share information on human rights defenders, with special focus on human rights awards and laureates
In the ongoing saga concerning the asylum request by Snowden, Kenneth Ross, the director of Human Rights Watch, makes on 2 August an interesting and courageous comment on Twitter: “Instead of trying to extradite Snowden, Congress should ask him to testify by video as spur to end mass NSA snooping.”
In a post on 4 June under the title “Bradley Manning not a Prisoner of Conscience for Amnesty International ?” I related the controversy surrounding the status of human rights defender for Breadly Manning. On 13 June, under title “Snowden a human rights defender? – Russia seems to think so” I referred to a similar issue with regard Read the rest of this entry »
Yesterday I referred to the difficulty of defining human rights defenders in relation to a Nigerian politician, and here comes another, maybe more difficult one:
As the United States Justice Department prepare charges against Edward Snowden, former federal government contractor who revealed the NSA’s secret surveillance program rights violation, as ABC News reported, Russia said Tuesday 11 June that it would consider a request from him for safe haven and The Guardian reported tuesday that Vladimir Putin’s spokesman says any appeal from whistleblower Edward Snowden for asylum will be looked at ‘according to facts,’
Aleksey Pushkov, chair of the State Duma’s International Affairs Committee, said Snowden is a “human rights activist.” Referring to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, Pushkov said, “In this sense, Snowden — like Assange — is a human-rights activist.”
“I’m willing to sacrifice all that because I can’t in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people all around the world with this massive surveillance machine they’re secretly building,” Snowden himself told The Guardian.
Russia might aid Snowden human rights activist – National Human Rights | Examiner.com.
For those who missed it or did not want to read the whole report, Carly Nyst wrote on 4 June 2013 an excellent summary of the recent landmark report by the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and the Right to Privacy, Frank la Rue.
AI Canada informs that a report released on May 28 2013 in Canada by the federal Privacy Commissioner highlights a troubling pattern of invasive and unwarranted government surveillance of Canadian human rights defender Cindy 
Blackstock. Dr. Blackstock is the Executive Director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, a prominent non-governmental organization promoting equitable access to education, health care and other services for First Nations children. Government documents obtained by Dr. Blackstock show that two federal departments monitored her personal Facebook page, tracked people who posted to her page, and sent staff to take notes on her public presentations, all in an attempt to find information that might help the government fight a discrimination complaint that Dr. Blackstock’s organization is pursuing before the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. The Privacy Commissioner concluded that the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and the Department of Justice went too far in their online monitoring of Dr. Blackstock. Read the rest of this entry »
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 