Newsroom

Update

Yesterday the Senate passed four amendments to the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act, including a provision that would allow the death penalty to apply to hate crimes.  This amendment, added by Senator Jeff Sessions, R, AL (a vocal opponent of the Act itself), adds nothing to the justice the bill seeks for victims of gender and sexuality-based hate crimes.  The goal of the Matthew Shepard Act (which is itself attached to the 2010 Defense Department authorization bill) is to allow the investigation and prosecution of some hate crimes based on the victim’s actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender, gender identification, or…

July 21, 2009

Update

The following comes to us from Essa Bokarr Sey, the former Ambassador of the Republic of The Gambia to France (1999-2001) and to the United States (2002-2003). We asked him to share with us his perspective on The Gambia today, in light of this week's Day of Action for Ebrima Manneh. To learn more about Amnesty International's concerns about human rights in The Gambia, click here. President Yahya Jammeh of The Gambia monopolizes power with excessive force. In The Gambia of today being an opposition or exercising one's right towards freedom of expression is a considered social taboo. Fear is…

July 21, 2009

Update

Lawyer and human rights activist Shadi Sadr has been arrested and detained by Iranian authorities. According to the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, Sadr was walking with friends to Friday Jummah prayers when she was violently confronted by a group of unidentified plain-clothed men. She was beaten with batons after attempting to escape, losing her headscarf in the process. Sadr was then pushed into an unmarked car and was subsequently driven off. She confirmed in a phone call to her husband that she had been arrested and was detained in ward 209 of Tehran’s Evin prison. Ms. Sadr has…

July 20, 2009

Update

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) demonstrated in a more than impressive way this week how science and technology can advance the cause of human rights. Using forensic analysis and satellite imagery, they did an excellent job in documenting a war crime—and the subsequent US supported cover-up—in Afghanistan, where in the wake of the US led invasion in 2001 hundreds of prisoners of war were killed by a US backed warlord and dumped in a mass grave in Dasht-e-Leili. Check out this must see video: The New York Times has covered the story in an extensive piece last weekend. PHR has…

July 17, 2009

Update

Human rights activist Natalia Estemirova was murdered Wednesday in the North Caucasus region in Russia. According to BBC News, she was allegedly bundled into a van and abducted as she was leaving her home in Chechnya on Wednesday morning. Her body was found shortly after in Ingushetia. She had been investigating human rights abuses in Russia for some time, working for a human rights organization called Memorial. She focused her efforts particularly on the Chechnya region, where she worked to battle impunity and to gather evidence on an alleged campaign of house-burnings by government-backed militias. Her murder has occurred just…

July 16, 2009

Update

Detainees held in the U.S. military detention center at Bagram Air Base are in the middle of a conundrum over their legal rights. Human rights campaigners argue that the prisoners should be provided with the same rights as those being held in the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The United States military, however, argues that they deserve different treatment since they are held in a  current war zone. In Bagram, detainees are informed about the reason for their arrest, and are offered the ability to defend themselves without outside legal counsel at six-month military review sessions. To protest their lack of…

July 16, 2009

Update

Tonight, PBS will premiere The Reckoning: The Battle for the International Criminal Court. This documentary film was produced by Skylight Pictures, an outstanding team of filmmakers who collaborated with AIUSA on our 2007 documentary Justice Without Borders.  Click here for local listings, as times vary. The broadcast date is significant, in that it marks the week eleven years ago that more than 160 governments came together to negotiate the treaty creating the International Criminal Court (ICC). The Reckoning follows the ICC's Prosecutor as he and his team confront the most challenging of armed conflict situations, compiling evidence of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in order to build cases against leaders of the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda,…

July 14, 2009

Update

So, we're halfway through July, and most people who haven't already taken a summer vacation are planning one, or at least expect to enjoy some time at the beach, the pool, or a neighbor's barbecue. I myself just got back from a 6-day trip which involved a good amount of sun and sand. It's summertime, and the livin' is easy, right? For some people, maybe. But for prisoners of conscience or those who defend human rights in many countries, summer brings no relief from the potential danger and sense of isolation they may face. By simply sending a postcard, however,…

July 14, 2009

Update

< p style="text-align: left;">***** Update: As we await the results of Leonard Peltier's parole hearing, it is still possible to take action on his behalf. The online action has a mailing address, fax number, and sample letter. You can print out the letter from the online action page, and then mail or fax it in. Help demand parole for Leonard Peltier! Anishinabe-Lakota Native American Leonard Peltier, a federal prisoner serving two consecutive life sentences for the murders of two Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents in 1975, is scheduled for a parole hearing before the US Parole Commission on 28…

July 13, 2009

Update

By Tony Cruz, AIUSA’s Business and Economic Relations Group Yahoo! held its annual shareholder meeting on June 25th — the first meeting with the company’s new CEO, Carol Bartz. In the meeting, Ms. Bartz attempted to show a new face of Yahoo; a bolder and progressive “no-nonsense” Yahoo. It was my third Yahoo! shareholder meeting and a chance to see if Yahoo!’s new face meant new business practices that would respect human rights. I presented two questions: Since 2006, what concrete steps has Yahoo taken to address the problem of Internet censorship in China? Will you publicly support the Global…

July 10, 2009

Update

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced today that it had been asked by the Sri Lankan government to scale down its operations in the country.  The ICRC has worked in Sri Lanka for the past 20 years; their activities have included visiting political detainees as well as former fighters with the opposition Tamil Tigers in order to monitor their conditions of detention.  The Sri Lankan Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe said today that the order was not only directed at the ICRC but at all international agencies; given that the fighting with the Tigers was over, all of the agencies were…

July 10, 2009

Update

On July 7, Ronald Kitchen became a free man.  Convicted of the murder of five people in 1988, he spent over a dozen years on Illinois’ death row facing execution, until former Governor George Ryan commuted his sentence, along with all other Illinois death sentences, to life without parole in 2003.  But his conviction was based on a confession he gave to Chicago police after they tortured him.  According to Kitchen, he was “hit in the head with a telephone, punched in the face, struck in the groin and kicked.”  Tuesday, all charges against him were dropped, and he was released.…

July 10, 2009