Category Archives: Human rights

Nicaragua’s congress announces ‘work plan’ to suspend elections

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US secretary of state says international community should ‘join forces’ against authoritarian Ortega regime

Nicaragua’s congress, controlled by the country’s long-serving president, Daniel Ortega, has announced a “work plan” to implement the authoritarian leader’s order that the country should no longer hold elections.

The UN and the US strongly condemned Sunday’s announcement by Ortega, who has been in power since 2007 and, after a controversial constitutional change last year, now governs alongside his wife, Rosario Murillo, as “co-president”.

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ICE arrests human rights lawyer who fled Chinese crackdown

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Arrest in Pennsylvania of Wu Shaoping, who is awaiting asylum decision, raises fears of deportation and persecution

A Chinese human rights lawyer has been arrested by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), raising concerns he could be deported to China where he would face persecution.

Wu Shaoping fled China at the end of 2019 amid a crackdown on human rights lawyers. He travelled to the US on a tourist visa and made an asylum claim in 2020, for which he is still awaiting a decision.

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Photo of bound Palestinian detainee corroborates Israeli torture reports, say rights groups

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Image of man in underwear, blindfold and bound to iron rod has been widely shared on social media

An Israeli soldier’s photo of a Palestinian man from Gaza stripped to his underwear, blindfolded and bound face-down to an iron rod corroborates extensive reporting on Israeli torture of Palestinians in detention and itself may constitute a war crime, rights groups have said.

The image was shared on a now-deleted personal social media account, with the Hebrew-language caption “good morning”. It was brought to wider public attention by a Palestinian writer and activist who goes by Tamer.

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Italy ordered to compensate woman who was told her rape allegations were ‘normal’

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ECHR rules that Italian prosecutor’s remarks perpetuated ‘sexist stereotypes’ and downplayed gender violence

The European court of human rights has ordered the Italian state to pay compensation to a woman whose allegations of repeated rape by her partner were dismissed by a prosecutor as “normal” for men who struggle to overcome resistance from “tired” women.

The court ruled that the remarks perpetuated “sexist stereotypes” and downplayed gender violence, resulting in the woman being subjected to further victimisation.

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Sudan’s RSF committed crimes against humanity in El Fasher, Amnesty says

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Report accuses paramilitary force of crimes including ethnic cleansing in systemic campaign against civilians

The Sudanese paramilitary Rapid Support Forces committed crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing during its campaign to capture El Fasher, Amnesty International has alleged.

Many of the crimes, including murder, torture, rape, enslavement and sexual slavery, were carried out as part of a widespread and systematic attack against civilians and amounted to crimes against humanity, the human rights organisation said in a report released on Wednesday.

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‘Witch-hunt’ in Niger as military regime rounds up LGBTQ+ population

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Fears of resurgence of HIV/Aids amid loss of access to PrEP drugs as at least 40 people arrested in ‘toxic’ climate

A “witch-hunt” is under way in Niger, where dozens of people have been arrested for homosexuality in the west African state following the introduction of a new penal code earlier this year.

Up to 40 people have been arrested and 16 men, including high-ranking military officials, have been imprisoned across the country, according to local media.

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‘Humanity is a privilege’: Umar Khalid on his six years in an Indian jail without trial

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Exclusive: Activist tells of his life as one of India’s most prominent political prisoners and his opposition to the government of Narendra Modi

Prison is hardest at sunset. As the thousands of prisoners incarcerated in Delhi’s most infamous jail are cast out of their cells and forced into the dank yard until darkness falls, prisoner number 626714 feels the punishing dread begin to rise.

Yet the inmate – better known as Umar Khalid – was recently moved to discover that another political prisoner, exiled at a camp thousands of miles from India, wrote of the very same feeling more than 150 years ago.

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UN calls for ‘prompt investigations’ of deaths in US immigration custody

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High commissioner for human rights calls for ‘those responsible for violations of the law’ to be held to account

The United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Volker Türk, on Friday raised the alarm internationally about deaths in US government immigration custody and called for “prompt, independent, impartial and effective investigations”.

Türk’s call came as the Trump administration faced investigations by watchdogs at its own Department of Homeland Security (DHS) into deaths and use of force against people detained in its expanding immigration detention system across the country.

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Outrage as woman jailed for three years after criticising Somali government online

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Sentencing of 27-year-old Sadia Moalim Ali condemned by former president and prime ministers as well as rights groups

A rickshaw driver in Somalia has been sentenced to three years in prison for comments she made on social media, in a case that has caught the public’s attention and provoked outrage in the country.

Sadia Moalim Ali, a 27-year-old nursing graduate, was originally charged with insulting government institutions and incitement to commit a crime, but convicted only of the former. Her sentence, immediately condemned as “fundamentally unjust”, was handed down on 25 June.

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Bahraini award to UK envoy shows ‘our diplomats are up for grabs’, says peer

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Rights activists call UK ambassador ‘morally compromised’ for accepting honour from Bahraini king in apparent breach of Foreign Office rules

The British ambassador to Bahrain has been accused of breaching government rules over accepting an award by the Gulf state’s king, a move critics suggest signals diplomats and civil servants are “up for grabs”.

This week, the ambassador, Alastair Long, received the Order of Bahrain from King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, in recognition of his diplomatic tenure, which human rights activists and politicians say is in “direct breach” of the Foreign Office’s rules on accepting foreign awards.

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Israel continues to commit genocide by targeting children in Gaza, UN inquiry finds

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Independent report says by aiming at children Israel is undermining capacity of Palestinian people to exist

Israel continues to commit genocide by deliberately targeting Palestinian children in Gaza, an ⁠independent UN inquiry has found.

The report by the UN independent international commission of inquiry examined violations against Palestinian children since the start of the war in Gaza, and said about 30% of the people killed by Israeli forces have been children.

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UK prioritised ties with UAE over averting mass atrocities in Sudan, MPs to be told

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Foreign Office failed to act on warnings of genocide due to ‘pressure’ from emirates, Yale human rights investigator will tell a parliamentary select committee

The British government had received intelligence that Ethiopia appeared to be supporting a genocidal militia in Sudan’s civil war as far back as 2024 but did not go public with the news for fear of upsetting the United Arab Emirates (UAE), a parliamentary committee will hear.

In May 2024, officials from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) told Nathaniel Raymond, an American human rights investigator at Yale University, that “significant private pressure” from the UAE meant the UK would not publicly divulge information linking Ethiopia and the emirates to their support for the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

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EU faces fierce criticism over plans to host Taliban in Brussels

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Rights campaigners and MEPs say meeting would normalise regime that erases women from public life

Rights campaigners and MEPs have warned that a meeting between EU officials and a Taliban delegation in Brussels risks normalising a regime that has banned girls from school beyond the sixth grade and sought to erase women from public life, while its ranks include two leaders accused of crimes against humanity.

A spokesperson for the Afghan foreign ministry confirmed that a delegation representing the ⁠Taliban had travelled to Brussels after the Belgian foreign ministry issued five single-day visas.

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Construction equipment multinationals may be aiding Israeli war crimes, experts say

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Images show Israeli military using six companies’ bulldozers and excavators to demolish south Lebanon villages

Human rights experts have alleged that six multinational construction equipment conglomerates may be aiding and abetting war crimes by supplying excavators and bulldozers to Israel, after photos and videos showed the Israeli military using their equipment to demolish villages in south Lebanon.

The Guardian geolocated and verified images showing the Israeli military using excavators made by six companies – Caterpillar, Volvo, Hyundai, Doosan, Hitachi and Komatsu – to destroy homes, public utilities, shops and other structures across southern Lebanon.

Israel has levelled entire villages inside the “yellow line”, a 608 sq km area occupied by Israel along the Lebanese-Israeli border. At least 46 villages in south Lebanon have suffered heavy damage, most of it caused by demolitions carried out after the 17 April Lebanon-Israel ceasefire, according to a satellite analysis by Bellingcat.

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Attacks on education, pupils and staff around the world up by 40%, says study

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Cases reported in 83 countries, with at least 10,600 students and staff killed, injured, abducted or arrested, GCPEA says

Attacks on education globally have surged by 40% with more than 8,556 recorded incidents and 10,600 students and staff killed, injured, abducted, arrested or otherwise harmed in 2024 and 2025, according to new research.

Attacks were reported in 83 countries, with the highest incidences recorded in Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Haiti, Palestine and Ukraine.

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Global brands ‘likely’ using mineral that funds rebels accused of atrocities in DRC, investigation finds

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Amazon and Sony among firms that may have sourced coltan, used in phones, from supply chains controlled by the M23 rebels, says Global Witness

Leading global brands including Amazon, Ericsson and Sony are “likely” to have sourced minerals linked to a militia accused of widespread sexual violence, summary executions and torture, a new investigation claims.

The companies allegedly, but unknowingly, acquired coltan smuggled from mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) that are occupied by the M23 militia, which has committed myriad atrocities in eastern DRC.

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‘Family values’ African charter condemned by rights groups as regressive and dangerous

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Draft treaty claims sexual and reproductive health and rights are an existential threat to the African family

An African treaty that rejects longstanding international human rights obligations moved a step closer to becoming policy this week as governments across the continent met in Ghana.

The draft African charter on family, sovereignty and values, seen by the Guardian, asserts that African values and culture are under attack from “foreign ideologies” and urges states to withdraw from any agreements that do not align with the principles of the charter, including the 2003 Maputo protocol, which promotes gender equality and protects the reproductive and health rights of women and girls.

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Italy’s top court rules against tourist refused tap water in Dolomites hotel

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Woman argued water was a ‘universal human right’ but court ruled no law obliged hoteliers to serve it from taps

A tourist’s simple request for a glass of tap water at a hotel restaurant in the Italian Dolomites has culminated in Italy’s top court ruling that being served water from the tap is not consumer right, after a lengthy and costly legal saga.

The case dates back to 2019, when the woman spent a week at the five-star hotel in the ski resort of Corvara, in Badia, over Christmas and New Year. She was on a half-board deal with the evening meal included, except for drinks.

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Starmer urged to intervene in ‘rigged’ Indian prosecution of British human rights activist

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Senior lawyers call on prime minister to request Indian prosecutors drop charges that would breach double jeopardy rule

Four senior lawyers, including the former attorney general Dominic Grieve, have written to Keir Starmer urging him to request that Indian prosecutors drop charges against the British national Jagtar Singh Johal on the basis that continued prosecution would be in manifest breach of the double jeopardy rule which prevents someone being tried twice for the same offence.

Johal has been held in an Indian jail for eight years, and in March last year was acquitted of the terrorist charges laid against him in a court in Punjab. The court found the prosecutors had “miserably failed” to present any reliable evidence, despite having had seven years to do so.

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Flotilla video: Ben-Gvir’s template of televised abuse was honed on Palestinians

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Targeting of foreign activists drew global outrage from governments that have not acted on violence against Palestinian detainees

Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has made abuse of detained Palestinians something of a macabre calling card, celebrating cruelty publicly and often on video.

During his time in office, violence including rape, extreme hunger and humiliation have been normalised in Israeli jails. Rights groups say detention centres have become “torture camps” for Palestinians.

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