Just when one thinks that Iran is going to change for the better, human rights defender Ms. Nargess Mohammadi is arrested (after years of continuous judicial harassment, including repeated summoning, interrogations and trials.)
Several NGOs, including the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (FIDH/OMCT) have strongly condemned the 5 May arrest of Nargess Mohammadi, who is the spokesperson and Vice-President of the Defenders of Human Rights Centre (DHRC). Upon her arrest, the agents claimed that she was being taken “to serve her prison sentence”. [Mrs Mohammadi started to serve a 6-year prison sentence on 21 April 2012, but that she was released on bail on 31 July 2012 for medical reasons.]
On May 3, 2015, Ms. Mohammadi attended the first hearing of her trial based on three main charges against her:
“assembly and collusion against the national security” based on her activities in the DHRC and cooperation with “the [Nobel Laureate] Shirin Ebadi, counter-revolutionary and feminist groups”;
“spreading propaganda against the State” based on her “interviews with foreign and counter-revolutionary media participation in illegal gatherings, supporting sedition and anti-security inmates”; and
“membership of the illegal and anti-security LEGAM group”.
Following a meeting in 2014 with the then High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs & Security Policy, Ms. Catherine Ashton, the Iranian authorities banned Ms. Mohammadi from travelling abroad; she has received 10 summons and has been detained twice by the security agents.
As reported by many newspapers including Al-Jazeera (Asad Hashim on 25 April) Sabeen Mahmud, a prominent Pakistani human rights defender, has been shot dead, shortly after hosting an event on Balochistan’s “disappeared people”, in the southern city of Karachi. Mahmud, 40, was the director of T2F [The Second Floor], a café and arts space that has been a mainstay of Karachi’s activists since it opened its doors in 2007. She was one of the country’s most outspoken human rights advocates. Mahmud was shot four times at close range and pronounced dead on arrival at the National Medical Centre hospital on Friday 24 April at 9.40pm.
Mahmud and her mother were on their way from an event (“Unsilencing Balochistan,” hosted at T2F, with Baloch human rights activists Mama Qadeer, Farzana Majeed and Muhammad Ali Talpur) when her car came under fire from unidentified gunmen, according to police. Her mother was also shot twice, but was out of immediate danger, hospital officials said.
The Voice of Baloch Missing Persons organisation, which both activists belong to, says that more than 2,825 people have “disappeared” in this way since 2005. They allege the disappearances, which are mostly of Baloch rights activists and students, have been carried out by the Pakistani government and its powerful ISI intelligence agency, a charge the agency denies.
“Sabeen was a voice of reason, pluralism and secularism: the kind of creed that endangers the insidious side of constructed Pakistani nationalism,” Raza Rumi, a rights activist who escaped an assassination attempt in March 2014 and now lives in the United States out of fear for his life, told Al Jazeera.
Stockholm-based Civil Rights Defenders announced earlier this month that its Civil Rights Defender of the Year award for 2015 has gone to Ms. Nguyễn Ngọc Như Quỳnh. She is Coordinator for the Vietnamese Bloggers Network and well-known for her use of social media to speak out against injustices and human rights abuses in Vietnam. Quỳnh has been blogging under the pseudonym of Me Nam (Mother Mushroom) and has openly criticised the Vietnamese government over human rights abuses and corruption. She began blogging in early 2006 when she paid a visit to a hospital and witnessed many poor people in the hot sun desperately waiting for treatment, but ignored because they lacked money to bribe hospital officials.
Civil Rights Defenders reported about bloggers and the human rights movement in Vietnam in: We will not be silenced.
Alison Des Forges (1942-2009) was a well-known human rights defender and one of the world’s leading experts on the Rwandan genocide. She was senior adviser of Human Rights Watch at the time of her death in the crash of Continental flight 3407. HRW named its human rights award after her [see: http://www.brandsaviors.com/thedigest/award/alison-des-forges-award-extraordinary-activism]. Now the Alison L. Des Forges Memorial Committee in her native Buffalo (NY) is organizing three events in Buffalo on 23 and 24 April 2015 with as focus “Islam, Islamism, and Human Rights in Africa”:
An international symposium on April 23 featuring talks by university researchers and representatives of human rights organizations working in Africa. This event is free and open to the public.
A scholarship dinner and discussion on April 23. [reservation is required, and tickets are $100 per person. Proceeds go to the Alison Des Forges Memorial Scholarships]
A community roundtable on April 24, where university researchers will reflect on the previous day’s symposium topics: “The Interplay of Politics, Religion, Terrorism, Modernity and Human Rights”.
“In an effort to address issues of intense public concern, these events will explore in depth the recent rise of violent extremist groups in Africa,” said Dussourd, co-chair of the Alison L. Des Forges Memorial Committee. “In so doing, we will go beyond sensational media headlines to the historical roots of this phenomenon as we examine groups such as Boko Haram, Seleka and Al-Shabaab.”
Having just posted about Sandra Kodouda’s disappearance for 4 days [https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2015/04/17/human-rights-defender-sandra-kodouda-remains-missing-four-days-after-abduction-in-sudan/ ] I am happy to report that yesterday (16 April 2015), the Sudanese human rights defender was returned home after reportedly being held in custody by the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) although they had denied they held her. She suffered a dislocated shoulder and other injuries during her detention.
reports that on 12 April 2015, human rights defender Sandra Kodouda was forcibly taken from her car by a group of unidentified men in Omdurman, Sudan.
She was speaking to a friend on the phone and the kidnappers were overheard on the telephone line as they refused to show their identification when Sandra Kodouda requested it, and instructed her to switch off her phone. Shortly after, family members found her abandoned car with the keys still in the ignition. When filing a criminal case at the Omdurman Central Police Station alleging the kidnapping of Sandra Kodouda, her family members were informed by the authorities that there was no record of her detention at that time.
[Sandra Kodouda has campaigned on social issues throughout the country. She is a member of the Youth Committee against the Building of Dal and Kajabar Dams, and peacefully partook in country-wide anti-austerity demonstrations in September and October 2013. Sandra Kodouda has previously been targeted as a result of her human rights work. She was detained by the NISS in August 2014 on account of her participation in the No to Women’s Oppression collective, an initiative which has worked to raise awareness of oppression against women and to promote and protect women’s rights through peaceful protest and reporting. She was also detained by the NISS in July 2012 after mobilising support for the release of youth activist Mr Rudwan Daoud, who himself had been detained by the NISS in the same month on the basis of participating in peaceful political protests.]
Today , 27 March 2015, the FIDH published a moving portrait of Mutabar Tadjibaeva, the well-known Uzbek human rights defender, under the title “If I were told that I only have one day left to live, I would spend it fighting for human rights.” A statement that in her case is not an exaggeration!
“If I were told that I only have one day left to live, I would spend it fighting for human rights,” says Mutabar Tadjibaeva, President of the organization Fiery Hearts Club. The 52-year-old Uzbek journalist and activist arrived in France in 2009 as a political refugee. She is no longer welcome In her native country, which has been governed for a quarter of a century by the dictator Islam Karimov. In Uzbekistan, Mutabar investigated drug trafficking, corruption and human rights violations. She endured threats, prison, torture and rape; her fight came at a high price.
In 2002, while this activist was fighting to make publicly known the case of Alimuhammad Mamadaliev, who had been tortured and killed by the police, she herself ended up behind bars for several days. In April 2005, was kidnapped by secret service agents and subjected to horrific treatment. These men would never worried about having to answer for their deeds. But even in the face of such injustice, Mutabar Tadjibaeva continued her activism and journalism until she was imprisoned three years later, on 7 October 2005, just before boarding a plane headed for Dublin where she was to participate in an international conference on human rights. She was arrested by police and, a year later, sentenced to eight years in prison, where she was subjected to torture. She was accused of engaging in illegal activities against the State during demonstrations where several hundred people had lost their lives in May 2005 in Andijan, an industrial city. It is clear to Mutabar that her arrest was for purely political reasons. She was one of many victims of State repression that followed the events of 2005.
“I know very well what prison in Uzbekistan is like and the torture. That is why I have decided to devote me life to fighting for human rights. When I was in jail, I dreamt that one day I would be free. I would tell the prison guards that I would get out of there and write a book on what I had lived through,” she recalls. On 18 May 2008, while still in prison, she was granted the Martin Ennals Award for human rights defenders. She was released a few months later and, on 10 December of that same year, Mutabar Tadjibaeva came to Paris where she accepted the Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité Award on behalf of the Fiery Hearts Club. Banned from Uzbekistan for almost ten years, the organisation took shelter in France in 2011. It will celebrate the 15th year of its existence this year. Every day, dozens of people come to her in search of assistance. She seeks out lawyers and funding, prepares reports and files individual complaints to the UN. Despite the modest means at her disposal and a state of health weakened by the torture she suffered, Mutabar wants to help those who are in same situation as she was in ten years earlier. Her wish is that human rights defenders take more of an interest in the situation in Uzbekistan. Mutabar Tadjibaeva has enjoyed the support of FIDH, and her organisation is now officially a member. “It is thanks to the support of the FIDH that I was able to keep my promise, that is, write my book entitled “Prisoner of the Island of Torture.” I worked with an Uzbek journalist and it is thanks to those recordings that I was able to tell my story. Otherwise, it would have been too hard psychologically,” Mutabar recalls. In the book, which has been published in Uzbek, Russian, French, and English, she shares her memories of prison and decries the cruelty of the regime.
For Mutabar, the challenge lies not in Karimov’s departure, but in regime change. “His departure could set off a war among the clans. The country is corrupt, there is no respect for the law. Karimov the dictator is not the only one to blame for the fact that people are being killed in prisons and tortured; the politicians who support the regime are also to blame. I want Uzbekistan to become a democratic country and dissidents like me to be able to return there and live,” she said. However, as Mutabar sees it, a return to her country is not within the realm of the possible.
On 29 March, Islam Karimov will be running for President for the fourth time, thereby violating Article 90 of the Constitution, which does not allow more than two terms. Mutabar Tadjibaeva and her friends have set up a virtual electoral commission to organise a vote on the Internet. This alternative platform has rejected the candidacy of the president. “When I decided to come to France as a political refugee,” she concluded, “I was afraid that I would not be able to do anything for my country remotely. But, now I see that if you are motivated and supported, anything is possible.”
The family of Rachel Corrie arrive at an Israeli court before hearing the verdict in her civil suit in August 2012. (Photo: Getty Images)
Mondoweiss Editors on 12 February 2015 disseminated the following statement by the family of Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old American peace activist from Olympia, Washington, who was crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer on 16 March 2003, while protecting the home of a Palestinian family from demolition:
Today we received word from our attorneys that the Supreme Court of Israel dismissed our appeal in the wrongful death case of our daughter and sister Rachel Corrie. Our family is disappointed but not surprised. We had hoped for a different outcome, though we have come to see through this experience how deeply all of Israel’s institutions are implicated in the impunity enjoyed by the Israeli military.
It will take some time before we have ability to read the decision in English and to process all the court has said. Nevertheless, it is clear that this decision, affirming the August 2012 lower court finding, amounts to judicial sanction of immunity for Israeli military forces when they commit injustices and human rights violations.
The Supreme Court decision ignores international law arguments regarding the protection of civilians and human rights defenders in armed conflict and grossly violates the internationally recognized right to effective remedy.
The court has determined that our separate case against Dr. Yehuda Hiss and Abu Kabir Institute, regarding inappropriate ways in which Rachel’s autopsy was conducted, may go forward in the lower court. We continue to be appalled that it requires a lawsuit to have a truthful accounting of what occurred, and complete repatriation of Rachel’s remains. Decisions as to next steps will be made by the family in consultation with our attorneys.
Despite the verdict, our family remains convinced we were correct in bringing this case forward. The day after Rachel was killed, Prime Minister Sharon promised President Bush a thorough, credible and transparent investigation. Clearly, that standard was not met. The U.S. government continues to call for such an investigation by Israel. A civil lawsuit cannot substitute for an impartial investigation, but it is the only process through which a family can discover more information and move forward when governments fail to act.
Rachel’s case provides yet another example of how the Israeli justice system is failing to provide accountability. We urge the international community, and not least the U.S. government, to stand with victims of human rights violations and against impunity, and to uphold fundamental tenants of international justice.
We are immensely grateful to our attorney Hussein Abu Hussein and to his entire legal team for the decade of work they have contributed to Rachel’s case, and continue to provide. We are grateful to all of our friends in Palestine, Israel, and elsewhere, who in so many different ways have supported our efforts.
We have taken this path for Rachel, the daughter and sister we love, lost, and miss. Her spirit lives. She has inspired all of our actions and will continue to do so.
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.
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 