prisoners will stay behind bars.
In a blog post by Kunal Majumder, CPJ India Correspondent on 8 January 2020, Indian freelance journalist Santosh Yadav says “I feel like a weight has been lifted’ as Chhattisgarh court ends four-year legal nightmare.
Freelance journalist Santosh Yadav, left, with human rights defender Shalini Gera and CPJ India Correspondent Kunal Majumder, during a convention on journalist safety in Raipur, Chhattisgarh, in February 2019 (CPJ)
On January 2, 2020 freelance journalist Santosh Yadav got his life back when the National Investigation Agency court in Jagdalpur acquitted him of charges of helping Maoists militants. The ruling marked the end of a legal nightmare that lasted over four years for Yadav, who says that he was threatened and beaten in custody, before being released on bail under restrictive conditions.
Yadav’s ordeal started in September 2015, when police in India’s Chhattisgarh state arrested him on accusations of aiding and abetting Maoist militants. The journalist’s colleagues and his lawyer, who spoke with CPJ at the time, said they believed the arrest was in connection to his reporting on alleged human rights abuses by police.
The journalist, who at the time was a contributor to the Hindi-language newspaper Navbharat in Bastar district, was charged with 28 counts including associating with a terrorist organization, supporting and aiding terrorist groups, taking part in a Maoist-led ambush against security forces, rioting with a deadly weapon, unlawful assembly, wrongful restraint, attempt to murder, public mischief and criminal conspiracy. He was held in pre-trial detention for one and a half years. Yadav told CPJ that during that time, police beat him regularly and threatened to have him killed. When he was released on bail, the court imposed several restrictive measures.
The day after the January 2 ruling that exonerated Yadav, the journalist spoke with CPJ about his struggle during the four years since his arrest. Here some excerpts from this interview :
Congratulations. So does this court ruling mean you are a free man?
Yes, all charges have been dropped. The judge said that I’m innocent and have been exonerated of all charges. He added that there is no evidence to prove the police charge that I’m a Maoist.
Prior to your 2015 arrest, had police contacted you about your reporting? Were there any signs or warning that police were unhappy with your journalism?
There were numerous incidents when local police officials would express displeasure over my reporting. I never thought it was anything serious. However, before my arrest, police started picking me up from my home at random hours, once at 3 a.m. They would threaten to arrest me, kill me. They even offered money in exchange for information on Maoists. They would keep me in lock-up the whole day and release me in the evening. I had a feeling that my life was at threat. I informed several journalists and human rights defenders including Malini Subramaniam [one of CPJ’s 2016 International Press Freedom Awardees], Shalini Gera and Isha Khandelwal that the police might arrest me.
…….. Previously, you told CPJ and otheroutlets that you were beaten and threatened even inside jail. Could you describe your time in prison?
I was beaten repeatedly, especially when I would go for bathing. I even started a protest fast, which several prisoners supported. The prison guards retaliated by beating us with batons. At that point, I didn’t know if I would live or die. After beating me mercilessly, I was stripped and put in solitary confinement for 11 days. Then they moved to me Kanker jail. [Kanker is 122 miles from Yadav’s hometown of Darbha.] Even there I was beaten up. The prison guards singled me out for my protests in the Jagdalpur jail and targeted me…
Tomorrow, 29 November, 2019, young people will gather at locations around the world for a Fridays for Future Global Climate Strike. On 2 December, United Nations delegates, world leaders, business executives, and activists will meet at the 25th Conference of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP25) in Madrid to discuss ways to protect the environment. Participants in these events should also discuss ways to protect the protectors: the individuals and groups targeted around the world for their efforts on behalf of the planet.
Protecting the endangered Asiatic cheetah. Tweeting a satirical poem. Attending a climate conference. Campaigning against a power plant. These actions hardly conjure images of suicide bombers or coup plotters. Yet they have been labeled “eco-terrorism,” “extremism,” or “threats to national security” by governments and businesses that seek to block the work of environmental activists. The dangers facing environmental defenders do not stop at accusations that they are national security risks.From the Amazon rainforest to South African mining communities, activists seeking to preserve ecosystems and ancestral lands are being threatened, attacked, and even killed with near total impunity, Human Rights Watch has found. But in contrast to many of these illegal acts, the unjust labeling of environmentalists as security threats is often more insidious, as it is generally carried out under the color of law.
In a long interesting piece on 28 November Human Rights Watch writes that only in exceptional cases would the actions of environmental activists meet a generally recognized definition of terrorism … When they engage in civil disobedience, their aim is usually to strengthen – and improve the enforcement of – existing environmental protection measures. It lists examples where environmental activists have been smeared as terrorists or other national security threats (for more detail see the original article):
In Kenya, the police and military have frequently labeled environmental activists opposing a mega-infrastructure project in the Lamu coastal region, including a coal-fired power plant, as “terrorists” while subjecting them to threats, beatings, and arbitrary arrests and detentions. In 15 cases documented by Human Rights Watch between 2013 and 2016, the authorities accused environmental defenders of membership in, or links to, the extremist armed group al-Shabab but provided no compelling evidence.
In the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte in 2018 placed 600 civil society members, including environmentalists and indigenous rights defenders, on a list of alleged members of the country’s communist party and its armed wing, which he declared to be a terrorist organization. Duterte’s “terrorist list” included Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, an indigenous Filipina who is the UN special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples and a climate change activist.
In Ecuador, eight years passed before the prominent environmental activist José “Pepe” Acacho, a Shuar indigenous leader, was able to clear himself of “terrorism” charges for his activities opposing mining and oil exploration in the Amazon. Acacho was charged with terrorism in 2010 for allegedly inciting violence during Shuar protests against a mining law.
In the US in August 2018, then-US Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke blamed “environmental terrorist groups” that opposed logging for wildfires on the West Coast – a proposition immediately attacked by leading environmental organizations including the Sierra Club. In 2017, 84 members of the US Congress, most of them Republicans, asked the Justice Department if activists mobilizing against the construction of oil pipelines could be prosecuted as terrorists. (The department’s response was that in some cases, yes.)
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In Russia, at least 14 environmental groups have stopped work in recent years, and the head of the prominent group Ekozaschita! (Ecodefense!), Alexandra Koroleva, fled the country in June to avoid prosecution under the draconian Law on Foreign Agents. The 2012 law requires any Russian group accepting foreign funding and carrying out activities deemed to be “political” to register as a “foreign agent,” a term that in Russia implies “spy” or “traitor.” Authorities have used the law to silence groups that opposed state-sanctioned development projects and petitioned authorities for the release of imprisoned environmental activists, a Human Rights Watch investigation found.
Civil society participation will be crucial to ambitious outcomes at COP25. Parties to the summit, which include all UN member countries and the European Union, should allow activists ample opportunity to air their concerns about the climate crisis and use their combined expertise to help identify solutions. They should also provide activists with a safe space to speak out about the threats they face for carrying out their work.
In addition, parties should publicly commit to robustly carrying out international and regional treaties that protect environmental defenders. One of these treaties is the Escazu Agreement (the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean), the world’s first covenant to include specific provisions promoting and protecting environmental defenders. Twenty-one countries have signed the 2018 agreement. But only six countries have ratified it – five shy of the ratifications needed to enter it into force. Chile, which stepped down as COP25 host because of protests stemming from economic grievances, but will still preside over the negotiations in Madrid, should lead by example and ratify the agreement.
COP25 participants should also commit to upholding the Aarhus Convention (the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters), to which Spain is a signatory. The convention – an environmental pact for Europe, the European Union, and Central Asia – grants the public, including environmental groups, an array of rights including public participation and access to information and justice in governmental decisions on the environment, without harassment or persecution. Parties to the treaty, including the EU, and Poland for its crackdown at COP24, have been criticized – including in some cases by the Aarhus Convention’s own oversight body – for flouting these provisions.
COP25 delegates should recognize that to genuinely protect the environment, they also need to protect its defenders – including those unjustly targeted in the name of security.
On the occasion of first International Day Commemorating the Victims of Acts of Violence Based on Religion or Belief – 22 August – a large group of UN independent experts (see names below) issued a statement saying that States have an important role to play in promoting religious tolerance and cultural diversity by promoting and protecting human rights, including freedom of religion or belief. The experts urged States to step up their efforts to combat intolerance, discrimination and violence against people based on religion or belief, including against members of religious minorities and people who are not religious.
Any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on religion or belief which has the effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise of human rights and fundamental freedoms on an equal basis would amount to religious intolerance and discrimination. This was made clear in the 1981 General Assembly Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief.
We have observed violence in the name of religion around the world perpetrated by States and non-state groups leading to discrimination, persecution, arbitrary arrests or detention, enforced disappearances, sexual violence and killings of many people based on their religion or belief. Victims have included religious minorities, individuals who are not religious, LGBTI persons, children and women who face many forms of discrimination and gender-based violence. Such violence threatens the hard-fought progress in securing women’s equality and the rights of LGBTI persons.
“We stress that religion or belief should never be used to justify discrimination. When faced with religious persecution or discrimination, victims are often also deprived of their right to participate fully in political, economic and cultural life, as well as their rights to education and to health. This can include the desecration and destruction of numerous cultural heritage sites of rich historic and religious value, such as places of worship and cemeteries.
As populism has become a trend in the political and social arena, it has fostered many forms of hatred against those who are viewed as foreign or simply different. Often, States and religious institutions resort to the instrumentalisation of religions or beliefs in order to retain their influence or control and achieve other political agendas. Fundamentalism is on the rise across the world’s major religious traditions, posing a threat to many human rights. Moreover, critical views of religions or beliefs are sometimes mischaracterised as ‘hate speech’ or labelled an offence to the religious feelings of others both by governments and non-state groups. Too often this is used as a pretext to silence those with critical voices and punish others for not believing.
The right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief is misunderstood as protecting religions and beliefs instead of the people with the beliefs and those without. It is incumbent on States to ensure that religions or beliefs are not used to violate human rights, and to combat religious extremism – which are a threat to many human rights, while adhering to international norms.
States have resorted to the securitisation of religion or belief, or viewing them through a lens of national security, in their fight against violent extremism. But an overly securitised approach has proven to be counterproductive and has led to xenophobia, increasing ‘religious profiling’ and discrimination, particularly towards religious minorities….
We urge States and all individuals and groups to work together to enhance the implementation of international human rights standards that protect individuals against discrimination and hate crimes, and to increase interreligious, interfaith and intercultural initiatives, and expand human rights education in an inclusive manner as a key catalyst for change.”
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 