Geoffrey Robertson at home in London. Photo: Kitty Gale
The Sydney Morning Herald of 17 April 2015 announces a series of public performances “Dreaming Too Loud” by the well-known British-Australian human rights lawyer Geoffrey Robertson. They will take place at Sydney’s City Recital Hall on 2 May, in Perth on 4 May, at Melbourne’s Hamer Hall on 5 May, in Adelaide on 8 May, Brisbane on 12 May and Canberra on 13 May.
A barrister entertaining a theatre audience? Well, the introductory piece (see some extracts below) certainly makes it sound like a very interesting event and I would not mind attending if Australia were just a bit closer! Also the proceeds go to two human rights NGOs including the International Service for Human Rights.
About his own performance: “Dr Johnson’s comment after watching a performing dog walking on its hind legs: it’s not that it’s done well, it’s the fact that it’s done at all“.
It will be an opportunity to explain the importance of human rights and how Australia might better contribute to them. I can reminisce about my own visits to death row and my times with torturers, and bring the latest news from the Ecuadorian Embassy.[Robertson was Assange’s lawyer] But I can also tell tales of Linda Lovelace and Mike Tyson and the Sex Pistols, and others I have defended. It will not be a night of doom and gloom, so long as I can suppress my tendency to talk about the Australian Constitution.
……
I have played roles in front of large audiences. During the run of Hypotheticals on the ABC, I was a man of many parts – General Bulldoza, Sergeant Doberman, Senator Gladhand, Amanda Autocue, Lester Gallop, Judge Knott, Kerry Murfax. Those names worked to avoid libel writs from the identities on whom they were based. For younger readers, incidentally, Hypotheticals were unrehearsed Socratic dialogues in which sixteen or so luminaries would sit around a horseshoe table and play themselves in imaginary scenarios of my devising. I had John Howard sit on the toilet, wondering whether to rub out the racist graffiti on the cubicle door or complain to the attendant, who was Charlie Perkins. I had George Pell give the kiss of life to a gay man, and Gareth Evans invaded Tasmania. ..
Hypotheticals was meant to challenge the 60 Minutes adage that “if it’s not visual, it’s not a story”. The important decisions in the real world are seldom set against glorious sunsets. They are made by people (usually men) in suits, with notebooks, sitting around a table in a nondescript room, with a few potted plants and a picture of the incumbent President – the momentousness of the decision is generally in an inverse relationship to the splendour of the surroundings in which it is made. Hence the Hypotheticals stage, with its table and notepads, must approximate to the workaday world, where an editor or take-over merchant or torturer selects the next victim. The object of the programme was to show how important decisions are made, in a way never revealed in studio interviews or press conferences.
Dreaming Too Loud will have neither props nor glorious sunsets. My thespian debut will be sandwiched between work assignments – an effort to reclaim the Elgin Marbles, lectures on the Armenian genocide and the defence of the former Prime Minister of Mauritius.
On 16 February 2015, the York Press carried a feature story by Stephen Lewis about 5 human rights defenders in the temporary shelter programmeat York University. The aim of the placements is to give those fighting for human rights around the world a breather, as well as the chance to forge contacts with other human rights workers and organisations around the world.
In York, Hikma can wear jeans – something she’d never be able to do in her own country. “Sudan is a very patriarchal society,” the 33-year-old human rights lawyer says. “Women cannot wear trousers, and I cannot go out in public without a scarf on my head. I want to wear my trousers.“
Born in North Darfur, she graduated with a law degree from Elnileen University in Khartoum in 2002, then started work as a protection officer at a refugee camp in South Darfur for civil war victims. In 2009, her organisation was closed down by the government.
Hikma Rabih
Undeterred, in 2011 she set up a legal aid centre in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital. Her organisation provides legal aid and representation for women who would otherwise have no chance of getting justice. Because of strict adultery laws, women who have sex outside marriage face 100 lashes, she says: married women who commit adultery can be stoned. If a woman is raped, but fails to prove it in court, she can be given 100 lashes as an adulteress. “The men always go free,” Hikma says.
Former NSA contractor turned whistleblower Edward Snowden was given the Carl von Ossietzky Medal in Berlin on Sunday, a medal which honors those who exhibit extraordinary civic courage or commitment to the spread and defense of human rights. According to website of the International League for Human Rights in Berlin, which has awarded the prize since 1962, Snowden was chosen because of his “momentous decision of conscience … to put [his] personal freedom on the line” to expose the “abuse of power” exercised by the US and Germany.
Snowden shares the medal with Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian journalist who broke his story, along with Laura Poitras, the documentary filmmaker who was in Berlin to accept it on the whole trio’s behalf [Snowden appeared on skype]. Several speeches were given, including one from former federal Interior Minister Gerhart Baum and human rights lawyer Wolfgang Kaleck, who represents Snowden. Baum spoke of how the Snowden had “opened our eyes to the largest intelligence surveillance scandal I know.” See more: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/snowden/
The von Ossietzky medal is named after the German Nobel Peace Prize winner who spoke out actively against the Nazi regime. Not to be confused with two other awards in the name of Ossietzky.
(The four winners of this year’s Right Livelihood Award (from left): Asma Jahangir, Bill McKibben, Alan Rusbridger and Basil Fernando. US whistle-blower Edward Snowden (not pictured) also received an honorary award)
Qantara.de 2014 on 9 December 2014 published an interesting interview by Roma Rajpal Weiss with Asma Jahangir, a prominent human rights defenders, winner of the Right Livelihood Award of this year and Laureate of the MEA as far back as 1995. The title “Every restriction is justified in the name of religion” is taken from Asma’s statement that most restrictions on the human rights of women in Pakistan are justified by arguments (perhaps rather feelings) based on religious or tradition. Read the rest of this entry »
On the occasion of Human Rights Day, the Geneva-based NGO Alkarama will present the 2014 Alkarama Award for Human Rights Defenders to Shireen Issawi, prominent lawyer and human rights defender from the Occupied Palestinian Territories. The event will be held on 11 December 2014 at 18:30 at the Ecumenical Center in Geneva (Switzerland).
Interesting to note that Peace Brigades International (PBI), in spite of a large number of Irish volunteers working for it, officially launched its local chapter in Ireland only now, Wednesday 26 November 2014. PBI is known for sending teams of international volunteers to areas of conflict at the request of local human rights defenders who are threatened and the volunteers provide protective accompaniment backed up by political support networks around the world.
At the launch, three visiting human rights defenders from countries where PBI works – Colombia, Kenya and Honduras – spoke about the risks facing human rights defenders in their countries. Honduran lawyer Donald Hernández Palma joined Colombian activist Yomaira Mendoza and Ruth Mumbi Meshack.
[Ms Mendoza’s husband was shot dead in front of her and her family’s land was taken from her illegally. After talking to Colombia’s attorney general about the progress of her case, she was subjected to death threats. After months of trying to reduce her risk in Colombia and re-location attempts within the country, she is now living in exile in Spain.]
[Mr Hernández Palma has been subject to threats and harassment in his work in criminal and environmental law, with a particular focus on mining in Latin America.]
[Ms Meshack is a community mobiliser, and founder and current National Coordinator of Bunge la Wamama, a women’s chapter a movement for social justice and accountability in different parts of Kenya. She has been imprisoned for her work defending human rights.]
RadioVop in Zimbabwe reported on 14 November 2014 that Kennedy Masiye, a human rights lawyer who was brutally assaulted by the police recently, has been honoured by the Law Society of Zimbabwe (LSZ) for his outstanding contribution to the protection and promotion of human rights in the country.
Masiye, a senior project lawyer with Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights (ZLHR) was named as the human rights lawyer of the year 2014 at the LSZ’s Summer School held in Nyanga last week. Masiye could not attend the award ceremony as he was detained in hospital (see picture above) recovering from acts of police brutality meted on him while in the course of discharging his professional duties.
[The LSZ’s human rights award is sponsored by Scanlen and Holderness Legal Practitioners and targets junior to mid-career lawyers under 35 years of age]
Masiye has represented and secured acquittals for several human rights defenders in the country including some former farm workers and villagers facing eviction from their living quarters.
“I am humbled by the award. At least the work that I am doing as a human rights lawyer is being recognised by the legal fraternity. ZLHR has enabled me to explore my potential in the human rights field. The award is an icing on the cake given the work that we have being doing at ZLHR,” said Masiye.
Change.org is carrying a petition submitted by Worldwide Women’s Support Circle. It concerns the human rights defender Souad Al-Shammary in Saudi Arabia. The story is very effectively put in the mouth of her daughter who asks for her release: “My mother’s name is Souad Al-Shammary. She is a liberal activist in Saudi Arabia who has called for the government to distance itself from radical Islamic clerics and to provide women with equal rights. On October 28th she was arrested and jailed for speaking out against the government — and I need your help to get her back.
On 13 November KCETLink, a US national independent public media organization, presents the television premiere of “BEATRICE MTETWA & THE RULE OF LAW“, chronicling the courageous human rights defender and her fight against social and political inequalities in Zimbabwe. Through interviews with Mtetwa and some of her clients, the film tells the story of what happens when leaders place themselves above the law and why defense of the rule of law is the cornerstone of society in which human rights are respected. Although Mtetwa’s platform is centered in Zimbabwe, her message and bravery are universal.
The television broadcast of BEATRICE MTETWA & THE RULE OF LAW coincides with the Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage presented by Georgia Tech honoring Beatrice Mtetwa on Thursday, 13 November, 2014. The Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage recognizes individuals around the world who, by asserting moral principle, have positively affected public discourse at the risk of their careers, livelihoods, and sometimes lives.
On Tuesday 11 November, viewers will have the opportunity to watch a live stream of a Q&A with Mtetwa and filmmaker Lorie Conway moderated by Jacqueline J. Royster, Dean of the Georgia Tech Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts, starting at 8 p.m. ET at linktv.org/mtetwa. In advance of the Q&A, viewers can also submit questions for Mtetwa online at linktv.org/mtetwa or on Twitter and Facebook using #allenprize. Amnesty International USA will also host the live stream of the Q&A on its website at amnestyusa.org.
The glimmer of hope for Nasrin Sotoudehand Iran which I saw in my post of 6 September [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2014/09/06/glimmer-of-hope-in-iran-nasrin-sotoudehs-ban-to-practice-overruled/] seems to have been crushed already. Yesterday, 20 october, the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, the joint programme of FIDH and OMCT, has received new information that on 18 October 2014, a three-member disciplinary investigation panel of Tehran’s Bar Association has now suspended Nasrin Sotoudeh’s law license for three years, based on a complaint filed by the Islamic Revolution Court’s Prosecution Office (unlike the first disciplinary panel of the Tehran Bar Association which rejected a similar request). Read the rest of this entry »
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 