When North Korea, Iran and Kazakhstan start praising your human rights records, it may be time to change tactics. Turkmenistan came under fire at a recent session of the United Nations Human Rights Council where it was questioned by its peers for its torture programs, systematic suppression of free speech and persecution of human rights defenders. Read the rest of this entry »
Posts Tagged ‘torture’
Bahrain refuses – again – UN Rapporteur on Torture
April 26, 2013Bahrain’s state news agency reported earlier this week that Juan Méndez, the UNs special rapporteur for torture, had “put off his visit” scheduled for early May following a letter from Salah bin Ali Abdulrahman, Bahrain’s human rights affairs minister. The letter outlined “reasons for the request to postpone the visit”, the agency said. However, Mr Méndez said on Wednesday 24 April (according to the National) that there was no choice in the matter, calling the refusal to play host to his visit “a unilateral decision by the [Bahraini] authorities“. “This is the second time that my visit has been postponed, at very short notice. It is effectively a cancellation, as no alternative dates were proposed, nor is there a future road map to discuss“.
So much for the much-touted Government-commissioned report of 2011 in which the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry found evidence of torture committed by the country’s security forces during a pro-reform uprising and the subsequent Government’s promise to coöperate with the UN to address the issues. Refusal to coöperate may pay again!
via Bahrain shuts out UN torture probe – The National.
Related articles
- UN ‘deep disappointment’ with Bahrain (bbc.co.uk)
- Bahrain blocks visit of UN official (bbc.co.uk)
Breaking News: Final Nominees Martin Ennals Award 2013 made public
April 24, 2013The Martin Ennals Jury just announced today (at 11h00 local time) the three Final Nominees for the Martin Ennals Award 2013. The MEA is the main award of the whole human rights movement thanks to its international Jury composed of 10 well-known human rights organisations (see below). The aim of the award is to provide protective publicity. The Final Nominees are:
Mona Seif, Egypt – Final Nominee MEA 2013
Mona Seif, Egypt: Core founder of the ”No To Military Trials for Civilians”, a grassroots initiative which is trying to stop military trials for civilians. Since February 2011, Mona has brought together activists, lawyers, victims’ families,local stakeholders and started a nationwide movement against military trials. As part of the recent crackdown on the freedom of speech in Egypt she has been charged along with other Human Rights activists. She noted that “International solidarity, and I mean people’s support not governments’, empowers us to continue our battle and stop military trials for civilians“.
Mahmudur Rahman reportedly tortured while in detention in Bangladesh
April 24, 2013
reports that on 18 April 2013, on his second day in custody at Kashimpur Central Jail, human rights defender Mahmudur Rahman was moved from judicial custody to Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University due to severe torture which reportedly included the hammering of nails into his flesh and bone as well as electric shock treatment. Mahmudur Rahman is an editor of the newspaper Daily Amardesh, which was closed by police without a court order on 11 April 2013, the same day the human rights defender was arrested. As an editor of the Daily Amardesh, Mahmudur Rahman has published articles exposing corruption scandals of high profile ruling party politicians including the Prime Minister and her family members. He also denounced the killing of 172 civilians by police during government clashes with the opposition last February. Despite the closure of the Daily Amardesh, the Interim Chairperson, Mrs Mahmuda Begum, made arrangements to print at an alternative press, however this was forbidden by the District Magistrate and 19 people were arrested at the press on 14 April 2013.
The torture reportedly took place whilst Mahmudur Rahman was in custody at the Detective Branch of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police. He was detained under police remand for six days before being handed over to judicial remand on 17 April 2013. The human rights defender had been on hunger strike in custody to protest his illegal detention, torture, and the arrest of his colleagues following the closure of the Daily Amardesh. A petition was filed to the High Court Division Bench on 18 April 2013 challenging the decision to send Mahmudur Rahman to police remand. The human rights defender’s lawyers argued that placing him in police remand without adequate measures in place to ensure his physical health violates the High Court’s directives concerning pre-trial detention. Mahmudur Rahman suffers from a heart condition which can be fatal if untreated. When the human rights defender was escorted into court to hear the petition, eye witnesses said that he had fresh wounds on his legs, blood stains on his clothes and that he found it difficult to sit down.
Front Line Defenders believes that the arrest and reported torture in detention of Mahmudur Rahman are related to his work in defence of human rights and denouncing government corruption in Bangladesh (see earlier appeal http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/node/2561 of 10 November 2010.
Related articles
Jailed Bahraini doctors should be released now, says Mary Lawlor
March 27, 2013In a piece in the Irish Times of 27 March 2013 Mary Lawlor, Director of Front Line Defenders, makes a strong plea for the release of the medical staff arrested and ill-treated in Bahrain:
“Medical ethics is apparently too sensitive an issue to discuss in Bahrain following the cancelling of an international conference that was being organised by the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland RCSI and Médecins Sans Frontières. Hardly surprising given that the Bahraini government jails and tortures medical professionals and human rights defenders……………..
….It is a pity that the RCSI did not feel strongly enough on the issue of medical ethics to speak out publicly when colleagues, some of whom had studied in Dublin, were being tortured in police custody in 2011………But the reality is that the government continues to jail those who raise their voices in defence of human rights. At this moment Dr Ali Al Ekri, Dr Saeed Al Samahiji and Ibrahim Al Demistani, a nurse, remain in prison having been convicted of “trying to overthrow the monarchy”, by treating injured demonstrators and speaking out about killings and torture. At the same time another 20 medics and health professionals will find out today whether the charges of participating in illegal gatherings have been upheld against them. They face the possibility of receiving a three-month prison sentence, although in practice, many of them have already spent that time in prison awaiting trial. Even those medics who have been released or who have had charges against them dropped have been removed from their posts. …. Repression in Bahrain is not a secret. Medical ethics would best be served by releasing the medics from prison together with Nabeel Rajab and all those human rights defenders who have had the courage to speak truth to power.”
Related articles
- Full report of observer mission to trial of Nabeel Rajab in Bahrain now available (thoolen.wordpress.com)
Rapporteur on Iran Ahmed Shaheed made report to Human Rights Council
March 14, 2013
(Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Iran Ahmed Shaheed. UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferré)
On 11 March 2013 the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, Ahmed Shaheed, voiced serious concern about the general situation of human rights in Iran, pointing to “widespread and systemic” torture, as well as the harassment, arrest and attacks against human rights defenders, lawyers and journalists. “The prevailing situation of human rights in Iran continues to warrant serious concern, and will require a wide range of solutions that are both respectful of cultural perspectives and mindful of the universality of fundamental human rights promulgated by the treaties to which Iran is a party,”.
Presenting his report to the Geneva-based Human Rights Council, Mr. Shaheed said that Iran has made some “noteworthy advances” in the area of women’s rights, including advancements in health, literacy and in enrolment rates on both the primary and secondary levels. Read the rest of this entry »
MEA Laureate files complaint against Uzbek government for forcible sterilisation and torture
February 28, 2013
Mutabar Tadjibayeva, one of Uzbekistan’s best known human rights defenders and Laureate of the Martin Ennals Award 2008, has filed a complaint against Uzbekistan for her brutal torture and forced sterilisation when she was serving an eight-year prison sentence for her human rights activities. The international human rights organisations FIDH and REDRESS recently filed the complaint on her behalf before the UN Human Rights Committee. This is the first known case before the Committee involving a Uzbek human rights defender being forcibly sterilised.
Tadijbayeva has repeatedly sought an investigation from Uzbek authorities into the serious human rights violations that she has suffered since 2002, but her claims have never been investigated and no-one has ever been prosecuted for them. Tadjibayeva is asking the Committee to order Uzbekistan to conduct an effective investigation, punish those found responsible and provide her with reparation, including compensation, as well as her full medical records about the surgery that left her infertile, among other things.
Read the rest of this entry »
Tadijbayeva has repeatedly sought an investigation from Uzbek authorities into the serious human rights violations that she has suffered since 2002, but her claims have never been investigated and no-one has ever been prosecuted for them. Tadjibayeva is asking the Committee to order Uzbekistan to conduct an effective investigation, punish those found responsible and provide her with reparation, including compensation, as well as her full medical records about the surgery that left her infertile, among other things.
Read the rest of this entry »
Four bus drivers in Singapore – after ill-treatment in detention – go on trial on 4 March
February 19, 2013
Human rights defenders Messrs He Jun Ling, Gao Yue Qiang, Liu Xiangying, and Wang Xian Jie will go on a joint trial from 4 to 8 March 2013, reports Front Line Defenders.He Jun Ling, Gao Yue Qiang Liu Xiangying, and Wang Xian Jie are human rights defenders who were employed by the state controlled public transport operator SMRT Ltd. More than 100 mainland Chinese bus drivers refused to report for duty on the 26th of November 2012. It took some time for authorities to label the stoppage an ‘illegal strike’. Once that happened, things moved quickly. 29 drivers accused of participating in the action were swiftly rounded up and deported. Five men were also arrested. One has already been tried, jailed and sent back home. The others – He Jun Ling, Gao Yue Qiang, Liu Xiang Ying and Wang Xian Jie – are waiting for their cases to be heard. They are currently facing charges of inciting an illegal strike among bus drivers, and could be sentenced to a fine of 2,000 Singapore dollars (approx €1,250), a 12-month prison sentence or both.He Jun Ling and Liu Xiangying revealed last week that were assaulted by police officials while they were held in custody in December 2012. According to the information received, He Jun Ling was interrogated from 5am to 1pm, during which time he was locked in a small room, handcuffed, and beaten in the stomach. Liu Xiangying reported that an official threatened him, stating that “they can dig a hole and bury him. No one will be able to find him.” He was also handcuffed to a chair and beaten in his neck and the left side of his body. Read the rest of this entry »Portrait number 4 in OMCT series is Franklin Castañeda Villacob from Colombia
December 4, 2012Today’s HRD in the OMCT series is Franklin Castañeda Villacob, 30 years old, working with the Committee of Solidarity with Political Prisoners (CSPP) in Colombia
Igor Kalyapin, the 2nd OMCT Portrait against Torture and Impunity
December 3, 2012The second portrait in the series of 10 HRDs against Torture is: Igor Kalyapin, founder and chair of Russian NGO Committee Against Torture (CAT).
……………….
The main obstacle we have is the same to the reason of torture: lack of effective investigation and absolute lack of will to investigate. Every case is a challenge and we never know for how many years we have to commit ourselves to deal with each of them.
Do you feel threatened because of your activities? Do you face any interference in your work? If this is the case, can you kindly precise.
Recently, we have started to face threats: our lawyers are targeted, some of them are approached by state agents, some of them were arrested, some of them were insulted. I myself now am facing a real threat to be accused of a crime that I have never committed (speaking out of investigational secret).
………………………
Public campaigns (as illustrated in the picture), support of the victims of torture, write support letters, can play a very important role in the fight against torture.
http://www.omct.org/human-rights-defenders/events/2012/12/d22055/
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 