Category Archives: Human rights

Ethiopia’s human rights chief as war rages in Tigray: ‘we get accused by all ethnic groups’

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Former political prisoner Daniel Bekele has made the commission more autonomous but critics claim he is biased on current conflict

There was a time when a report by Ethiopia’s human rights commission was a staid affair, its findings offering window-dressing for hand-wringing donors and legal cover to the government.

Between 2013 and 2017 the commission systematically “whitewashed human rights violations through compromised methodologies, dismissing credible allegations”, according to a 2019 Amnesty International study that accused it of “brazen bias against victims”.

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Eritrean soldiers killed 19 civilians in latest Tigray atrocity, locals claim

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Killings took place near Ethiopia’s Abuna Yemata church on 8 May, according to multiple testimonies

Eritrean soldiers killed 19 civilians in a village at the foot of an internationally celebrated rock-hewn church in Tigray three weeks ago, witnesses, relatives and local residents have claimed, the latest alleged atrocity in the war-torn Ethiopian region.

Most of the victims in the alleged attack were women and young children.

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My story proves Rwanda’s lack of respect for good governance and human rights | Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza

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Responsibility for defending what the Commonwealth stands for must not pass to the country without reforms

If Rwanda had hosted the Commonwealth heads of government meeting, which has been cancelled for the second time due to Covid-19, the UK was due to hand the country the Commonwealth chair.

Rwanda would have held the responsibility for defending what the Commonwealth stands for – despite violating those same values for decades. When Rwanda was admitted as a member in 2009, I had hoped our government would apply Commonwealth values in its governance. But this did not happen.

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Migrant guards in Qatar ‘still paid under £1 an hour’ ahead of World Cup

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Promises of better working conditions ring hollow for tens of thousands of security guards, who say they still work long hours for low pay

Every day at 5pm, Samuel boards the company bus that takes him to his night shift as a guard at a luxury high-rise tower near Qatar’s capital, Doha. When his shift ends 12 hours later, he says he will have earned £9, just 75p an hour.

Samuel, who is from Uganda, says he almost never has a day off. “You have to tell lies, like ‘you are sick, you’re not feeling good’, so that you get a day off,” he says.

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Rise of armed civilian groups in Myanmar fuels fears of civil war

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Dozens of grassroots people’s defence forces have emerged to take on brutal military

Myanmar is on the verge of a new civil war, a spokesperson for the country’s parallel government has warned, as communities increasingly take up arms to protect themselves from a relentless campaign of military violence.

Conflict has raged for decades in Myanmar’s borderlands, where myriad ethnic armed groups are fighting with the military for greater autonomy. Since February’s coup, however, dozens of new, grassroots people’s defence forces have emerged to oppose the junta, with battles occurring in areas of the country that were previously peaceful.

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Uncovered: the brutal secrets of UK deportation flight Esparto 11

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On 12 August 2020 at 7.48am the first of a series of Home Office flights carrying asylum seekers left Stansted. This is the harrowing story of the hours before it took off and the anguish of those on board

At 7.15am, half an hour before charter flight Esparto 11 took off from Stansted airport, a detainee with a documented history of self-harm asked to use the plane’s bathroom. He was taken to the toilet by an escort working for the Home Office who held the door ajar with his foot and, after several minutes, peered inside to discover the detainee had slashed his wrist with a blade.

Pinning the man with his body weight to gain “control”, another officer squeezed into the bathroom and placed a handcuff on the wrist. According to an account written by officers, the handcuff was used to “[give] him pain”, a reference to a restraint technique which involves deliberately inflicting suffering to gain submission. In this case, most likely by twisting the cuff or pushing it into the wrist.

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Argentina sends out DNA kits in drive to identify thousands ‘disappeared’ under dictatorship

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Move is part of groundbreaking effort to name 30,000 murdered by regime after 1976 coup

The Argentinian government has sent hundreds of DNA testing kits to its consulates around the world in a groundbreaking effort to put names to unidentified victims murdered in the “Dirty War” waged by the brutal military dictatorship four decades ago.

Last month, the Argentinian authorities, in collaboration with the National Commission for the Right to Identity, the Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo movement and investigators from the Argentinian Forensic Anthropology Team (EAAF), launched its international Right to Identity campaign, committed to putting a name to every woman, man and child killed by the military junta in Argentina in the 1970s and early 80s.

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‘One name in a long list’: the pointless death of another West Bank teenager

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Obaida Jawabra was weeks from turning 18 when he was shot by an Israeli soldier, after a life shaped by arrests and imprisonment

Route 60, the north-south artery that carves its way through the West Bank, is both the lifeblood of the region and a source of daily fear.

Flanked in parts by 2.5-metre-high (8ft) separation barriers, military checkpoints and watchtowers crewed by Israeli snipers, the 146-mile highway that starts and finishes in Israel but passes Hebron and Bethlehem in the West Bank, has been the scene of many fatal attacks and violent clashes.

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UN rights body debates ‘systematic discrimination’ in Israel and Palestine

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UN chief says Israel attacks on Gaza could constitute war crimes and accuses Hamas of firing indiscriminate rockets

The UN’s main human rights body is to meet to discuss launching an investigation into “systematic discrimination and repression” in Israel and Palestine, with the aim of identifying what it said were the root causes of recent Gaza bloodshed.

A draft proposal that calls for unprecedented levels of scrutiny of alleged abuses, called at the request of Muslim states, will be put before the 47-member UN human rights council on Thursday.

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Nigeria’s court strike paralyses underfunded justice system

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Defendants left in prison for months awaiting trial as staff strike over judicial system’s financial autonomy

A nationwide strike of court workers in Nigeria is paralysing the justice system, resulting in extended prison remands for those awaiting trial or sentencing and lengthy delays for everyone else.

In March last year, Taiwo Ebun*, 27, was arrested for alleged armed robbery in Lagos. Since then he has been in detention.

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GCHQ’s mass data interception violated right to privacy, court rules

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Human rights judgment follows legal challenge begun in 2013 after Edward Snowden’s whistleblowing revelations

GCHQ’s methods for bulk interception of online communications violated the right to privacy and the regime for collection of data was “not in accordance with the law”, the grand chamber of the European court of human rights has ruled.

It also found the bulk interception regime contained insufficient protections for confidential journalistic material but said the decision to operate a bulk interception regime did not of itself violate the European convention on human rights.

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Washington toughens stance to fight atrocities in Ethiopia

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Joe Biden’s administration increases pressure on government of prime minister Abiy Ahmed to end human rights abuses

Senior Ethiopian officials may face restrictions on their travel to the US, as Washington increases pressure on the government of prime minister Abiy Ahmed amid growing global concern about atrocities and famine caused by conflict in the northern region of Tigray.

Though visa restrictions are likely to target only a small number of individuals, the move signals President Joe Biden’s administration is shifting to a more direct strategy to force Ahmed to end continuing human rights abuses in Tigray and allow free flow of much-needed humanitarian aid.

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Gaza damage and Glasgow raids: human rights this fortnight in pictures

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A roundup of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Myanmar to Peru

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Belarus blocks top news site in ‘full-scale assault’ on free press

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Widely read Tut.by news site taken offline in latest attack on media freedom, say human rights groups

A leading news site in Belarus has been taken offline and its journalists interrogated by government officials in what human rights campaigners are calling a “full-scale assault” on the right to freedom of expression in the country.

Tut.by, a news site read by more than 40% of Belarusian internet users, has been blocked and its editors questioned after their offices and houses were raided by authorities.

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‘Pray for Myanmar’: Miss Universe pageant gets political

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Thuzar Wint Lwin, in dress of besieged Chin minority, highlights brutal repression since coup in Myanmar

In the months leading up to the Miss Universe pageant, most contestants were busy making promotional films and rehearsing for their moment in the limelight. Thuzar Wint Lwin of Myanmar was on the streets of Yangon, protesting against the country’s brutal army.

As the military used increasingly deadly force to crush rallies opposing its February coup, she visited the relatives of those who had been killed, donating her savings. Online, she raised awareness of military violence, despite the risk of retaliation.

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Petra Diamonds pays £4.3m to Tanzanians ‘abused’ by its contractors

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Firm settles over allegations claimants were shot, stabbed and beaten by guards at mine that produced one of Queen’s favourite gems

The British mining company Petra Diamonds has agreed to pay £4.3m in compensation to dozens of Tanzanians who allegedly suffered serious human rights abuses at a mine famed for producing a flawless pink diamond for one of the Queen’s favourite brooches.

The 71 Tanzanian claimants, represented in the London high court by the British law firm Leigh Day, alleged grave violations by the company, among them being shot, beaten, stabbed, assaulted, detained in cramped and filthy holding cells, and handcuffed to hospital beds.

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Indefinite detention of refugees is unlawful under international law, but Australia has quietly made it legal

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To counter the court’s ruling against unlawful detention, the government simply wrote a new law allowing it to do whatever it wants

In 2012, a person placed in immigration detention in Australia was held, on average, for less than 100 days.

In 2021, that figure is 627 days – 20 months – the highest it has ever been.

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Iranian asylum seeker cleared of Channel smuggling charges

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Man who took turn steering boat ‘because he didn’t want to die’ freed, with case opening way for others to appeal their sentences

An asylum seeker jailed on smuggling charges for helping to steer a boat filled with migrants from France to England has had his conviction overturned at a retrial after spending 17 months in jail.

Lawyers and campaigners say the verdict could lead to other migrants currently in jail on smuggling charges being freed, allowing the Home Office policy of prosecuting asylum seekers who play a role in piloting boats across the Channel to be challenged more widely.

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‘Bodies are being eaten by hyenas; girls of eight raped’: inside the Tigray conflict

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A nun working in war-torn Tigray has shared her harrowing testimony of the atrocities taking place

The Ethiopian nun, who has to remain anonymous for her own security, is working in Mekelle, Tigray’s capital, and surrounding areas, helping some of the tens of thousands of people displaced by the fighting who have been streaming into camps in the hope of finding shelter and food. Both are in short supply. Humanitarian aid is being largely blocked and a wholesale crackdown is seeing civilians being picked off in the countryside, either shot or rounded up and taken to overcrowded prisons. She spoke to Tracy McVeigh this week.

“After the last few months I’m happy to be alive. I have to be OK. Mostly we are going out to the IDP [internally displaced people] camps and the community centres where people are. They are in a bad way.

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Rape is being used as weapon of war in Ethiopia, say witnesses

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Ethiopian nun speaks of widespread horror she and colleagues are seeing on a daily basis inside the heavily isolated region of Tigray

Thousands of women and girls are being targeted by the deliberate tactic of using rape as a weapon in the civil war that has erupted in Ethiopia, according to eyewitnesses.

In a rare account from inside the heavily isolated region of Tigray, where communications with the outside world are being deliberately cut off, an Ethiopian nun has spoken of the widespread horror she and her colleagues are seeing on a daily basis since a savage war erupted six months ago.

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