Category Archives: Human rights

Six Libyans face death penalty for converting to Christianity

Posted on by

Religious laws are increasingly being used to silence civil society and human rights groups, say activists

Six Libyans are facing the death penalty for converting to Christianity and proselytising under laws increasingly being used to silence civil society and human rights organisations, say activists.

The women and men – some from Libya’s minority ethnic groups, including the Amazigh, or Berbers, in the west of the country – were separately detained in March by security forces.

Continue reading...

Uganda’s parliament passes mostly unchanged anti-LGBTQ bill

Posted on by

Bill retains harshest measures of legislation adopted in March, including death penalty for certain same-sex acts

Uganda’s parliament has passed a mostly unchanged version of one of the world’s strictest anti-LGBTQ+ bills after President Yoweri Museveni asked that certain provisions from the original legislation be toned down.

Despite four amendments, the bill retains most of the harshest measures of the legislation adopted in March. Those include the death penalty for certain same-sex acts and a 20-year sentence for “promoting” homosexuality, which activists say could criminalise any advocacy for the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer citizens.

Continue reading...

China ‘barring thousands of citizens and foreigners from leaving country’

Posted on by

Analysis of Chinese court records shows eightfold increase in cases mentioning exit bans between 2016 and 2022

China is increasingly barring people, including foreign executives, from leaving the country, according to a report and research.

Scores of Chinese nationals and foreigners have been ensnared by exit bans, according to the report from the rights group Safeguard Defenders, while a Reuters analysis has found an apparent surge in court cases involving such bans in recent years.

Continue reading...

UK ‘should impose sanctions on human rights abusers in Sudan’ – report

Posted on by

UK all-party group says failure to bring to justice Darfur abusers 20 years ago has led to current violence

The UK should impose sanctions on human rights abusers in senior Sudanese military positions as well as designate the Wagner group operating in Sudan as a terrorist group, a report from the all-party group on Sudan has urged.

The group, including the Conservative former Africa minister Vicky Ford, said on Wednesday the west has allowed impunity to become the norm, and the failure to bring to justice many of those responsible for the genocide in Darfur 20 years ago has allowed the same militia to regroup and form part of the forces now blocking democracy in the country.

Continue reading...

UK government funding anti-LGBTQ+ organisation in Uganda, says report

Posted on by

The Inter-Religious Council of Uganda, which is openly homophobic, is a direct recipient of UK aid money

The UK government is helping to fund the work of a virulently homophobic religious organisation in Uganda, whose leaders have backed a proposed law that would make identifying as gay a criminal offence, a report has found.

Analysing official data given to the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI), the report by the Institute for Journalism and Social Change (IJSC) found a “staggering” number of connections between anti-LGBTQ+ organisations in Uganda and international aid donors, including the UK.

Continue reading...

Tory MP criticised for Kazakhstan-funded £5k trip to observe elections

Posted on by

Human rights groups raise concerns after UK trade envoy Daniel Kawczynski praised the country’s ‘functioning democracy’

The Conservative MP Daniel Kawczynski is facing criticism after the Kazakh government funded a £5,100 trip for him to observe elections and quoted him praising the country’s “functioning democracy”.

Kawczynski, a trade envoy for the prime minster, Rishi Sunak, travelled to watch parliamentary elections in Kazakhstan in March amid concerns among human rights groups about the treatment of Zhanbolat Mamai, the leader of the unregistered Democratic party. Mamai was this month banned from political activism and journalism for six years.

Continue reading...

Fears grow for Taiwan book publisher believed held in China

Posted on by

Reported detention of Li Yanhe has echoes of 2015 disappearances of five Hong Kong booksellers

Concerns are mounting for a Taiwan-based book publisher believed to have been detained in China, in a case that has echoed the disappearances in 2015 of five Hong Kong booksellers.

Li Yanhe, also known by the pen-name Fucha, reportedly travelled to Shanghai last month to visit relatives but has been uncontactable since Thursday. His alleged detention was first reported by Bei Ling, a Chinese writer and activist, who said on Facebook that he had been told by various sources that Li had been arrested by authorities in Shanghai.

Continue reading...

Scandal of Syria’s stolen homes: fraudsters use courts to legitimise thefts from refugees

Posted on by

Assad forces said to be in partnership with networks stripping exiles of their property and leaving them nothing to return to

It was through an unexpected phone call from a police officer, telling him he was summoned to court in Damascus, that Abdullah*, 31, discovered his house was being stolen.

He had to abandon his home in 2012, when he fled Syria during a security crackdown on anti-government activists. Now, he was being told to explain to the courts that he had not transferred the house to a distant relative.

Continue reading...

MEPs approve plans for long-awaited overhaul to EU asylum system

Posted on by

European lawmakers say that after seven years of deadlock it could be the final chance to resolve the issue

The European parliament has approved a series of proposals to overhaul the EU asylum system in a bid to end a years-long deadlock over the issue.

Voting in Strasbourg, MEPs approved plans on the distribution of refugees and migrants across the bloc, screening of people at the EU’s external borders and giving non-EU nationals long-term residence permits after three years of legal stay in a member state.

Continue reading...

Lords could defeat plan to ignore ECHR small boat rulings, ministers warned

Posted on by

Former head of judiciary says move by UK could amount to ‘symbolic breach of the rule of law’

Ministers have been warned by a former head of the judiciary that plans to let the UK ignore rulings from the European court of human rights (ECHR) on small boat crossings could be defeated in the House of Lords.

John Thomas, who was lord chief justice of England and Wales from 2013 to 2017, said the move would probably amount to a “symbolic breach of the rule of law”.

Continue reading...

‘Burhan and Hemedti are both genocidaires’: activists despair as Sudan violence surges

Posted on by

Sudanese campaigners describe their fears amid escalating clashes between forces loyal to the two generals, as well as their anger over warnings ignored

The Sudanese people will continue to resist military forces that usurped the transition to democratic rule, says the protester who has become known as “the Spiderman of Sudan”.

The young teacher, who became known as “Spidey” for the costume he wore to protests against the military coup in 2021, said a friend had already been killed in heavy fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which erupted on Saturday.

Continue reading...

Outcry over lengthy jail terms handed to China human rights lawyers

Posted on by

UN rights chief voices concern over sentencing of Ding Jiaxi and Xu Zhiyong

The UN human rights chief, Volker Türk, has said he is “very concerned” after China sentenced two prominent human rights lawyers to more than a decade each in jail.

Xu Zhiyong and Ding Jiaxi were convicted of subversion of state power after closed-door trials and sentenced to 14 and 12 years respectively.

Continue reading...

China jails two leading human rights lawyers after closed-door trial

Posted on by

Xu Zhiyong and Ding Jiaxi, prominent figures advocating for improved civil rights, given lengthy jail terms in latest crackdown on dissent

A Chinese court has sentenced two prominent human rights lawyers to jail terms of more than a decade each, a relative and rights groups say, in the latest move in a years-long crackdown on civil society by President Xi Jinping.

Xu Zhiyong, 50, and Ding Jiaxi, 55, were put on trial behind closed doors in June last year on charges of state subversion at a court in Linshu county in the north-eastern province of Shandong, relatives said at the time.

Continue reading...

Iranian police plan to use smart cameras to identify “violators of hijab law”

Posted on by

Women who break Islamic dress code will be identified, warned on first instance and then taken to court

Police in Iran plan to use smart technology in public places to identify and then penalise women who violate the country’s strict Islamic dress code, the force said on Saturday.

A statement said police would “take action to identify norm-breaking people by using tools and smart cameras in public places and thoroughfares”.

Continue reading...

Macron arrives in China hoping to talk Xi into changing stance on Ukraine

Posted on by

French leader sees Beijing as possible ‘gamechanger’ and will also discuss European trade on three-day visit

Emmanuel Macron has arrived in China for a three-day state visit during which he hopes to dissuade Xi Jinping from supporting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine while also developing European trade ties with Beijing.

Shortly after arriving in the Chinese capital, Macron said he wanted to push back against the idea that there was an “inescapable spiral of mounting tensions” between China and the west.

Continue reading...

Almost half of human rights defenders killed last year were in Colombia

Posted on by

The county was the deadliest for rights activists in 2022, and Latin America and Ukraine together accounted for 80% of the 401 deaths

Colombia was the deadliest country in the world for human rights defenders in 2022, accounting for 186 killings – or 46% – of the global total registered last year, according to the latest report from the international human rights group Front Line Defenders.

Front Line Defenders found that killings of rights defenders across the globe increased in 2022, with a total of 401 deaths across 26 different countries, compared with 358 deaths in 38 countries registered in 2021.

Continue reading...

Law council joins calls to abolish Australia’s powers to detain terrorist offenders to prevent future crimes

Posted on by

Peak legal body endorses findings by independent monitor that recommends scrapping continuing detention orders

Australia’s peak lawyers body has urged the government to abolish “fraught” powers that allow terrorist offenders to be imprisoned so as to prevent possible crimes being committed in the future.

Last week a damning report by Australia’s national security law watchdog recommended scrapping continuing detention orders, which allow terrorist offenders to be imprisoned for three years on the basis of predicted crimes rather than for any crime they have committed.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Mark Dreyfus rejects human rights commissioner’s claim Indigenous voice would undermine principles of equality

Posted on by

Attorney general declines to comment on calls for commissioner Lorraine Finlay to consider her future in the role

Federal attorney general Mark Dreyfus “does not agree” with the human rights commissioner that the proposed Indigenous voice to parliament would undermine human rights principles of equality and non-discrimination in Australia, but would not comment on calls for the commissioner to consider her future in the role.

In an opinion piece published in the Australian on Thursday, commissioner Lorraine Finlay wrote that the draft wording of the referendum question and proposed amendment to the constitution “inserts race into the Australian constitution in a way that undermines the foundational human rights principles of equality and non-discrimination, and creates constitutional uncertainty in terms of its interpretation and operation”.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Brazil may sue VW amid claims firm used ‘slave labour’ under military rule

Posted on by

Prosecutors seek compensation for workers kept on cattle ranch owned by German carmaker during dictatorship from 1973 to 1987

Brazil is threatening to take the German carmaker Volkswagen to court over allegations that it used slave labour on a vast ranch in the Amazon, after talks on compensating workers ended without agreement.

Public prosecutors in Brazil are seeking compensation for men who they say were forced to work in “humiliating and degrading” conditions, with no clean water or sanitation, on the Fazenda Vale do Rio Cristalino cattle ranch, which was owned by the company in the northern Pará state, between 1973 and 1987.

Continue reading...

Switzerland and France accused of lack of climate action in ECHR hearing

Posted on by

Group of Swiss women and French ex-mayor suing their governments in first such cases heard by rights court

The governments of Switzerland and France have been accused of breaching the human rights of their citizens by not acting decisively enough on climate change, at a landmark legal hearing in Strasbourg.

A panel of judges at the European court of human rights heard petitions from a group of Swiss women and a French former mayor seeking to bolster climate action in their countries. Although climate litigation has spread quickly around the world, these are the first such cases to be heard by the ECHR.

Continue reading...