Ms. Ragia Omran, a leading Egyptian human rights lawyer and women’s rights activist, was announced -on 2 July 2013 – as the winner of the 2013 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award, now in its 30th year. The award recognizes her extraordinary work, and initiates a partnership to support her efforts to advance the women’s rights, the rule of law, and democracy in Egypt through human rights legal advocacy. Read the rest of this entry »
Posts Tagged ‘woman human rights defender’
Detention after solidarity action in Mahiliou, Belarus
August 8, 2013Social activist Dyiana Yakauleva was detained by the riot police at the police station in Krylenka Street. Human rights defenders Barys Bukhel and Aliaksei Kolchyn are trying to clear up the circumstances of the detention. From 11.30 -12.30 a.m. a solidarity action, timed to coincide with the International Day of Solidarity with the Civil Society of Belarus, was held in the city of Mahiliou, Belarus. During the action, social activists handed out postcards with a portrait of the imprisoned head of the Human Rights Center “Viasna” Ales Bialiatski. The protest went peacefully but after it ended Dyiana Yakauleva was detained anyway.
Related articles
- UN Rapporteur joins chorus to urge freedom for Bialiatski in Belarus (thoolen.wordpress.com)
Russian Rights Defender Gannushkina Fined For Refusing Documents
June 26, 2013
(Svetlana Gannushkina)Prominent Russian human rights activist Svetlana Gannushkina has been fined for refusing to provide documents demanded by prosecutors. A court in Moscow ruled late on June 18 that the chairwoman of Moscow-based Civic Collaboration Committee must pay 2,000 rubles (50 Euro) for failing to turn over papers related to the financial activities of her organization. Gannushkina, a Soviet-era veteran rights defender, has been refusing to provide the documents to investigators since April. Prosecutors made the request under the new law requiring all nongovernmental organizations that receive foreign funding and engage in political activity to register as ‘foreign agents’. [Last week, a Moscow court rejected an appeal by Russia’s independent election monitor, Golos, against the 300,000 ruble $9,500 fine imposed on the group under the legislation.] Based on reporting by Interfax and ITAR-TASS
via Russian Rights Defender Fined For Refusing Demand For Documents.
Related articles
- Russian Gay-Rights Group Fined For Refusal To Follow Controversial Law (rferl.org)
- Russian NGO “For Human Rights” forcibly evicted from offices (thoolen.wordpress.com)
Russian human rights defender Tanya Lokshina continues against all odds | Globalization | DW.DE | 12.06.2013
June 12, 2013In the series Storytellers, Deutsche Welle gives the floor to Tanya Lokshina of HRW who has worked for 15 years in of the most difficult regions: Russia itself and conflict-ridden volatile areas like Chechnya and Dagestan as well as South Ossetia.
At first glance, Tanya Lokshina may not be the kind of person you would expect to travel to some of Russia’s most dangerous areas on a regular basis. But Read the rest of this entry »
Kazakhstan: 5 year prison sentence of human rights defender Roza Tuletaeva upheld
June 10, 2013
Roza TuletaevaOn 28 May 2013, the Supreme Court of Kazakhstan upheld the five-year prison sentence of human rights defender Roza Tuletaeva, Read the rest of this entry »
Abduction and physical assault of human rights defender Lydia Mukami in Kenya
June 5, 2013On 1 June 2013 at dawn, Kenyan human rights defender Ms Lydia Mukami was abandoned in a bush after being abducted by unidentified men who had spent several hours subjecting her to physical assault. Lydia Mukami is the chairperson of Mwea Foundation, a grassroots organisation of rice farmers in the Mwea constituency that has been at the forefront of an ongoing campaign to challenge the constitutionality of Kenya’s 1966 Irrigation Act. Read the rest of this entry »
Surveillance of indigenous human rights defender Cindy Blackstock in Canada
June 1, 2013AI 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 »
China: Ms Ye Haiyan, defender of children & women’s rights, defends herself and is detained following assault
June 1, 2013On 30 May 2013, human rights defender Ms Ye Haiyan was detained by police after being assaulted at her home in Guangxi province, China. Ye Haiyan is an advocate for the rights of sex workers and people living with HIV/AIDS. She has been consistently targeted over the past number of years because of her work.
Just before 12pm on 30 May 2013, a group of plainclothes women arrived at Ye Haiyan’s home and began to physically attack her. Ye Haiyan was alone with her 13-year-old daughter at the time and managed to send out a series of messages on Twitter appealing for help and asking her followers to report the incident Read the rest of this entry »
PEN Prize to Honor Jailed Turkish Translator Ayşe Berktay
May 21, 2013
(Ayşe Berktay in Bakırköy Women’s Prison – Photo courtesy Ali Berktay)
On 15 April 2013 PEN American Center named Ayşe Berktay, a translator, writer, and activist in Turkey, as the recipient of its 2013 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award. Berktay, a leading advocate for peace, women’s rights, and Kurdish rights in Turkey, was arrested on October 3, 2011, and is currently being tried for “membership in an illegal organization” for her pro-Kurdish cultural advocacy. One of at least 130 writers currently in prison or on trial in Turkey, many on false terrorism-related charges, she could face up to 15 years in prison if convicted. Read the rest of this entry »
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“.
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 