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Update

Last week, we told you about the need for UN peacekeepers to stay in eastern Chad to help protect refugees and IDPs. We also sent an open letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton about our concerns. Now you can check out our new video that sends a powerful message to Secretary Clinton and all of the US Government that we need greater civilian protection in Chad. And don't forget to ask Secretary Clinton to support MINURCAT's renewal! We need you to take action today to make sure peacekeepers can stay in Chad and the Central Africa Republic. MINURCAT still has…

May 4, 2010

Update

Egypt workers were on the move this weekend, with significant ramifications we hope for the future of human rights in that country. Just weeks after a court order forced the government to implement a new council intended to ensure workers receive a living wage, workers across the country went on strike and showed again that after years of muzzling civil society, the government has failed to stop opposition voices. More must be done.  It’s not enough that the government enforce minimum wage laws.  The government must also, Amnesty International says, lift restrictions on the creation and functioning of independent workers’…

May 4, 2010

Update

Originally posted on HuffingtonPost.com In a recent speech to the American Society of International Law (ASIL) the legal advisor to the State Department, Harold Koh, stressed the "most important difference" between the Obama and the Bush administrations is their "approach and attitude toward international law." Koh said this difference is illustrated by an emerging "Obama-Clinton Doctrine," based on a commitment to four main principles: "principled engagement; diplomacy as a critical element of smart power; strategic multilateralism; and the notion that living our values makes us stronger and safer, by following rules of domestic and international law; and following universal standards,…

May 4, 2010

Update

Today, World Press Freedom Day provides an opportunity for people around the world to celebrate the fundamental human right to freedom of expression.  Every day, journalists around the world face the threat of intimidation, censorship, imprisonment and violence, including torture, for their efforts to report on human rights violations. We are shining a light on 8 specific cases in places including China, Zimbabwe, Russia and Egypt where rights to free speech and expression have been harshly denied. It was during this same time last year when we witnessed the release of American journalist Roxana Saberi. She was arrested in Iran…

May 3, 2010

Update

Seven years after the US invasion of Iraq, violence is still taking the lives of countless Iraqis. Amnesty International’s new report Iraq, Civilians Under Fire exposes the ongoing violence inflicted on minority groups including women, gay men, religious minorities, and human rights activists, journalists and refugees. Kidnapping, torture and murder are used by militias, terrorist organizations and occasionally the government itself, often with impunity. Women who are abused are not safe even in the few shelters that exist. Honor killings are rampant and those who perform them are not punished. Forced marriages, forced veiling and rape are common across the…

May 3, 2010

Update

This weekend, the Washington Post reported that the American Board of Anesthesiology (ABA) decided in February to censure any of its members who participate in executions.  As the document outlining the policy states, bluntly:   "… anesthesiologists may not participate in capital punishment if they wish to be certified by the ABA." As members of the medical profession, anesthesiologists are bound by the oath to "do no harm," and of course helping the state kill a prisoner violates that oath in the most fundamental and basic way.  According to the Post, anesthesiologists have been employed by executioners to "consult prison officials…

May 3, 2010

Update

Update, 5/7/2010: The trial judge has ordered the execution of Ajmal Qasab.  My hope is that his sentence is commuted because executing Qasab is simply a form of revenge. The sole surviving member of the squad responsible for the deaths of 174 (almost all civilians) people in downtown Mumbai in late November 2008 was convicted of murder, although two of his alleged associates were acquitted of the charges.  A court was created in Maharashtra (the state were Mumbai is located) to prosecute these cases and this case was the culmination of year long prosecution that had numerous hiccups along the way.  In…

May 3, 2010

Update

On World Press Freedom Day, Amnesty USA is calling attention to fearless journalists fighting every day to tell the stories that matter and remind us how fragile freedom of expression remains. Repression of journalists, including imprisonment, violence and even death, continues frequently in many places around the world. In Zimbabwe, media repression opened significantly in the past year, with the government allowing foreign reporters to return to the country. But the government continues to lock down domestic reporting. The only daily newspapers, radio and TV stations in Zimbabwe are state run. The Global Political Agreement (GPA), signed by Zimbabwe’s three…

May 2, 2010

Update

Alex Neve, Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada and Gitmo researcher is on the ground and reporting live on the Omar Khadr trial at Guantánamo Bay

April 29, 2010

Update

By Alex Neve, Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada.  Neve is currently at Guantánamo to observe the military commissions proceedings against detainee Omar Khadr. This is his third in a series of posts from the field. The rumours did indeed prove to be true.  Yesterday evening the government did finally approve and release a 280-page Manual for Military Commissions, laying out the rules that are to govern the conduct of Omar Khadr’s and all military commission proceedings.  But his legal team did not receive a copy of the new rules – essential to mounting any legal strategy – until shortly…

April 29, 2010

Update

UN peacekeepers that have been crucial in protecting civilians in eastern Chad and northern Central African Republic (CAR) are being asked to leave once the mission’s mandate ends on May 15th. Without these peacekeepers, human rights abuses in the region will almost certainly increase, further endangering the lives of the refugees and internally displaced people living in camps. Both the conflict in neighboring Darfur, Sudan, and Chad’s own internal conflict have created hundreds of thousands of refugees and internally displaced people, many of which now live in refugee camps in the eastern part of Chad, close to the border with…

April 29, 2010

Update

Six years on Abu Ghraib victims still fight for justice, while the private military contractors involved appear to be immune from criminal prosecution and continue to win multi-million dollar government contracts.

April 29, 2010