Over 50 NGOs have signed a joint letter to Aung San Suu Kyi requesting the immediate and unconditionally release of Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo.
TO: Aung San Suu Kyi, State Counsellor, Myanmar
Posts Tagged ‘Reuters’
50 human rights NGOs address Joint Letter to Aung San Suu Kyi on Reuters Journalists
November 6, 2018China, Russia and Pakistan in UN fail at attempt to muzzle human rights defenders (for now)
July 7, 2018On 6 July 2018 Stephanie Nebehay reported for Reuters that China, Russia and Pakistan lost their bid on Friday to weaken a U.N. resolution upholding the crucial rule of human rights defenders. The United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a resolution calling on all states to protect civil society groups from threats and intimidation, and prosecute reprisals against them. Chile presented the resolution text on behalf of more than 50 countries on the final day of a three-week session. Amendments proposed by China, Pakistan and Russia – declaring that civil society groups must respect “the sovereignty and territorial integrity of states” and that their funding must be “legal and transparent” – were soundly defeated. So, in spite of increasing retaliation against human right defenders and pressure on civil society in many countries [see recently: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2018/06/08/ishr-new-report-on-reprisals-and-restrictions-against-ngo-participation-in-the-un/ ], the UN is still able to resist some of the more blatant attempt to silence critics.
“China and Russia are often the least tolerant of civil society at home. They are now seeking to introduce similar restrictions at the international level,” John Fisher of Human Rights Watch told Reuters. Their attempts to place national sovereignty above international human rights law “would turn guarantees of peaceful assembly and association on their heads”.
“These amendments were a swing and a miss for China and its allies on the Council,” Sarah Brooks of the International Service for Human Rights told Reuters, using an American baseball term. “Their efforts to limit civil society’s independence and shut down civil society voices were rebuffed by a strong message – from member states across the globe – about the importance of keeping defenders’ voices at the table”.
[At the current session, China tried unsuccessfully to block the accreditation of Uighur activist Dolkun Isa, U.N. sources said. China’s delegation publicly challenged activists speaking on behalf of Uighur and Tibetan ethnic minorities. Council president Vojislav Suc, Slovenia’s ambassador, said allegations of intimidation and reprisals had emerged during the session and urged “all necessary measures” to prevent such acts.]
Bahrain: denationalization, reprisals and travel bans against human rights defenders – will it ever end?
June 23, 2016Bahrain does everything it can to keep itself in the spotlight of human rights concern. A coalition of NGOs, as well as the UN and (reluctantly) the USA have recently come out with criticism over travel bans, reprisals, denationalization and other violations:
When the 32nd session of the United Nations Human Rights Council opened in Geneva on 13 June 2016, Nabeel Rajab, Bahrain’s best-known human rights defender, was arrested after dozens of police officers raided his home at around 5am and confiscated his electronic devices. The day before, Bahraini human rights defenders and victims of violations were prevented from flying to Geneva. On 16 June 21 NGOs signed a statement of serious alarm by Bahrain’s restrictions civil society especially preventing them from engaging with the UN.
[Rajab, President of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR – nominee of the MEA 2012), founding Director of the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) and Deputy Secretary General of FIDH, was reportedly arrested under order from the Ministry of Interior’s Cybercrimes Unit. Bahraini officials had imposed a travel ban on Rajab a year ago, and since April 2015 have maintained charges against him for crimes related to freedom of expression online. Despite the submission of several appeals against the ban, authorities remained unresponsive. On 14 June 2016, Rajab was transferred to the public prosecution; and new charges were brought against him of allegedly ‘publishing and broadcasting false news that undermines the prestige of the state’. The public prosecution remanded him to seven days in detention pending investigation.]
In a new escalation of its crackdown against civil society, Bahraini authorities have now also banned other human rights defenders from leaving the country. The bans were imposed as the activists were attempting to travel to Geneva to participate in the Human Rights Council.
In light of this escalated attack on civil society in Bahrain, the 21 NGOs call for the immediate release of all human rights defenders in Bahrain, including Nabeel Rajab, and for the removal of the imposed travel bans which unfairly restrict activists’ freedom of movement. We also request that the President of the HRC, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders, the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Opinion and Expression and the Special Rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Association call on the Bahraini authorities to immediately and unconditionally lift the travel ban imposed on Bahrain’s civil society activists and guarantee Bahraini human rights defenders are free from intimidation and restrictions on their work, including at the UN. We also call on the international community to hold the government of Bahrain to its commitments and obligations to foster a safe environment for the peaceful enjoyment of universal human rights. The government of Bahrain must immediately stop the ongoing reprisals against human rights defenders who are engaging with international mechanisms including the UN system. [21 signatories to be hound at the bottom of this post.]
On 21 June 2016, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights stepped in with an expression of great concern over this intensification of a crackdown on free expression and association, and the right to a nationality: Read the rest of this entry »
Thailand returns recognized refugees to China (and falsely claims they did not know about their status)
December 8, 2015Anneliese Mcauliffe in Al Jazeera on 6 December 2015 reported that two Chinese human rights defenders recognised as UN refugees were forcibly deported from Thailand to China last month and have appeared on Chinese state-run television and confessed to human-trafficking offenses. CCTV reported that Jiang Yefei was arrested for “assisting others to illegally cross the national border”, and Dong Guangping was charged with using a trafficking network to flee China while awaiting trial on sedition charges. It was the first time the two men were seen since being taken from a detention centre in the Thai capital Bangkok in November and deported to China.
U.N. Rapporteur on Myanmar called “whore” by radical Buddhist monk
January 21, 2015
Wirathu:”Just because you hold a position in the United Nations doesn’t make you an honourable woman. In our country, you are just a whore,”
For those who think that hate speech has no place in peace-loving Buddhism, this is sobering item:
A radical Myanmar Buddhist monk, Wirathu, called the U.N. human rights envoy – Ms Yanghee Lee – a “whore”, and accused Lee of bias towards Rohingya Muslims, a stateless minority in the western Myanmar state of Rakhine. Wirathu denounced Yanghee Lee, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar before a cheering crowd of several hundred people, in a speech in Yangon on Friday, after she questioned draft laws that critics say discriminate against women and non-Buddhists. “You can offer your arse to the kalars if you so wish but you are not selling off our Rakhine State,” he said. Kalars is a derogatory word for people of South Asian descent.
His speech was condemned by Thawbita, a leading member of the progressive Saffron Revolution Buddhist Monks Network in Mandalay, where Wirathu is also based. “The words used that day are very sad and disappointing. It is an act that could hurt Buddhism very badly,” Thawbita told Reuters. But he is unlikely to face censure. A senior official at the Ministry of Religious Affairs told Reuters there were no plans to act against Wirathu. This is the more remarkable as in December a New Zealander and two Burmese were charged with insulting Buddhism. The arrest was triggered by a complaint by an official from the country’s religious department. [see: http://news/world-asia-30527443]
Rapporteur Lee in a statement released by her office on Monday said: “During my visit I was personally subjected to the kind of sexist intimidation that female human rights defenders experience when advocating on controversial issues“.
Myanmar monk’s U.N. whore rant “could hurt Buddhism” | Asia-Pasific | Worldbulletin News.
Tony Blair’s Children’s Award in contrast with his PR work for a dictator
November 27, 2014This blog has always had keen interest in awards and in celebrities abusing their reputation. The current row over Tony Blair receiving an award from Save the Children USA as described by Katie Nguyen of Reuters on 26 November 2014 is exactly at the crossroads of these two interest.
(former British Prime Minister Tony Blair at International donors conference on October 12, 2014.
CREDIT: REUTERS/MOHAMED ABD EL GHANY/FILES)
Queen Noor of Jordan not the right choice to present human rights awards
December 14, 2013Laila Alawa in a post on PolicyMic of 13 December puts a good question: should award givers not take care in selecting the one who hands out the award? She does not mince her words in stating that Queen Noor of Jordan was the wrong choice by the Thomson Reuters Foundation as she does not uphold the qualities that this foundation wants to reward. Read the rest of this entry »
UN human rights report is politically motivated says Iran
October 27, 2013The Tehran Times of 24 October 2013 , the governmental english-language newspaper of Iran, devoted a big piece on the reaction of the Government to the latest report by Ahmed Shaheed, UN special rapporteur on human rights in Iran. According to Reuters, in an address to the UN General Assembly’s Third Committee Ahmed Shaheed, said, “Any renewed or revitalized dialogue between Iran and the international community must include and not seek to sideline the issue of human rights” and “Human rights considerations must be central to the new government’s legislative and policy agenda, and to international dialogue and cooperation.” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Afkham, responded on Thursday that the mechanism for the appointment of the rapporteur was “completely political,” adding, “Terrorist groups and the groups which are seeking violence and have innocent people’s blood on their hands have been used as sources to prepare this report so it has no legal weight. In addition, Iran’s Permanent Mission to the UN issued a statement in which it defended the country’s human rights record. For those who are interested here follow some long excerpts which in tone and content are still very tough but perhaps the last paragraph reflects a bit more the hope that many have since Rouhani’s election: “Finally, notwithstanding our strong criticism of the report, we will continue our efforts to promote human rights in our country, including through enhancing our cooperation with the UN human rights machinery, particularly OHCHR, the UPR, thematic mandate holders and bilateral dialogue on human rights.” Read the rest of this entry »
Amnesty International says new Greek legislation fuels asylum-seeker abuse
May 24, 2013
(Undocumented immigrants in the courtyard of a detention centre near the Evros River in northern Greece – (c) Reuters)
I would be amiss in not reporting the criticism by Amnesty International of my adopted home country: Read the rest of this entry »
