In case you missed it, AI‘s annual report came out some days ago. The video above gives a short summary.
As usual the report provides a comprehensive overview of the state of human rights in 160 countries over the course of 2014.
In its annual assessment of the world’s human rights, AI says that without urgent action and a fundamental shift in approach, there is strong reason to believe the next few years could see:
more civilian populations forced to live under the quasi-state control of armed groups, subject to abuse, persecution and attacks
deepening threats to freedom of expression and other rights, including violations caused by new draconian anti-terror laws and intrusive mass surveillance
a worsening humanitarian and refugee crisis with even more people displaced by conflict as governments continue to block borders and the international community fails to provide assistance and protection
“If lessons are not learned – if governments continue to ignore the relationship between the current security crisis and the rights failures which have led us here – then what was a bad year for rights in 2014 could get even worse in the years to come,” said Salil Shetty, Secretary General of Amnesty International.
Whatever your opinion of George Clooney as an actor, there is no doubt that he is one of the most willing to use his celebrity for human rights causes. The latest example is his Op-Ed piece in the The New York Times, entitled, “George Clooney on Sudan’s Rape of Darfur” (together with John Prendergast and Akshaya Kumar, published on 25 February 2015) .
“Because Sudan’s government routinely blocks journalists from going into the Darfur region and severely restricts access for humanitarian workers, any window into life there is limited,” Clooney says. “The government has hammered the joint peacekeeping mission of the United Nations and African Union into silence about human rights concerns by shutting down the United Nations human rights office in the capital, Khartoum, hampering investigators of alleged human rights abuses and pressuring the peacekeeping force to withdraw.”
The 53-year-old actor then explains the evidence that has been received from citizen journalists and local human rights defenders with that videos have been smuggled out.
In the morning of 24 February 2015, the bodies of human rights defender Ms Intissar Al Hasairi and her elderly aunt were discovered in the boot of the human rights defender’s car in Tripoli, Libya, by security forces. The human rights defender and her aunt had allegedly been shot by members of an armed group. The human rights defender had been missing since the previous evening. Read the rest of this entry »
From the blog “News You May Have Missed” I picked up this interesting news item showing how each person can be a human rights defender when they want to:
Photo from Muslim Public Affairs Council’s Facebook page
More than 1000 Muslims formed a human shield around a synagogue in Oslo, Norway on February 21 in response to the attack on a synagogue in Denmark last weekend. Chanting “No to anti-Semitism, no to Islamophobia,” an estimated 1200-1400 Norwegian Muslims formed a “ring of peace” around the synagogue, offering symbolic protection for the city’s Jewish community. See video coverage on the NRK website here. One of the speakers in the video is 17-year-old Hajrah Asrhad, one of the event’s organizers.
On 23 February 2015 Radio Prague reported that a new centre designed to promote civic engagement in post-Soviet countries has formally begun operating in Prague. The Prague Civil Society Centreseeks to cultivate values such as openness and human rights in countries such as Belarus, Russia, Armenia, Georgia and Ukraine. Download MP3 for the full interview by Dominik Jun with Rostislav Valvoda, head of the new centre.
World Bulletin News (from Turkey) reports on 13 February about the Dutch and Austrian governments funding a three-year project to support African human rights defenders. One always wonders why this kind of information pops up in one news source but not in others. Read the rest of this entry »
The long-read for the weekend comes from Counterpunch, 13/15 February 2015 where Graham Peebles treats the horrible media situation in Ethiopia. Basing himself on a variety of UN and NGO sources – including the recent report by Human Rights Watch – he describes in detail and by name what happens to journalists and human rights defenders who try to cover reality.
Reporters Without Bordersrecently published its 2014 World Press Freedom Index. It has a nice easy-to-use and colorful map. The accompanying text spotlights the negative correlation between freedom of information and conflicts, both open conflicts and undeclared ones. In an unstable environment, the media become strategic goals and targets for groups or individuals whose attempts to control news and information.
The ranking of some countries has also been affected by a tendency to interpret national security needs in an overly broad and abusive manner to the detriment of the right to inform and be informed. This trend constitutes a growing threat worldwide and is even endangering freedom of information in countries regarded as democracies. Finland tops the index for the fourth year running, closely followed by Netherlands and Norway, like last year. At the other end of the index, the last three positions are again held by Turkmenistan, North Korea and Eritrea, three countries where freedom of information is non-existent. Despite occasional turbulence in the past year, these countries continue to be news and information black holes and living hells for the journalists who inhabit them. This year’s index covers 180 countries.
In the context of the current conflict in Ukraine, the following notice, dated 11 February 2015, from the Ukrainian Helsinki Union is interesting:
“Human Rights Defenders: Introduction of Certificate from Military Registration and Enlistment Office for Trips Abroad can Prejudice National Interests of Ukraine“
The initiative of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, demanding persons liable for call-up to have the certificate from military registration and enlistment office to travel abroad and even to leave region is contrary to the Constitution of Ukraine and valid legislation, perpetrates human rights and can prejudice national interests of Ukraine.
The representatives of Ukrainian Helsinki Union assert: “The implementation of forced mobilization in no way will strengthen the defensive capacity of our country and will not make better anything in our Armed Forces, except the call-up statistics of military registration and enlistment offices. Yet, Ukraine is extremely interested in free movement of people, wares and capital. Panic about mobilization breakdown is more the product of information war than the result of real processes in the society. The President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin was the first one to state the forced mobilization in Ukraine. The contempt of freedom of movement policy must be ceased immediately. Provoked by Russian propaganda, this policy is apparently harmful for the national interests of Ukraine”.
Azerbaijani human rights defender Emin Huseynov is in hiding in the Swiss embassy in Baku since 18 August, 2014 reports the ”Caucasian Knot” referring to the Norwegian Human Rights House Foundation. He went there after the Azerbaijani authorities searched the office of the Institute for Reporters’ Freedom and Safety (IRFS) and confiscated equipment and documents. The office of the organisation remains sealed since 11 August, 2014, and the employees are called to interrogation. According to the article, Florian Irminger, the head of the Geneva office of the HRHF thinks that Switzerland should go on supporting the Azerbaijani human rights defender on humanitarian grounds: ”His stay at the Embassy is justified with the crackdowns level in the country, false charges against human rights defenders in Azerbaijan, and the impossibility to defend oneself in the court because of the lack of judicial system independence in the country and pressure on their lawyers’‘. The Swiss Foreign Ministry confirmed in the “Rundschau” that they had provided the Azerbaijani human rights defender with shelter on humanitarian grounds. ‘‘Since then we’ve been discussing the matter with the Azerbaijani officials in order to find a solution to the situation,” the Swiss Foreign Ministry written response reads. Read the rest of this entry »
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 