ISHR had the chance to meet with Cédric Herrou for the Geneva premiere of movie ‘Libre’ where director Michel Toesca follows him in his endeavours in France‘s Roya Valley. During our interview, Herrou, a migrant rights defender and president of association ‘Défends Ta Citoyenneté’, shared his testimony, challenges, aspirations and calls to action. The interview was published on 22 March 2019.
ISHR published on 25 Octpber 2018 this interview with Namibian women’s rights defender Linda RM Baumann. “We carry out the universal responsibility to insure that all people are protected” affirms Linda RM Baumann in her interview with ISHR. Linda is strategic coordinator for Namibia’s Diverse Women Association (NDWA) and she advocates for LBT’s women rights.
Bernice Chan wrote in the South China Morning Post on 8 May 2019 “They’re not music videos’: YouTube human rights news channel Just Asia struggles to make a difference”.
I have often referred to ‘Just Asia’, the weekly YouTube news programme from the Hong Kong-based NGO Asian Human Rights Commission that aims to broadcast news of regional human rights abuses to a global audience. It is the only regular ‘broadcast’ of its kind.
As founding video producer of Just Asia, Amila Sampath, 30, gathers film clips and news snippets from around the region. His sources include activists, lawyers and NGOs, and the show, uploaded on Fridays, is anchored by university student volunteers. Sampath has produced more than 250 episodes of Just Asia, but getting audiences to take an interest in the protection and well-being of fellow human beings has not been easy. He is disappointed the show is not more widely viewed. “It is difficult to get people to watch human rights stories,” Sampath says. “They’re not music videos, but I just have to keep trying.”
Sampath’s aim is to broadcast regional human rights abuses to a global audience. Photo: Dickson Lee
Just Asia he puts together with a skeletal crew comprising himself as producer, cameraman and director, and colleague Meryam Dabhoiwala, who writes the scripts and edits. Their studio is a simple office in Ho Man Tin, Kowloon, with a green screen background. Each week he compiles five regional stories and enlists the help of university students to shoot the episodes and edit the videos.
Hong Kong student volunteer Alexandra Leung presents an episode of Just Asia, a weekly human rights news programme on YouTube produced by the Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission.
One volunteer is Alexandra Leung Chui-yan, 22, who will be graduating from the School of Communication at Hong Kong Baptist University this month. On August 17, 2017, Leung was in Barcelona, walking along La Rambla boulevard, when a car ploughed into a crowd. The terrorist attack killed 13 people and injured more than 130, including Leung. In the ensuing chaos she was trampled, resulting in a broken toe and fractured knees. Leung has since undergone surgery, but is still not completely healed. A few months after the incident she began volunteering for Just Asia as a trainee, learning how to read the news in front of a camera and how to pronounce Southeast Asian names.
Last year ISHR interviewed Nayaali Ramirez Espinosa, a lawyer providing legal assistance to Mayan communities in the region of Holpelchén, in the State of Campeche in Mexico. She expresses her satisfaction with some legal achievements such as the indigenous consultation in the region. It was published on 13 December, 2018.
ISHR published on 21 January 2019 this profile of Romel Rubén Gonzalez Diaz from the Indigenous and Popular Regional Council of Xpujil. This organisation works in partnership with the Cooperativa Chac Lol, in the defense of the territory, training in municipal and human collective rights, generating sustainable development alternatives (agriculture, biocultural tourism, sustainable management of natural resources). The main problem in Muna, Yucatan is the proposal to establish a solar park megaproject with 1227,000 solar panels, destroying 700 hectares of tropical forest, by the company Sunpower of the USA.
On Tuesday 18 December, on behalf of the @HRDWorldSummit delegates, @mogwe_alice will become the first civil-society representative ever to address the @UN General Assembly. She will present the final action plan of the 2nd Human Rights Defenders World Summit which took place in Paris at the end of October 2018. [https://hrdworldsummit.org/action-plan/]. The film above – produced by True Heroes Films – gives an impression of the variety of HRDs and issues at that event, in just 2:30 minutes.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights – celebrating its 70th anniversary – has 30 articles. True Heroes Films (THF) made for the UN 30 short video stories to show the impact of the Declaration around the world. Go to: @TrueHeroesFilms or YouTube. The series runs until 10 December, Human Rights Day. Everyday a new one!
2018 is the year of the Human Rights Defenders! The Norwegian Human Rights Fund (NHRF) celebrates its 30th anniversary by showcasing some of the brave human rights defenders it supports through out the year. Iván Madero is a human rights defender from Colombia. Iván Madero Vergel is the director of CREDHOS, an organization that documents violations and accompanies human rights defenders. For him becoming a human rights defender was a natural response to the difficult circumstances in his hometown Barrancabermjea. For more than three decades he has been a leader that stands up for the rights of others. In this video, he tells how it is to work in a country where people who stand up for human rights are risking their lives:
“Migration is not a crime. Defending the rights of migrant people should not be criminalised,” said Azadi (pseudonym) in her interview with ISHR. Today, more than 68 million people around the world are refugees or internally displaced as a result of conflict or persecution. They seek a safer life and better future. “Migrant rights defenders want to show people on the move that another Europe exists: it’s the Europe of the civil society that tries to welcome them. The Europe of solidarity”, Azadi concluded.
