“This is a landmark moment in the fight for climate justice as it is likely to provide clarity on how existing international law, especially human rights and environmental legislation, can be applied to strengthen action on climate change. This will help mitigate the causes and consequences of the damage done to the climate and ultimately protect people and the environment globally.” 

This is a landmark moment in the fight for climate justice.

Marta Schaaf, Director of Climate, Economic and Social Justice, and Corporate Accountability Programme, Amnesty International

“We salute this remarkable achievement by Vanuatu, and other Pacific Island states, which originally brought this urgent call to advance climate justice to the UN. Their resolution was adopted by consensus, endorsed by more than 130 countries, backed by a broad civil society coalition and has widespread popular support.

“Today’s victory sprang from the efforts of youth activists in Pacific Island states to secure climate justice. Like other states in the region, Vanuatu has been hit by a series of powerful cyclones, and faces an existential threat from rising sea levels and intensifying storms, caused primarily by fossil fuel use in industrialized countries, over which it has no control or responsibility.

An advisory opinion from the court can help put a brake on this accelerating climate disaster.

Marta Schaaf

“The ICJ can now choose to provide a robust advisory opinion to advance climate justice. We know from this month’s IPCC report that the 1.5°C global warming limit agreed to in Paris in 2015 is likely to be breached before 2035 unless urgent action is taken. We see some fossil fuel-producing states both resisting calls to phase them out, and falsely promoting carbon capture and storage as a technological fix for the climate. An advisory opinion from the court can help put a brake on this accelerating climate disaster.”

The post Global: UN backs Pacific Island states by asking the International Court to advance climate justice appeared first on Amnesty International.

“Yang Hengjun has been detained on totally baseless allegations that he is a spy, and the Chinese authorities must ensure that his trial meets international fair trial standards.

“The charges against Yang appear to be a politically motivated prosecution for articles he wrote that were critical of the Chinese government. This is an outrageous attack on his right to freedom of expression.

“Having reportedly endured hundreds of interrogations and been held in inhumane conditions with severely restricted access to his lawyer, Yang now faces an unfair trial behind closed doors. He remains at grave risk of torture and other ill-treatment.

“Yang’s case is yet more proof that incommunicado detention, coercive interrogations, secret hearings and the flagrant denial of fair trial guarantees on nebulous charges are part of the Chinese authorities’ routine repertoire for targeting government critics and human rights activists.

“Unless China can provide concrete, credible and admissible evidence that Yang has committed an internationally recognized offence, he must be immediately released with all charges dropped.”

Background

Yang Hengjun, a prominent writer and occasional critic of the Chinese government, goes on trial for espionage on 27 May 2021 after more than two years in detention. If found guilty, he faces a minimum of three years in prison and a maximum sentence of death if he is deemed to have “endangered national security with particularly serious harm to the country and the people”.

Yang was initially detained by police in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou in January 2019. He was then held under “residential surveillance at a designated location” before being taken into custody in December 2019. He was only allowed access to Australian consular officials and his lawyers eight months later, after being formally arrested on espionage charges in August 2020.

“Residential surveillance in a designated location” is a measure in Chinese law that, under certain circumstances, enables criminal investigators to hold individuals for up to six months outside the formal detention system in what can amount to a form of secret incommunicado detention.

According to media reports, Yang Hengjun said he had endured more than 300 interrogations by 30 different people, sometimes for hours at a time in the middle of the night.

Espionage is categorized as a crime of “endangering national security” under China’s criminal law. Suspects in national security trials are regularly deprived of procedural rights normally afforded to ordinary suspects, including access to legal counsel of their choice and the right to a public hearing. Yang has denied all the espionage allegations against him.

The Australian government last week asked China to allow its officials to be given access to Yang’s trial as “a basic standard of justice”.

The post China: Australian-Chinese writer held on baseless ‘spying’ charges must get fair trial appeared first on Amnesty International.

“Today the United States has taken a bold step for global solidarity. By supporting the waiving of intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines, the Biden Administration has put the lives of people around the world ahead of the profits of a few pharma giants and their shareholders. 

“Other rich states – such as Australia, Brazil, the EU and UK – must now follow suit. Only by sharing knowledge and technology can the production of vaccines be accelerated to reach as many people as fast as possible. The only way to end the pandemic is to end it globally. The only way to end it globally is to put people before profit.”

Background: 

In October 2020, India and South Africa requested a waiver that would allow countries to neither grant nor enforce patents and other specific intellectual property rights related to COVID-19 products until global herd immunity is achieved. A significant number of lower- and middle-income countries supported this proposal. Most high-income countries opposed it. 

Other rich states – such as Australia, Brazil, the EU and UK – must now follow suit. Only by sharing knowledge and technology can the production of vaccines be accelerated to reach as many people as fast as possible. The only way to end the pandemic is to end it globally. The only way to end it globally is to put people before profit

Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General

If agreed, the waiver would suspend the implementation, application and enforcement of certain intellectual property rights, such as patents on pharmaceutical products, and facilitate the development and manufacture of more and lower-cost COVID-19 diagnostics, treatments and vaccines.

While 60 countries are co-sponsoring the waiver proposal and over 100 countries out of the 164 World Trade Organization member states are supportive, a key number of rich states are still opposing it – notably Australia, Brazil, EU, Japan, Norway, Switzerland, and the UK, while others, such as Canada, are staying neutral. 

The People’s Vaccine Alliance today released poll that showed that 69% of the United States public support the measure. 

International human rights standards and trade rules are clear that protecting intellectual property must never come at the expense of public health. 

The WTO’s Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) sets out minimum standards for many forms of intellectual property that are pertinent to pharmaceutical companies, such as copyrights, trademarks, patents, undisclosed information (including trade secrets and test data) and anti-competitive practices. 

The post USA: Support for intellectual property protection waiver for COVID-19 vaccines must spur more countries into action appeared first on Amnesty International.

The organization spoke to parents who have been completely cut off from their children – some as young as five years old – and cannot return to China due to the threat of being sent to a “re-education” internment camp.

“China’s ruthless mass detention campaign in Xinjiang has put separated families in an impossible situation: children are not allowed to leave, but their parents face persecution and arbitrary detention if they attempt to return home to care for them,” said Alkan Akad, Amnesty International’s China Researcher.

“The heartbreaking testimonies of the parents we spoke to only scratches the surface of the scale of suffering endured by Uyghur families separated from their children. The Chinese government must end its heartless policies in Xinjiang and ensure that families can be reunited as quickly as possible without fear of being sent to an oppressive camp.”

Amnesty International interviewed six exiled Uyghur families currently residing in Australia, Canada, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey. The families, who left China prior to the intensification of the crackdown against Uyghurs and other Muslim minority groups in 2017, had not dreamed that their children would be prevented from joining them.

The tragedy of family separation in Xinjiang exposes the inhumanity of China’s efforts to control and indoctrinate Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic groups

Amnesty International's Alkan Akad

Since 2017, an estimated one million or more people have been arbitrarily detained in so-called “transformation-through-education” or “vocational training” centres in Xinjiang, where they have been subjected to various forms of torture and ill-treatment, including political indoctrination and forced cultural assimilation.

“Uyghurs overseas often hesitate to publicly talk about human rights abuses against them and their families due to fear of repercussions for their relatives back in China. In spite of such challenges, these parents have decided to publicly share their stories in the hope that it will help them reunite with their children soon,” said Alkan Akad.

Children make perilous journey in attempt to reach Italy

Parents Mihriban Kader and Ablikim Memtinin fled from Xinjiang to Italy in 2016 after being harassed by police and pressured to give up their passports.

They left four children in the temporary care of grandparents, but soon afterwards the grandmother was taken to a camp, while the grandfather was interrogated by police.

“Our other relatives didn’t dare to look after my children after what had happened to my parents,” Mihriban told Amnesty International. “They were afraid that they would be sent to camps, too.”

The three youngest children were sent to an “orphan camp”: facilities set up across Xinjiang to house – and indoctrinate – children whose parents have been forced into internment camps, prison and other detention facilities. The eldest child was placed in a boarding school subjected to surveillance and monitoring.

Mihriban and Ablikim were unable to contact them from Italy, but in November 2019 they received a permit from the Italian government to bring their children to join them.

The four children – aged between 12 and 16 – travelled alone across China to the Italian consulate in Shanghai, but they were seized by police and sent back to the orphanage and boarding school.

“Now my children are in the hands of the Chinese government and I am not sure I will be able to meet them again in my lifetime,” Mihriban said. “The thing that hurts most is that, to my children, it’s as if their parents don’t exist anymore; as if we passed away and they are orphaned.”

In another case, Omer and Meryem Faruh fled to Turkey in late 2016 after police demanded they hand over their passports. They left their two youngest children, aged five and six, with grandparents because they did not yet have their own travel documents. Omer and Meryem later found out their relatives had been taken to camps, and they have received no word about their children since.

“We haven’t heard the voices of our daughters for the last 1,594 days,” Omer told Amnesty International. “My wife and I cry only at night, trying to hide our sorrow from our other kids here with us.”

Access for human rights monitors vital

Alkan Akad said: “The tragedy of family separation in Xinjiang exposes the inhumanity of China’s efforts to control and indoctrinate Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic groups in the name of ‘countering terrorism’.

“China must end the measures that restrict the rights of all Muslim minorities to freely leave and return to the country. It must close all political ‘re-education camps’ and release detainees immediately, unconditionally and without prejudice.”

Amnesty International is calling on the Chinese government to provide full and unrestricted access to Xinjiang for UN human rights experts, independent researchers and journalists to conduct investigations about what is happening in the region.

Meanwhile, the organization urges other governments to do everything they can to ensure that Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other Chinese ethnic minorities resident in their countries are provided with assistance in trying to locate, contact, and reunite with their children.

The post China: Parents of missing Uyghur children describe horror of family separation appeared first on Amnesty International.

“Papua New Guinea’s health crisis has now reached the level we feared it would a year ago with a surge in cases. A combination of an ailing health system and inadequate living conditions has created a perfect storm for COVID-19 to thrive in the country’s overcrowded informal settlements.

“Amnesty International has received reports of inadequate amounts of personal protective equipment for health workers, and that some hospitals are full or threatening to close to new admissions.

“Misinformation within the community and online about the illness is also rife, with some suggesting the illness is a government conspiracy theory. This has also been fuelled by the government at times publishing inaccurate information on the number of confirmed cases. There is no effective public information campaign by the government to dispel the misinformation.

“While Australia and New Zealand have made pledges of assistance to Papua New Guinea in response to the pandemic, it is woefully inadequate. Australia has sent a team of medical experts this week and has pledged monetary support, but this will not provide immediate relief.

“Basic health infrastructure is urgently needed in Papua New Guinea to help immediately on the diagnostic and treatment level, as well as for the distribution of vaccines once they are approved by the national authorities.

“Yet there is little prospect of vaccines arriving this month amid a deeply unequal global rollout. As a consequence, many poorer countries such as Papua New Guinea will continue to be at the back of the queue for limited supplies of vaccines.

“Australia and New Zealand, together with other key donors, need to urgently step up and provide the assistance their neighbour needs now. Both countries continue to fail to support calls by around 100 countries, mainly in the global south, for a temporary waiver of intellectual property rights that would enable increased production, affordability and accessibility of vaccines.”

Background

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Queensland Government, between 30 and 50 per cent of test results in Papua New Guinea returned a positive result in early March 2021.

As of 16 March 2021, the government had reported 26 confirmed deaths and 2269 confirmed cases. The WHO has noted that severe undertesting means these numbers are likely to be significantly underestimated and that at least two provinces have widespread community transition.

Papua New Guinea is part of the United Nations COVAX scheme, which aims to fairly and equitably deliver vaccines to all countries. However, COVAX has to date not been resourced enough to ensure poorer countries are getting access to vaccines. The scheme is being severely undermined by wealthy countries buying up more vaccines than they need, significantly impacting on the ability to secure vaccines for other nations. 

The post Papua New Guinea: Australia and New Zealand efforts ‘woefully inadequate’ amid COVID-19 surge appeared first on Amnesty International.

“It is extremely concerning that a private company is willing to control access to information that people rely on.  Facebook’s action starkly demonstrates why allowing one company to exert such dominant power over our information ecosystem threatens human rights. 

“It’s alarming that community support groups, emergency services and charities have had their content blocked.

“We’re particularly concerned with the effect this is having on people in the Pacific, many of whom rely on getting information and news from Facebook due to the nature of their agreements with telecommunications providers.

“Facebook’s willingness to block credible news sources also stands in sharp distinction to the company’s poor track record in addressing the spread of hateful content and disinformation on the platform.

“Amnesty International calls on Facebook to immediately reverse this decision.”

The post Facebook must stop blocking Australian news sites from being shared appeared first on Amnesty International.

Listen on:

Listen on:

ANNA: Nauru is a tiny island in the middle of the Pacific, hundreds of miles from any land. I mean it sounds like it would be a nice place you know. It used to be called Pleasant Island until it became independent in 1968 but most of it is actually uninhabitable, nothing can grow, you can’t live there, it’s all dusty, very polluted. It’s actually kind of a bit of a wasteland.

TANYA: Nauru is the world’s smallest island nation at about one-and-a-half times the size of Los Angeles City Airport. Only 10,000 people live there and the country’s economy is almost entirely dependent on its close neighbour…. Australia which uses the island for a very specific and very secretive kind of business …..detaining humans.

ANNA: So imagine you are a parent, you live in Syria let’s say. Your life is in danger, your family’s lives are in danger. You have to get out of the country. You have this idea of Australia as a safe democratic prosperous country. You want to start a life for yourself.

TANYA: Anna Shea, Researcher on Refugee & Migrant Rights at Amnesty International.

ANNA: You travel thousands of miles, very dangerous irregular routes. You might reach Christmas Island which is Australian territory or you might be within sight of the northern coast of Australia. All of the pain and suffering you’ve been through is worth it and then the coast guard processing your application for refugee status effectively kidnaps you and takes you to Nauru.

TANYA: So it’s a bit like being shipwrecked?

ANNA: Err no. With shipwreck you have a kind of hope that you might get off but on Nauru you can never leave.

TANYA: There’s been a lot of attention on President Trump border policy in the last year and the inhumane treatment of children and families in particular but the US isn’t the first country to pursue this kind of zero tolerance approach to refugees. Australia has been detaining families on Nauru since 2001. 

Stories started to break about how poor the conditions were on the island in 2014 and in response the Australian government tried to shut off Nauru from outside scrutiny which wasn’t hard given that the island is surrounded by miles of ocean

ANNA: What started happening was that Australian Nauru became more and more secretive about what was actually going on on this Island and the visa cost jumped from $200 to $8,000 overnight. There is a new law in Australia that meant that anyone who worked on the island and talked about what happened risked actual jail time. So, what were they trying to hide?

TANYA: I’m Tanya O’Carroll, part of the research department at Amnesty International and this is Witness a podcast that goes behind the scenes on investigations that made some of the biggest headlines of human rights.

ANNA: The reports that came out were really really alarming and became more alarming as time went by

TANYA: Stories about what it takes to uncover the truth when there are people who prefer the truth to stay buried.

ANNA:  And we felt we needed to go there ourselves to really understand what was happening to these people.

ANYA:  I hate roller coasters, I don’t do downhill skiing, I’ve never done bungee jumping. None of that excites me at all so I think for me I’m probably an adrenaline junkie but in a very different way. It has to be very specific type of adrenaline.

TANYA: That’s Anya Neistat, she’s a bit of a legend in the world of human rights investigation. She led Amnesty’s research department for five years and full disclosure, until very recently she was also the boss.

ANYA: When you know that you’re not just after, you know, getting your adrenaline levels high but that it is about getting work done and kind of winning against the bad guys.

TANYA: In 2016, Anya and Anna Shea set out to discover what was going on on Nauru. Visas were required for travelers from almost every country and most applications were turned down. But Anya had a bit more luck.

ANYA: And that’s because I have a Russian passport and Nauru and Russia have a no visa agreement. So we knew that with a Russian passport,  I could probably get there but that didn’t quite solve the problem because first of all my name is fairly well-known. It takes one Google click to find out who I am and second of all, you would think that with all these precautions that they take to make sure that nobody gets the island, they would at some point in the journey check. And it’s not a short trip, right. It took me three days to get there.

TANYA:  To avoid touching down in Australia

(Anya: from Paris to LA, from LA to…)

TANYA: And alerting the government there to what she was up to…

(Anya: from Hawaii to Marshall Islands, from Marshall Islands to Kiribati, from Kiribati to Nauru)

TANYA: Anya took a particularly roundabout route.

ANYA: And of course, you know what was always on mind you know was whether all of that was in vein because they might turn me around.

ANNA: She was very confident about her ability to handle anything but I was quite worried because there’s a lot of violence in Nauru. There have been a lot of targeting of women and sexual violence and that sort of thing so I was trying to encourage her to take it very seriously.

ANYA: I think because they know that nobody can get there, the checks at the airport are very very basic computer. They don’t even have a computer so it’s just like a wooden desk and a woman asked like ‘oh Russian, where’s your visa?’ 

‘I don’t need a visa.’

‘Oh Peter, Russians don’t need visas?’

‘No they don’t need visas.’

‘Okay, fine.’

TANYA: Anya had made it to Nauru. But how long would she be able to avoid detection?

ANYA: The island is 20 square kilometres. There is one that goes around it and of course everybody knows each other. There is one hotel where all of the internationals stay so I knew that I had a few days while people probably would think that I work for some other organization but then you know there will come a time when they will realize who I am, and it’s just the question of when, it’s not a question of if. It totally seemed like mission impossible.

TANYA: She got to the hotel and started making calls.

ANYA: One of the very few contacts that I had was this man named Wajeed and I didn’t know anything about him. I just was told that he might be able to help me. And he was from a minority community in in Pakistan. He had to flee because of endless persecution and death threats and he told me about a completely insane journey that they took getting into Indonesia and waiting there and getting into one of these boats. And I don’t remember now, but I think they spent days in the sea and he was completely sure that he was going to die. Ultimately you know making it to Australia and then being immediately shipped to Nauru. He’s also very well-educated man. He is an electrical engineer and it was somewhat disruptive because every once in a while he would get a call in the middle of our work and he had to run to the airport because something was not working and they couldn’t land a plane. You know, I find it fascinating that the whole operation of Nauru Airport was basically dependent on Wajeed being able to get there on time.

TANYA: Wajeed agreed to be Anya’s fixer. He’d drive her around the island, introduce her to detainees and translate when language got in the way. Anya thinks he felt relatively fortunate with the job and his health and wanted to help the many refugees who hadn’t been so lucky. But he was taking a big risk.

ANYA: He was there by that time for three years. He knew very well, who is who in the community and whom you can trust and who you cannot trust and when it’s time to leave the place because people are starting to gather. He knew the guards and the camps so it wasn’t particularly suspicious when we were picking up somebody from the camp to talk to. I would stay in the car and he would just walk to them and kind of explain that he’s inviting this person to go for a walk or whatever it was.

We knew very well this was a one off chance to actually get the information. I had a week and that was it and I knew that, in any case, even if I could stay longer I just will get arrested and deported. It was very clear that my time … the clock is ticking.

TANYA: Our second researcher, Anna Shea, began to attack the problem from a different angle. She travelled to Australia tried to make contact with people who had worked on Nauru.

ANNA:  You’d think it would be fairly easy but it was really difficult. And that’s partly because Australia has made it a criminal offence to speak about anything to do with offshore detention, offshore processing. So it felt like an undercover operation which is ludicrous.

TANYA: Anna asked local NGOs to help and slowly she began to find people who were willing to talk.

ANNA: So the interviews with these people were really unlike any interview I’d done before. I felt like a therapist. It was really bizarre. I had people crying and just partly they felt tremendously guilty about being part of this even though it sounds like a lot of them were doing their best to treat these people humanely and to work against this horrible dehumanization that was happening all around.

TANYA: One interviewee asked to meet Anna in a bar in Melbourne.

ANNA: I don’t think I knew her full name and she wanted to meet in this bar because it’ll be really loud and people couldn’t over hear.  And it was really noisy. I was actually a little bit difficult to hear her even across the table at this bar.  And yeah, it was weird waiting there. I didn’t know what she looked like. I don’t know how I signaled to her that I was there. I might have put my Amnesty card on the table or something like that.  And this woman was really scared and she kind of kept looking around. It just felt like we were in, I don’t know, some kind of fascist state where people could be listening to any conversation and we can be thrown in jail for chatting. It was Australia … I mean this was Melbourne.  

TANYA: Slowly a picture of life on the island began to emerge from Anna and Anya’s interviews.

ANNA: Detention Centre, Accommodation Centre was kind of in the middle of the Island and that’s where the phosphate mining used to take place so the air is extremely dusty, just bare rock on the ground. It’s extremely hot and for a long time people were just in tents that were covered in mould, like really dangerous mould that gave people respiratory problems. So it’s a really really inhospitable place to live.

ANYA: No places for children. There are no places for women. There were lots of issues with sexual assaults in the camps. Very significant levels of violence coming from the local population. So many people were attacked, their cell phones taken… beatings. I collected so many photos of people covered in blood because they were just attacked by Naurans. 

ANNA: They started out as kind of regular folks and then just deteriorated into really severe anguish and mental illness. The kind of hopelessness, their inability to think of any future for themselves just destroys people.

(Insert from person detained on the island):  My son got mental issues. He started wetting his bed, developed what seems like autism. He almost doesn’t speak, has nightmares, panic attacks. My wife got anxiety. She started taking more pills but nothing changed. For the last few months she just stayed in bed. She doesn’t move, doesn’t want to see her son and he doesn’t want to see her either. When my wife is screaming, he can hear it and gets very depressed afterwards. I have no hope. It’s end of time here.)

ANNA: There was this little boy whose teacher was telling me, I think he’d actually been born on Nauru. She could see the logical connections being made in his mind. He’s like ‘okay, so prisons are for bad people.  People who have done bad things. But we are in a prison. So, does that mean that we are bad?’

ANYA: Story after story after story…lots of children. Father whose wife died back in Afghanistan and he was there with two of his young boys who were really…especially one of them…was completely suicidal. He just tried everything to kill himself. He doesn’t eat, he tries to run and drown himself in the ocean. He tries to cut his hand. It’s just insane. The brutality of it was just incredible. 

(Clip from person detained on island): I’m so tired at night. I just start crying but I’m trying not to show weakness to my nephews. I wish I could kill myself but because of them, I can’t. In Iraq, just one bullet or a bomb and it’s over but here I’m dying a thousand times.)

ANNA: All that they were trying to do was to protect themselves and their families and start a new life. And they felt the really burning injustice of being punished for that really simple human act. 

TANYA: You are talking about refugees. People who are fleeing the most awful situations that push them from their homes. And then they end up somewhere, by what you’re saying sounds like actually even worse. For their mental health, the actual situation for them and the hopelessness is worse than the conflicts they are fleeing, in some cases.  

ANNA: That’s absolutely true. And a kind of measuring of how bad it is, is the fact that dozens and probably hundreds of people, did go back to their country of origin because that was the only way they could leave. That was the only option. You know you can stay on for as far as we know it the rest of your life or you can go back to Syria or Myanmar or Sri Lanka and die there. And lots of people chose to leave.  They would rather face that than this kind of endless hopelessness of Nauru. 

ANYA: Some of the most difficult interviews to organise were with the social workers, partially because they faced enormous risks talking to me. And there would just a few who agreed but of course their testimonies were incredibly valuable. They’ve been working there for several years and they could really put all of these individual stories that I collected in context and the nightmare that they were living through, responding to emergency calls about suicides every other night. But of course organising this interview really felt like being in a cheap spy movie. Again, it was just so bizarre. These were Australian women. I was not meeting some, you know, dissidents in China. I was not meeting with Syrian opposition figures, right. I was meeting with Australian young women who signed up to do some social work for refugees. And this was the insanity of the situation. 

It was in the middle of the night. They call me and they said ‘you ready…. so in about 7 minutes you leave your hotel room and you’ll see in the corridor that woman and you just follow her and she’ll take you to where we meet.’  It was dark and we went out of the hotel, through these dump sites and abandoned buildings, and up and down some stairs. And stray dogs barking at night and mosquitoes eating you alive. Ultimately, I think it was somewhat closer to the ocean where there was an abandoned building so we climb on this roof. Two other women were there and I spoke to them quite a while and took notes and the interview ended actually when I got a text message from one of the witnesses that I met earlier, who said ‘listen we think you need to wrap everything up because the police was asking about you and we don’t think they know exactly who you are and where you are but you might be careful’. At that point I said ‘why don’t we wrap it up’ and basically everything stopped and they just disappeared in the night. And that was it. 

The social workers shared with me some of their procedures which was very important for us. Some of the internal documents about how they are supposed to report the incident and things like that. And many of these emails were with Australian Immigration Service and for us that was a critical piece of information to prove that they are actually very well aware of everything that’s happening on the island. And then of course you know, what I was doing everyday was photographing my notes and typing them up, uploading all the videos, the photos, the documents.  And my last night with Wajeed – my driver and fixer -I was like to ‘take me somewhere where I can burn them.’ 

I don’t know if you remember the movie Argo about this operation in Iran and there is a moment there that I just cannot watch. It just gets my heart rate so high where they go through the airport on the way out and they go through the passport control first. People looking at their passports very closely and then finally they get on the plane and as they are sitting on the plane thinking that it’s over, there is this military truck driving up the plane. And in some ways Nauru was the same. So, it’s really until the plane takes off, you cannot really breathe out.  That does get your heart pumping. 

TANYA: With the information gathered, it was Anna Shea’s job to pull it together into a report. 

ANNA: When I got Anya’s notes, they were just so detailed and so horrific that I could almost not even bring myself to read them. They were just so awful.  I was like ‘I need to turn this into a report. We need to do something about this. How am I going to make myself sit here and read this horror?’

TANYA: The report called Island of Despair was published in October 2016 . The Australian government responded aggressively. 

ANYA: They completely refused to both acknowledge what is going on there and take responsibility. And that was despite not just our findings but, you know, also the findings of their own parliamentary commission and you know lots of local organisations. And they were very upset that in the report we compared the situation to torture and we did very detailed analysis basically explaining why. Because Amnesty doesn’t use the word ‘torture’ easily and lightly and they knew it and for them that was kind of the knife in the heart.  They really have not been criticised in those exact terms before and this is something they were not comfortable with. 

ANNA: Part of the reason that this policy is so dangerous is that it sets the bar so low and I think Australia has kind of been leading the pack on that. And the United States recently has really followed suit with this detention and separation of children from their families. I mean, to treat young people and babies and infants in this way is completely unconscionable. 

TANYA: What do you think has been impact of this research? Do you feel like we have been changing people’s views? Have we shifted the debate in Australia? Is there an end in sight to this kind of horrific treatment of people? 

ANNA: I think it’ll be a while yet but people are being taken off Nauru. Some of them are going to the United States under a deal – surprisingly – that Australia and the previous government had made. Some are in Australia. They were moved there for medical transfers but haven’t been sent back. There is a movement in Australia, of public opinion against this,  that people see that is wrong. We have to give credit to the huge amounts of civil society organisations and religious groups and teachers unions who have been working from day one to end it. But a lot of these groups don’t have the resources to send researchers to write these kinds of detailed reports. So, I know that our research has been really useful. 

ANYA: You know what really warms my heart. I am very closely in touch with my Wajeed, my fixer. He moved to the US last June. It was one of the best days of my life. I was so happy for him. I’ll never forget it’s the last night I was in Nauru, he invited me over to their container settlement and there is a full-scale Pakistani feast. There are six or seven men, who I’d met before, who prepared this incredible meal. I was in tears. It was incredible that they did this. I have no idea how they made it possible. There is really not much food on Nauru. It’s not like people are starving but how they got the spices, how they prepared this I have no idea. But it was wonderful. and then we went to Wajeed’s room and he said ‘I need to give you a gift’ and he literally like looked around this room where there is absolutely nothing clearly trying to search for something like his pants on hook or whatever t-shirt. And so, he found a book, a cheap detective novel.  I cherish this book so much because, for me, it’s just the ultimate expression of why we do this work. When people have nothing, give you something that’s precious. And people always ask me ‘how how do you cope with that? You go to all of these horrendous places. You talk to people who have gone through so much trauma and you see you piles of bodies and and people who went through all this,’ and I always say that this is not what I bring back. Personally, in my heart what I bring back is this, time after time, incredible lessons in courage and resilience and strength of human spirit in the most trying circumstances. And I feel so lucky and privileged and honoured to have that. In the face of enormous suffering and injustice, people do have this capacity to remain human, to care for each other, to find incredible strength in themselves to carry on. To fight for justice for themselves, for others, or even just to live.

TANYA: Amnesty is calling on Australia to close its camp on Nauru and bring all the refugees to safety. 

If you’d like to join our campaign go to Amnesty.org

Amnesty’s Witness is hosted by me, Tanya O’Carroll. This episode was produced by Cathy FitzGerald with original music by Stephen Coates.

The post Witness by Amnesty International: Episode 2 – Pleasant Island appeared first on Amnesty International.

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit young people hard, disrupting education, putting their jobs at risk and making their futures uncertain.

But young people have also been some of the most active in responding to the pandemic and campaigning for human rights. Seven young activists, from Malaysia, Afghanistan, Senegal, Poland, Australia and Kyrgyzstan, told Amnesty about the amazing initiatives they set up or are involved in to support their communities.

DEFENDING WOMEN’S RIGHTS

In Poland, Sandra Grzelaszyk, 20, has been campaigning for women’s rights, in particular their right to access abortion. Poland already has some of the strictest abortion laws in Europe, and earlier this year a bill was brought before parliament which would ban abortion in cases of severe and fatal foetal impairments. Unable to protest in the streets because of the lockdown, Sandra and her fellow campaigners moved their activism online. They posted pictures and videos inviting people to make their voices heard by signing Amnesty International Poland’s petition to stop the bill becoming law. So far more than 80,000 people have signed the petition.

“Leaders are using the pandemic to increase their power or change the law. We were really angry that the government could do something like this during a really hard time for everyone, without them having the opportunity to protest their objections. The choice to have an abortion is an individual choice every time. Only the woman herself can know what decision is best for her. I don’t think the foetus is more important than the life of a woman. People can have different plans for their life, not everybody wants family and children and that’s okay. I see people who want to control women’s bodies, but women are not property. I am a woman and I just want to live my life without fear or being controlled just because of my gender.”

DISTRIBUTING FACE MASKS

In Senegal, Mamadou Diagne, 25, has been distributing face masks to some of the people most exposed to the risk of COVID-19 and to try to slow down the spread of the virus. So far, he and his fellow volunteers have distributed 1,000 masks to market traders, who must wear face coverings and use hand sanitizer under rules set by the mayor. The masks themselves were donated by a former Amnesty activist now living in the Netherlands.

“People are happy to receive these masks because it hasn’t been possible for everyone to get hold of them. The traders are in contact with people all day long, so they are more exposed than others. If they catch the virus, they can spread it very quickly. We also want to distribute masks to beggars and talibés (children who are forced to beg by Qur’anic school teachers). They are vulnerable because like traders, they are in contact with people all day. Fighting this pandemic is not easy. People have a fear of this coronavirus. If they hear a rumour that this person or that person has COVID-19, they are stigmatized and the infected person is shamed.”

FIGHTING XENOPHOBIA

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In Malaysia, Heidy Quah, the 26-year-old founder of Refuge for the Refugees, has been helping some of the most marginalised people in society. Heidy’s NGO provides schooling to refugee children, but during the pandemic she has adapted to meet the needs of refugee families. Heidy has been distributing essentials such as rice, eggs and milk powder to refugee families who have been hit hard by the “movement control order” which was introduced to stop the spread of COVID-19.

Heidy has also been speaking out about the Malaysian government’s treatment of refugees during the crisis. On the pretext of fighting COVID-19, the government has rounded up thousands of undocumented migrants, including children, and put them in detention centres. Heidy’s Facebook posts denouncing the deplorable conditions in these centres have resulted in death threats, online harassment and questioning by the police – but she is determined to use her voice. Her right and the right of other activists like her to freedom of expression has been defended by Amnesty.

“The mass arrests led to overcrowding in detention centres. Because of overcrowding, we saw a spike in cases in detention centres. We’ve seen a big spike in numbers of COVID-19 cases in detention centres, and because of the cramped environment, it spreads like wildfire. We’ve heard stories of babies being born in detention centres, and upon birth, they are declared COVID-19 positive. This is how dire the situation is right now. I really cannot imagine what it’s like to have to be worried sick for my safety. My frustration is why do we need to treat other human beings in such a nasty way? How would I want to be treated if one day I get detained? What would I want the communities around me to do? What can I do with the privilege I have? It isn’t about having a fancy house, big fancy cars and holidays. What it really is, is having a voice. And having my voice counted for.”

BRINGING BOOKS TO CHILDREN

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In Afghanistan, 19-year-old Mohib Faizy, an Information Technology student at the American University of Afghanistan, has been bringing books to hundreds of children who would not otherwise be able to access them. Using a video recording tool, Mohib has recorded himself reading children’s books that contain powerful messages about humanity. The videos are then posted on the Facebook page of LEARN, an NGO that focuses on providing quality education to Afghan children, and are also sent on flash drives to teachers and children across the country.

“My friend Pashtana Durrani, who is an Amnesty activist, shared a site with me which contains many Pashto and Dari books for children. I chose only those that were really useful and had a great message for children. I always read the book before I record it. In many districts, children do not have access to schools. We are creating schools for them. Our plan is to eventually distribute tablets preloaded with these books to help needy students who have shown their eagerness to learn and get an education. I always wanted to improve my society, so is a great chance for me to serve my people.”

USING ART TO SUPPORT MARGINALISED VOICES

In Australia, 21-year-old Fin Spalding, a member of Amnesty Australia’s National Youth Advisory Group and one of its national LGBTI leaders, is developing an online “Artivism” campaign, combining art and activism in support of LGBTI people. The campaign will showcase works of art by LGBTI people on the theme of visibility. Not only will the campaign provide an avenue for people to express themselves, but it also aims to highlight the plight of individuals who are at risk simply for who they are. The campaign will be launched on Instagram in August.

“It is a well-known fact that the queer community has used art in order to express ourselves and we as a community have pushed the boundaries on what art is. This campaign is about visibility in the COVID-19 pandemic and shining a light on Queer people within Australian society. But while this campaign will also bring light to the discrimination that the Queer community faces, it will also work to shed light on the artistic talent which is in the Queer community such as drag artists, fashion and make-up.”

HELPING LGBTI PEOPLE QUARANTINING IN UNSAFE SPACES

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In Kyrgyzstan, Farkhad Musazov, 24, has been involved in supporting LGBTI youth who are quarantining in unsafe spaces, which can include their family homes. Through his organization, Kyrgyz Indigo, Farkhad has helped LGBTI youth in need of psychologists, advocates and lawyers by making their contact details available online. Kyrgyz Indigo, one of Amnesty’s partners in its annual Write for Rights campaign, also provides humanitarian aid and a safe space in five temporary shelters for LGBTI people, including activists. It has also teamed up with another organization, Labrys, to distribute food, personal hygiene products and protective equipment such as medical gloves and masks to hundreds of LGBTI people in the country.

“Many LGBT+ who have lost their jobs and income during the pandemic have been forced to return to their families. But they are finding it difficult to express themselves. Their families want to control their behaviour and speech. In addition, the older generation are mostly very conservative and religious which means LGBT+ can face a lot of tension and hostility at home. Many suffer domestic violence at the hands of their families and have nowhere to turn to.”

ENSURING NO ONE IS LEFT BEHIND

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As a refugee from Syria, 20-year-old student Hasan Al-Akraa understands the difficulties that refugees face better than most. Even in normal times, it can be a challenge for refugees to put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads, but COVID-19 has made life even more precarious. Hasan recently linked up with Amnesty to share his experiences of being one of many youth activists supporting migrants and refugees. Through his Al-Hasan Volunteer Network, he has been providing food parcels to refugee families in Malaysia where he now lives. He has also been crowdfunding to pay hospital fees and rent for struggling refugees, in particular, single mothers, orphans, the sick and families with six or seven mouths to feed. He does it because he can’t ignore the suffering around him.

“During the movement control order (MCO), everyone was struggling, not just refugees. Malaysians too. But we need to understand that those who were struggling even before MCO, now it’s like a double struggle. We cannot just forget about them. That includes refugees, low-income families, the PPR (People’s Housing Project) families. We don’t want to see families in the streets. We don’t want to see children living in the streets, somebody in a hospital waiting to deliver a baby but not being accepted in the wards, we don’t want to see someone die, or their health conditions get worse without us stepping in. We don’t want to see anyone going to bed hungry – that is a hard no for us. It’s very important for us to help. Anybody who comes forward, we help.”

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Last week saw an exception to the rule. One boat, carrying hundreds of people, approached Malaysia’s shores. Unusually, it wasn’t turned away. “Deportation was not conducted,” the authorities explained, “as the boat was damaged.” They added that a woman’s dead body was found on board, and that 269 people were placed in detention.

As boats remain stranded yet again, it appears governments in the region have learned nothing.

Hundreds more Rohingya people are believed to be adrift on cramped fishing boats between the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea, trying and failing to find a welcoming shore and a safe country. Their ordeal, starved of food and water, has lasted months and shows no sign of ending. Despite acknowledging that most of the people it rescued last week could barely walk, Malaysia has since pushed another boat back.

The Bali Process’ deadly silence

Leaders could have convened an urgent meeting under a regional mechanism called the Bali Process, co-chaired by Australia and Indonesia, and taken life-saving action accordingly. But months later, Bali Process members are still only discussing whether they even want a formal meeting.

At a time when regional cooperation is needed more than ever, the treatment of these women, men and children is an abject failure. Again and again, governments invoke COVID-19 as a reason for aggressively warding off the boats from their coasts back into desolate open waters. In doing so, they are claiming that a life-threatening pandemic justifies leaving hundreds more to die.

Like COVID-19, the issue of Rohingya people seeking safety requires effective and decisive regional cooperation. It does not make sense to tackle one crisis at the other’s expense. And like COVID-19, there is nothing to gain by ignoring the calls for help, or wishing the problem away: it will only put more lives at risk. By failing to help, governments are also undermining the bedrock of international cooperation: their obligations under international law, including the search and rescue of those in distress at sea, and protecting the human rights of refugees arriving on their shores.

Then came the 2015 crisis and the pledges of “never again”.

Today regional governments are handling the emergency in different ways, but all of them are inhumane.

Rohingya people continue to flee violence and persecution from their homes in Myanmar, as well as from the hardships of refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh. In recent weeks, the boats have tried to reach Malaysia and were also spotted off the coasts of Thailand.

In previous years, thousands more Rohingya people attempted similar journeys, some travelling even further to Indonesia, India and Australia.

Then came the 2015 crisis and the pledges of “never again”.

Today regional governments are handling the emergency in different ways, but all of them are inhumane.

After the 2015 tragedy, cruelty persists

After rescuing a previous vessel in early April, Malaysia boasted about its military efforts to push more boats away. Indonesia has paraded its border patrol ships and helicopters, threatening the same cruel push-back to any boat that enters their waters. Both cited COVID-19, among other concerns, to justify their actions.  Australia and Thailand are staying largely silent.

Nothing is known about conditions on the boats. Relatives are without news: cell phones are out of reach, and long out of battery.

Bangladesh, meanwhile, already hosts nearly one million Rohingya people in its refugee camps along the Myanmar border. The Bangladesh government has done the most in recent weeks to rescue returning survivors – but it has indicated that any further arrivals may be towed to Bhasan Char, a remote silt island, which the UN has yet to deem habitable. Any experiment which involves keeping refugees on the island away from families – as well as humanitarian and protection services – could amount to arbitrary detention.

Repeated, urgent calls for search and rescue operations, most recently from the former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, are going unheeded.

Nothing is known about conditions on the boats. Relatives are without news: cell phones are out of reach, and long out of battery.

All that we know comes from the testimonies of those who recently survived such journeys. And what they tell us is this: for many, the rescue came too late.

One woman said she witnessed more than 50 people die on a ship of nearly 400 people she was stranded on for months. Traffickers, she says, ran both engines to try to conceal the sound of splashing water when bodies were thrown into the sea.

A humane, regional response to Rohingya suffering

As the world envisions a ‘new normal’ after COVID-19, a crucial test will be how to better protect the most marginalised in our societies. The treatment of the Rohingya is one such test.

But right now, the pandemic response is putting many of them in greater danger – and not just for those stranded at sea.

Policies on immigration detention – which have targeted Rohingya – continue to endanger their health and lives in overcrowded detention centres in Malaysia and Thailand, where they face an acute risk of contracting COVID-19. Those in Bangladesh’s refugee camps are also singularly at risk of infection.

The persistent suffering of the Rohingya is not an issue that can be resolved overnight: but it is one the region can address humanely together.

Meanwhile Myanmar continues to deny the Rohingya people justice for crimes against humanity its military have committed against them, and continues to impose apartheid conditions on the Rohingya remaining in Myanmar. Many of them are denied healthcare, all while the pandemic rages.

The persistent suffering of the Rohingya is not an issue that can be resolved overnight: but it is one the region can address humanely together.

Regional governments can begin by triggering the urgently awaited dialogue under the Bali Process and agree ways to save those stranded at sea, as well as those who attempt these dangerous boat journeys in future.

Perhaps even the sliver of good news at the start of this piece might turn out to be an illusion: in the past couple of days, media reported that the Malaysian authorities were considering floating that boat and its 269 survivors back out to sea.

This would be a heinous move, which would breach the most basic tenets of international law and shows with ever-increasing urgency why a regional dialogue is necessary. If COVID-19 can teach the region – and its leaders – anything about cooperation and solidarity, it is that none of us are safe until everyone is safe.

Usman Hamid is the Director of Amnesty International Indonesia

Sam Klintworth is the Director of Amnesty International Australia

A version of this article originally appeared in Nikkei Asian Review.

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Political activists, human rights defenders, and others imprisoned solely for peacefully exercising their rights – must be immediately and unconditionally released

While the move is welcomed, it must be extended to all prisoners of conscience. Hundreds of people are behind bars for simply exercising their rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. Now they are also faced with an unprecedented and unacceptable risk to their health 

“All prisoners of conscience (PoC) – political activists, human rights defenders, and others imprisoned solely for peacefully exercising their rights – must be immediately and unconditionally released,” Amnesty International Indonesia director, Usman Hamid, said.

“That includes the release of 57 PoCs from Papua. Freedom of expression and assembly they exercised are rights protected in our Constitution and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Criminally charging someone for his or her peaceful expression is a blatant violation to these constitutional rights.

“Indonesian authorities must be able to distinguish people who peacefully advocate for the right to self-determination from those who use force or use expressions that incite discrimination, hostility or violence. Their expression is part of the rights to freedom of thought in the community.”

In the time of this pandemic, the authorities should also re-examine the cases of all prisoners in pre-trial detention with a view to releasing them. According to international human rights law and standards, there is a presumption of release pending trial, in accordance with the presumption of innocence and right to liberty. This entails the release of MG, an alleged minor from Papua, accused of the killing of construction workers and currently stands trial in Jakarta.

“Detention against him should be suspended. The judges should determine his fate by immediately declaring the result of a legitimate forensic test upon his age. His right to health must not be denied,” Hamid said.

The Indonesian authorities should also consider an early or conditional release of prisoners at high risk, such as older prisoners or those with serious medical conditions.

“As outlined by the World Health Organization, they are vulnerable communities to COVID-19. In the name of humanity, they must be released.”

Prisoners and detainees, including ten thousand people arbitrarily detained, are at risk of contracting COVID-19 as they are held under unhygienic conditions in locations across the country.

“In Indonesian prisons and detention centres, the conditions of lacking access to clean water and severe overcrowding will be exacerbated by the outbreak.”

The Indonesian authorities must therefore cooperate with the hospitals to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the country’s prisons and detention centres.

“Indonesia has a long record of denying prisoners and detainees’ medical care and medicines, something they urgently need. Anyone detained must have access to prevention and treatment services as the COVID-19 pandemic threatens lives,” Hamid said.

The authorities should ensure that all prisoners have prompt access to medical attention and health care to the same standards that are available in the community, including when it comes to testing, prevention and treatment of COVID-19. Prison staff and health care workers should have access to adequate information, equipment, training and support to protect themselves.

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January 

Legal abortion services were finally available to women in Ireland, following an historic referendum in May 2018 that marked a huge victory for women’s rights. It was the result of years of dedicated work by activists, including Amnesty International, to encourage a powerful conversation that helped catalyse the abortion debate in Ireland. This ultimately led to greater protection for those people who need an abortion there, and paved the way for the same inspiring progress in Northern Ireland later in the year.

©Amnesty International / Marianne Bertrand

As a tribute to Julián Carrillo, an environmental rights defender killed in October 2018, we launched Caught between bullets and neglect, a digest on Mexico’s failure to protect environmental human rights defenders. Just a few hours after the launch, two suspects in Julián’s murder were arrested, showing the immediate impact Amnesty’s work can have on justice.

The Angolan Parliament approved a revision of the Criminal Code to remove a provision widely interpreted as criminalizing same-sex relationships. They even took a step further, by criminalizing discrimination against people based on sexual orientation – the first country in 2019 to make this move, and a hearteningly radical move for an African nation.

February

After spending 76 days in detention in Thailand, refugee footballer Hakeem al-Araibi was able to return to his home in Melbourne on 12 February. The Bahrain-born footballer had been detained upon arrival in Bangkok on 27 November 2018, due to an erroneous Interpol red notice, and faced the threat of extradition to Bahrain. A campaign launched by Amnesty and other groups to free the footballer, who is a peaceful and outspoken critic of the Bahraini authorities, grew into the #SaveHakeem movement. The campaign spanned three continents, engaging footballers, Olympians and celebrities, and drawing the support of more than 165,000 people.

Following international attention and campaigning by Amnesty, Saudi authorities overturned a call by the Public Prosecution to execute Saudi woman activist Israa al-Ghomgham for charges related to her peaceful participation in protests. Israa al-Ghomgham still faces a prison term, and Amnesty continues to campaign for her immediate and unconditional release.  

March

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In Ukraine, an International Women’s Day rally organized by human rights defender Vitalina Koval in Uzhgorod, western Ukraine, went ahead peacefully, with participants protected by police. The event marked a major change for the region, after similar rallies organised by Koval in previous years had been targeted by far-right groups, with police singularly failing to protect participants from violence.

AFRICOM admitted for the first time that its air strikes have killed or injured civilians in Somalia, after the release of Amnesty’s investigation The Hidden US War in Somalia: Civilian Casualties from Air Strikes in Lower Shabelle. Following this report, US military documents came to light confirming that the US authorities knew of further allegations of civilian casualties resulting from many of their air strikes in Somalia.

©Amnesty International

Gulzar Duishenova had been championing disability rights in her country Kyrgyzstan for years. In March 2019, her persistence paid off when Kyrgyzstan finally signed up to the Disability Rights Convention. Amnesty supporters wrote nearly a quarter of a million messages backing her.

And in Iraq, just days after Amnesty and other NGOs raised the alarm about a draft cybercrime law that would seriously undermine freedom of expression there, the Iraqi parliament chose to withdraw the bill, confirming to Amnesty that its “concerns have been heard”.

April

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In April, love triumphed when a ban on all LGBTI events in Ankara, Turkey, was lifted by the administrative appeals court. “This is a momentous day for LGBTI people in Turkey, and a huge victory for the LGBTI rights activists – love has won once again,” said Fotis Filippou, Campaigns Director for Europe at Amnesty International.

The District Court of The Hague issued an interim ruling in favour of Esther Kiobel and three other women who took on one of the world’s biggest oil companies, Shell, in a fight for justice. Esther has pursued the company for more than 20 years over the role she says it played in the arbitrary execution of her husband in Nigeria. Amnesty has shared over 30,000 solidarity messages with Esther Kiobel, and is supporting her Kiobel vs Shell case in The Hague. As a result of this hearing, the court in October 2019 heard for the first time the accounts of individuals who accuse Shell of offering them bribes to give fake testimonies that led to the ‘Ogoni Nine’ – who included Esther Kiobel’s husband – being sentenced to death and executed.  

President of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang Nguema, announced that his government would introduce legislation to abolish the death penalty.

May

Taiwan became the first in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage after passing an historic law on 17 May, with the first same-sex weddings taking place on 24 May. Together with LGBTI rights groups from Taiwan, Amnesty had campaigned for this outcome for many years. We are now working to end all discrimination against LGBTI people in Taiwan.

Qatar promised more reforms to its labour laws ahead of the 2022 World Cup. Human rights pressure also played a role in FIFA’s decision to abandon plans to expand the 2022 Qatar World Cup to 48 teams, which would have involved adding new host countries in the region. Amnesty worked together with a coalition of NGOs, trade unions, fans and player groups, calling attention to the human rights risks of the expansion, including the plight of migrant workers building new infrastructure.

June

© Eric de Mildt

Climate change activist Greta Thunberg and the Fridays for Future movement of schoolchildren were honoured with Amnesty International’s Ambassador of Conscience Award 2019. The Fridays for Future movement was started by Greta, a teenager from Sweden who in August 2018 decided to miss school every Friday and instead protest outside the Swedish parliament, until it took more serious action to tackle climate change.

In a long overdue move, Greece passed legislation to recognize that sex without consent is rape, and Denmark’s government committed to doing the same. This development is testament to the persistence and bravery of survivors and campaigners for many years, and creates real momentum across Europe following 2018 Amnesty’s review of outdated legislation in 31 European countries and other barriers to accessing justice for rape survivors.

From 1 June 2019, contraceptives and family planning clinic consultations became free of charge in Burkina Faso. The change was seen as a response to our 2015 My Body My Rights petition and human rights manifesto calling for these measures to be put in place. With financial barriers removed, women in Burkina Faso now have better access to birth control, and more choice over what happens to their bodies.

July

© Brendan Harkin/Love Equality

In a momentous and inspiring day for human rights campaigners, the UK parliament voted through a landmark bill on 22 July to legalize same sex marriage in Northern Ireland. The bill also forced the UK government to legislate for abortion reform in Northern Ireland, including decriminalization on the basis that a Northern Ireland Executive (government of NI) did not return in three months.

Also in July, in a US Congressional hearing, a senior Google executive gave the clearest confirmation yet that the company has “terminated” Project Dragonfly, its secretive programme to develop a search engine that would facilitate the Chinese government’s repressive surveillance and censorship of the internet. This followed Amnesty’s #DropDragonfly campaign, and hundreds of Google staff speaking out.

On 22 July, 70-year-old human rights defender and prominent Palestinian Bedouin leader Sheikh Sayyah Abu Mdeighim al-Turi was released from prison in Israel, after spending seven months in detention for his role in advocating for the protection of Bedouins’ rights and land. Sheikh Sayyah thanked Amnesty International and all those who took action on his behalf: “I thank you all very much for standing up for the right of my people and the protection of our land. While I was in prison, I felt and heard your support loud and clear, and it meant the world to me.”

August

Mauritanian blogger Mohamed Mkhaïtir, who was sentenced to death and held in arbitrary detention for more than five years after publishing a blog on caste discrimination, finally walked free.

Amnesty International

In August, Saudi Arabia announced major reforms easing some of the major restrictions imposed on women under its repressive male guardianship system, including allowing them the right to obtain a passport which should make it possible for them to travel without permission from a male guardian. The changes also grant women in Saudi Arabia the right to register marriages, divorces, births and deaths and to obtain family records. While we welcome these changes, people campaigning for women’s rights remain in prison, and we must do all we can to fight for their freedom.

September

© Ede Istvan Judt

Syrian national Ahmed H. was finally allowed to return home, after being imprisoned and then held in immigration detention in Hungary for more than four years. He had been arrested on terrorism charges after being caught up in clashes on the Hungarian border. At the time he was helping his elderly parents, who were escaping Syria and were crossing into Hungary as refugees. An amazing 24,000 people joined the #BringAhmedHome campaign, calling on Cyprus to allow Ahmed to return to his family.

A court in Tunis acquitted 18-year-old activist Maissa al-Oueslati, after she faced trumped-up charges that could have resulted in her imprisonment for up to four years. Maissa and her 16-year-old brother had been arbitrarily detained by police earlier in the month for filming a protester threatening to set himself on fire in front of a police station.

October

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At midnight on Tuesday 22 October 2019, after a last-minute effort by the DUP to overturn the bill, same sex marriage became legal in Northern Ireland, while abortion was decriminalised. All criminal proceedings were dropped, including those against a mother who faced prosecution for buying her 15 year-old daughter abortion pills online.

Grainne Teggart, Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland Campaign Manager, said it was the beginning of a new era for Northern Ireland, in which the nation was freed from oppressive laws that police people’s bodies and healthcare. “Finally, our human rights are being brought into the 21st century. This will end the suffering of so many people. We can now look forward to a more equal and compassionate future with our choices respected.”

November

©LightRocket via Getty Images

Kurdish-Iranian award-winning journalist and refugee Behrouz Boochani arrived in New Zealand to attend a special WORD Christchurch event on a visitor’s visa sponsored by Amnesty International. It was the first time Boochani, known for his work reporting on human rights abuses from within the Australian government’s refugee detention centres, had set foot outside Papua New Guinea since he was detained on the country’s Manus Island in 2014.

©Amnesty International

Humanitarian volunteer Dr Scott Warren was found not guilty by a court in Arizona of charges linked to helping migrants on the US-Mexico border. In a similar case, Pierre Mumber, a French mountain guide who gave hot tea and warm clothes to four West African asylum seekers in the Alps, and was acquitted of “facilitating irregular entry”.

December

Alberto Fernández is inaugurated as President of Argentina on 10 December. As president-elect, Fernández announced he would push for the legalization of abortion as soon as he took office, saying: “It is a public health issue that we must solve.”

The Philippines’ Commission on Human Rights said that 47 major fossil fuel and carbon-polluting companies could be held accountable for violating the rights of its citizens for the damage caused by climate change. The landmark decision paves the way for further litigation, and even criminal investigations, that could see fossil fuel companies and other major polluters either forced to pay damages, or their officials sent to jail for harms linked to climate change.

The regional Economic Community of West African States’ (ECOWAS) Court of Justice rejected a 2015 ban imposed by the government of Sierra Leone preventing pregnant girls from sitting exams and attending mainstream school – and ordered the policy to be revoked with immediate effect.

The post In a dangerous world, human rights activists have been winning all year appeared first on Amnesty International.

This is a wake-up call to world leaders that they must take far more decisive action to tackle the climate emergency or risk betraying younger generations further.

Kumi Naidoo

Climate change is one of the most important issues facing the world, according to a major new survey of young people published by Amnesty International today to mark Human Rights Day.

With the findings published as governments meet in Spain for the UN Climate Change Conference, the organization warns that world leaders’ failure to address the climate change crisis has left them out of step with young people.

“In this year when young people mobilised in huge numbers for the climate, it can be no surprise that many of those surveyed saw it as one of the most important issues facing the world,” said Kumi Naidoo, Secretary General of Amnesty International. 

“For young people the climate crisis is one of the defining challenges of their age. This is a wake-up call to world leaders that they must take far more decisive action to tackle the climate emergency or risk betraying younger generations further.”

Ipsos MORI, on behalf of Amnesty International, questioned more than 10,000 people aged 18-25-year olds—also known as Generation Z—in 22 countries for the “Future of humanity” survey.

They were asked for their opinions on the current state of human rights in their country and the world, which issues they feel are most important and who they feel is responsible for addressing human rights abuses.

Respondents were asked to pick up to five issues from a list of 23 major issues facing the world. In total, 41% of respondents said climate change was one of the most important issues facing the world, making it the most commonly cited globally, followed by 36% who chose pollution and 31% who selected terrorism.

As we mark Human Rights Day, we need to recognise that the climate crisis will arguably be the defining issue for younger generations.

Kumi Naidoo

Global warming was also most commonly cited as one of the most important environmental issues facing the world (57%), out of 10 environmental issues such as ocean pollution, air pollution and deforestation.

“As we mark Human Rights Day, we need to recognise that the climate crisis will arguably be the defining issue for younger generations. The right to a healthy environment, including a safe climate, is essential for the enjoyment of so many other rights. It is a right that young people today have been forced to take the lead in asserting,” said Kumi Naidoo.

Generation Z “living inside a failed system”

The climate crisis, pollution, corruption and poor living standards are all windows on an alarming truth about how the powerful have exploited their power for selfish and often short-term gain.

Kumi Naidoo

However, the survey’s findings extend well beyond the climate crisis, reflecting the everyday struggles and concerns facing Generation Z in their own countries.

At a national level corruption was most commonly cited as one of the most important issues (36%), followed by economic instability (26%), pollution (26%), income inequality (25%), climate change (22%) and violence against women (21%).

“This generation lives in a world of widening inequality, economic instability and austerity where vast numbers of people have been left behind,” said Kumi Naidoo.

“Faced with all this, the message from young people is clear. We are living inside a failed system. The climate crisis, pollution, corruption and poor living standards are all windows on an alarming truth about how the powerful have exploited their power for selfish and often short-term gain.”

The survey’s findings come at a time of widespread mass protests around the world, from Algeria to Chile, Hong Kong, Iran, Lebanon, and Sudan. Many of these movements have been largely led by young people and students, who have angrily called out corruption, inequality, and abuse of power and faced violent repression for doing so.

“Amnesty International believes that young people want to see systemic transformations. They want a reckoning with the climate emergency, with the abuse of power. They want to see a completely different future blossoming instead of the wreckage that we are heading towards,” said Kumi Naidoo.

Call for system change built on human rights

If the events of 2019 teach us anything, it is that younger generations deserve a seat at the table when it comes to decisions about them.

Kumi Naidoo

Alongside climate change, a clear majority of young people value human rights in general and want to see their governments take most responsibility to protect them, according to the findings of the “Future of humanity” survey.

The majority of survey respondents agreed that:

• the protection of human rights is fundamental to the future of the countries tested (73% agree vs 11% disagree);
• governments should take the wellbeing of their citizens more seriously than economic growth (63% agree vs 13% disagree); and
• human rights must be protected, even if it has a negative impact on the economy (60% agree vs 15% disagree).

The findings also revealed an unequivocal belief among many young people across every country surveyed that governments should take most responsibility for ensuring human rights are upheld, with 73% of respondents in total picking governments over individuals (15%), businesses (6%) and charities (4%).

Coupled with the results that show that most young people believe voting in elections is an effective method for initiating human rights change, over and above going on strike or attending a protest, the results were not all bad news for leaders who are “willing to listen”.   

“If the leaders of the world are willing to listen carefully, they will notice that Generation Z are not asking for small tweaks. Young people are looking for fundamental changes in the way the world works. If leaders fail to take that seriously, they risk betraying a generation,” said Kumi Naidoo.  

“If the events of 2019 teach us anything, it is that younger generations deserve a seat at the table when it comes to decisions about them. Unless the voices of those on the frontlines are part of the discussion on how we tackle the challenges facing humanity, the crises we are witnessing in the world will only get worse.

“Above all, governments must begin the new decade with meaningful action to address the climate emergency, reduce inequality and put in place genuine reforms to end abuses of power. We need systemic changes, built on human-rights, to the economic and political systems that have brought us to the brink.”

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