Posts Tagged ‘woman human rights defender’
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.
Posted in human rights, Human Rights Defenders | 1 Comment »
Tags: fined, Foreign agent, foreign funding, GOLOS, Human rights defender, Human Rights Defenders, Information Telegraph Agency of Russia, Interfax, Moscow, moscow court, Non-governmental organization, Russia, russian ngo, Svetlana Gannushkina, woman human rights defender
June 12, 2013
In 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 »
Posted in HRW, human rights, Human Rights Defenders | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Chechnya, Deutsche Welle, Human Rights Watch, Moscow, Moscow Helsinki Group, Russia, Tanya Lokshina, United States, Vladimir Putin, woman human rights defender
June 10, 2013
Roza Tuletaeva
On 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 »
Posted in Front Line, human rights, Human Rights Defenders | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Advocacy Organizations, Frontline Defenders, Human right, Human Rights and Liberties, Human rights defender, labour movement, labour rights, OzenMunaiGaz, prison, Sentence (law), Supreme Court, torture, trade unionists, woman human rights defender, Zhanaozen
June 5, 2013
On 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 »
Posted in human rights | Leave a Comment »
Tags: assault, death threats, environmental issues, Frontline Defenders, human rights, Human rights defender, ill treatment, intimidation, Kenya, land rights, Lydia Mukami, Mwea, Mwea Foundation, Nairobi, National Irrigation Board, protection, woman human rights defender
June 1, 2013
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 »
Posted in AI, human rights, Human Rights Defenders | Leave a Comment »
Tags: AI, AI Canada, Blackstock, Canada, Canadian Human Rights Tribunal, Cindy Blackstock, department of aboriginal affairs, discrimination complaint, facebook, federal privacy commissioner, First Nations, Human right, Human rights defender, Indigenous People, privacy, right to privacy, woman human rights defender
June 1, 2013
On 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 »
Posted in human rights | Leave a Comment »
Tags: assault, cases of child abuse, child abuse, China, Frontline Defenders, Guangxi, guangxi province china, Hainan, hiv aids, Human rights defender, Human Rights Defenders, human rights of women, rights of children, self-defence, sex workers, woman human rights defender, Ye Haiyan
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 »
Posted in human rights, Human Rights Defenders | 1 Comment »
Tags: awards, Ayşe Berktay, Human rights defender, New York City, PEN, PEN American Center, PEN International, President of Turkey, prison, translator, Turkey, woman human rights defender, writer
April 24, 2013
The 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“.
Posted in Human Rights Defenders, MEA | 2 Comments »
Tags: Arab spring, Chechnya, Egypt, final nominees 2013, Final Nominees for the Martin Ennals Award 2013, Haiti, Human right, human rights awards, Human Rights Defenders, human rights lawyer, Igor Kalyapin, impunity, Jean-Claude Duvalier, Joint Mobile Group, Mario Joseph, Martin Ennals, Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders, MEA, military trials, Mona Seif, news, No To Military Trials for Civilians, Russia, torture, woman human rights defender
April 18, 2013
The Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition (WHRD IC) strongly condemns the attempted assassination of the Honduran journalist Fidelina Sandoval, who was shot at outside the television and radio station Globo TV where she works on the morning of 8 April, 2013. Fidelina Sandoval was crossing Boulevar Morazán on her way to work when a grey van with two men sitting in the front caught her attention. She turned her face so as not to be looking directly at them, but seconds later heard a shot fired from a gun. The WHRD IC is disturbed by this attack and expresses its concern for the well-being of Fidelina Sandoval, her family and her colleagues, who have also been targeted. Globo TV alone has experienced multiple attacks including raids and the destruction of equipment, as well as threats, persecution, intimidation and other forms of rights violations and violence against the numerous staff members.
The WHRD IC is further disturbed by the escalating violence against WHRDs and widespread impunity in Honduras since the coup d’état in June 2009. As highlighted in a case study on Honduras in the WHRD IC’s Global Report <http://www.defendingwomen-defendingrights.org/pdf/WHRD_IC_Global%20Report_2012.pdf> , repression and denial of rights are not isolated cases but rather demonstrate a general policy of terror and abuse enacted with impunity – particularly towards women.
Posted in Human Rights Defenders | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Fidelina Sandoval, freedom of expression, Globo, globo tv, Honduras, human rights, Human Rights and Liberties, Human Rights Defenders, Journalist, journalists, Rede Globo, threats, WHRD IC, woman human rights defender, Women Human Rights, Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition
January 21, 2013
Sudanese teacher and activist Jalila Khamis Koko, who was arrested by the National Security Service in March 2012, was released from detention after a court hearing on 20 January reports Amnesty International.
Jalila was acquitted of all charges except those related to “spreading false news”, a vague provision of the criminal code often used by the government to silence dissent. It is punishable by six months in prison, but the court released her since she had already spent nine months in pre-trial detention. “Jalila’s release is victory for justice but the nine months that she has spent in detention simply for expressing her opinions cannot be ignored,” said Audrey Gaughran, Amnesty International’s Africa program director. “The government must also ensure that she is able to return to her teaching job from which she was unfairly dismissed during the course of her detention.”
Posted in human rights | Leave a Comment »
Tags: Africa, Amnesty International, Audrey Gaughran, Human rights defender, Jalila, Jalila Khamis Koko, National Security Service, Sudan, teacher, woman human rights defender
(Svetlana Gannushkina)
Roza Tuletaeva
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 