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Human Rights

Defending Humanity

September 20, 2024 Patrick Lawrence, Consortium News. , , , , , , , ,
Anyone taking up the question of our shared humanity in the late summer of 2024 must begin with mention of the Gaza crisis, or — with the escalating violence in the West Bank — the wider Palestine crisis. These events are of world-historical magnitude. They challenge any idea of humanity we may have until now held as truths held to be self-evident, as we Americans would say. That seems to be over now. It is as if an era in the human story has ended, and we enter upon one that requires us to think again, maybe for the first time since the 1945 victories, when those who came before us looked back upon the wreckage of the 1930s and 1940s and asked, “Where is our humanity?”

Legal Experts Push Biden To Drop ‘Punitive And Deadly’ Sanctions

September 13, 2024 Brett Wilkins, AFJG. , , ,
As human rights defenders on August 12th marked the 75th anniversary of the Fourth Geneva Convention and its prohibition of collective punishment, hundreds of legal experts and groups urged the global community—and the United States government in particular—”to comply with international law by ending the use of broad, unilateral coercive measures that extensively harm civilian populations.” In a letter to U.S. President Joe Biden, the jurists and legal groups wrote that “75 years ago, in the aftermath of one of the most destructive conflicts in human history, nations of the world came together in Geneva, Switzerland, to establish clear legal limits on the treatment of noncombatants in times of war.”

Takeover! A Human Rights Approach To Housing

September 13, 2024 Ann Garrison, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
Cheri Honkala and the Poor People’s Army, also known as the Poor People’s Campaign for Economic Human Rights, produced their book about how to take over abandoned federal properties. In the City of Philadelphia, where the Poor People’s Army is based, scholar Elsa Noterman reports that there are 10 abandoned properties for every single homeless person. Nevertheless, the wait times to receive public housing are years long. Their neighborhood, Kensington, has been devastated by factory closures since the passage of NAFTA. “Call to Movement: The Politics of Love,” the first section of the introduction to TAKEOVER!, is inspiring, heartrending and, like the rest of the book, beautifully written.

‘Gross Human Rights Violations’ At ICE Detention Center

September 10, 2024 Joe Piette, Workers' World. , , , , , ,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - When immigrants are picked up from their communities and eventually detained at Moshannon Valley Processing Center, Pennsylvania’s largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center, they are forced to endure “punitive, inhumane and dangerous conditions.” The charge of “widespread human rights violations” was made in a report by the Stephen and Sandra Sheller Center for Social Justice, with support from the Pennsylvania American Civil Liberties Union. Entitled “In the Shadow of the Valley: The Unnecessary Confinement and Dehumanizing Conditions of People in Immigration Detention at Moshannon Valley Processing Center,” the report was released at a press conference at Temple University Beasley School of Law on Sept. 4.

The Crisis In Afghanistan Is A Result Of US Recklessness

September 7, 2024 Abdul Rahman, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
The third anniversary of the end of the two decades of US war and occupation in Afghanistan coincides with a particularly contentious presidential election year in the US. Both the Democrats and Republicans are busy blaming each other for the fiasco. It is clear that Afghanistan has become yet another embarrassing episode in the long history of US imperial adventures which no one wants to take responsibility for. Two of the top generals in the US army, Mark Miley, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Kenneth McKenzie, former chief of US Central Command, who led the withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021, testified in front of Congress earlier this year.

Organizations Call For An End To AI Use In Immigration Decisions

September 6, 2024 Hannah Zhao and Matthew Guariglia, Electronic Frontier Foundation. , , , ,
EFF, Just Futures Law, and 140 other groups have sent a letter to Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) must stop using artificial intelligence (AI) tools in the immigration system. For years, EFF has been monitoring and warning about the dangers of automated and so-called “AI-enhanced” surveillance at the U.S.-Mexico border. As we’ve made clear, algorithmic decision-making should never get the final say on whether a person should be policed, arrested, denied freedom, or, in this case, are worthy of a safe haven in the United States. The letter is signed by a wide range of organizations, from civil liberties nonprofits to immigrant rights groups, to government accountability watchdogs, to civil society organizations.

Black Alliance For Peace Condemns The Federal Indictments Of Uhuru 3

September 4, 2024 Black Alliance For Peace, Black Agenda Report. , , , ,
The process of jury selection on September 3rd, 2024, will mark the beginning of the federal trial of Omali Yeshitela, Chairman of the African People’s Socialist Party (APSP); Penny Hess, Chair of the African People’s Solidarity Committee (APSC); and Jesse Nevel, Chair of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement (USM), together known as the Uhuru 3. The Uhuru 3 were indicted by the U.S. government in April 2023 on the absurd charges of being “agents of a foreign government.” Charges very similar to the indictment of W.E.B. Dubois, the internationally known Black scholar and human rights defender. Dubois was eighty-one at the time of his indictment as a supposed agent of the Soviet Union for his anti-nuclear and pro-peace advocacy.

‘Havana Syndrome’ Research Cancelled For Unethical Coercion Of Participants

September 2, 2024 Cubadebate, Resumen English. , , , , ,
The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) reported Friday that it is ending its investigation of what is commonly known as “Havana syndrome,” a mysterious illness experienced by a number of spies, soldiers and diplomats who have reported sudden debilitating symptoms of unknown origin. The NIH said it would end the work “out of an abundance of caution” after an internal investigation found that people had been coerced into taking part in the research. The coercion, the agency specified, was not on its part, but NIH did not elaborate on who may have coerced participation. It noted, however, that voluntary consent is a fundamental pillar of ethical research conduct.

Human Rights Abuses In $40 Billion Tuna Industry Still A Major Problem

September 1, 2024 Greenpeace USA. , , , , ,
Fourteen out of 16 major US grocery retailers received failing grades in Greenpeace USA’s latest scorecard on tuna supply chain practices, highlighting ongoing issues in human rights and sustainability on the high seas. The new report, The High Cost of Cheap Tuna 2024, 3rd Edition, finds that while some retailers have made improvements in sourcing tuna, U.S. retailers’ current human rights and sustainability practices are failing. Of the 16 retailers, only Aldi and HyVee passed the scorecard and Trader Joe’s finished last, with a 12% score. Trader Joe’s score reflects the retailer’s failure to respond or complete a survey and its website providing almost zero transparency on its sustainability and human rights practices.

Human Rights Activist Sarah Wilkinson Arrested By UK Police

August 29, 2024 News Desk, The Cradle. , , , , , ,
British human rights activist and social media influencer Sarah Wilkinson was arrested by UK police on 29 August, reportedly over “content she posted online.” “The police came to her house just before 7.30am. [Twelve] of them in total, some of them in plain clothes from the counter-terrorism police. They said she was under arrest for ‘content that she has posted online.’ Her house is being raided, and they have seized all her electronic devices," Jack Wilkinson is quoted as saying by the social media account Suppressed News. “The pro-genocide UK regime has arrested [MENAUncensored's] roving reporter and Human Rights Activist Sarah Wilkinson for supporting the Palestinian resistance and relaying what is really happening in Gaza and the West Bank to the world,” MENA Uncensored announced.

The US Prison System Is Slowly Killing Its Political Prisoners

August 15, 2024 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
Each year on Black August, socialists, revolutionaries, and those familiar with the Black radical tradition mark the month to “study, fast, train, fight” in honor of the many freedom fighters who were killed or languish behind bars in service to the Black liberation movement. Black August marks a number of key dates within the Black liberation movement, including when the first enslaved Africans landed in what is now the United States in 1619, Nat Turner’s slave rebellion in 1831, as well as more modern events such as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom of 1963 and the Watts Rebellion on 1965.

Activists Call On Biden To End The Federal Death Penalty

August 14, 2024 Victoria Valenzuela, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
Now that Joe Biden is a lame duck president, activists are holding him accountable to make good on his promise to end the federal death penalty during his remaining six months as president. Biden’s election campaign in 2020 had pledged to end the federal death penalty and incentivize the remaining 27 states that still allow executions to do the same. While he made history as the first president in the United States to openly oppose the death penalty, there has been no movement to actually end federal executions during his nearly four years in office. With six remaining months in office, activists are calling on Biden to close Terre Haute, the federal execution facility in Indiana, and commute the death sentences of the remaining 40 people on the federal death row.

‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 311: Condemnations Of Israel’s Massacre

August 12, 2024 Qassam Muaddi, Mondoweiss. , , , , , , , , ,
The death toll from Israel’s bombing of the Tabi’in school in the Daraj neighborhood in Gaza City surpassed 100 victims according to the Palestinian health ministry. The bombing targeted two floors in the school, one of which was being used as a mosque, where civilians were holding the dawn (Fajr) prayer at the moment of the strike. The Palestinian Civil Defense said that Israeli bombs killed and maimed everyone who was present on the mosque floor, describing the massacre as “beyond imagination” and comparable to the massacre at the Al-Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza City in December of last year, which killed 500 Palestinians.

Borrell Calls For EU Sanctions Against Israeli Ministers

August 12, 2024 News Desk, The Cradle. , , , , , , ,
EU Foreign Policy chief Josep Borrell said on 11 August that the bloc must consider imposing sanctions against Israeli far-right ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich for “incitement to war crimes.” Borrell urged the Israeli government to clearly dissociate itself from individuals who incite war crimes and to work seriously towards a ceasefire deal. The high-ranking EU official also denounced Ben Gvir for urging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt all humanitarian aid and fuel to the Gaza Strip amidst the ongoing genocide. Finance Minister Smotrich’s comments about starving two million Gazans by withholding aid in exchange for Israeli captives as “sinister,” in stark contrast to the Israeli minister’s assertion that the approach is “justified and moral.”

Pro-Palestine Activists Are Under Attack In Europe

August 12, 2024 Leon Wystrychowski, People's Dispatch. , , , , , ,
Since October 7, and the subsequent genocide in Gaza, millions have taken to the streets worldwide to demonstrate against the current genocide, as well as against the 76-year-long Israeli occupation of Palestine. In Europe and North America, and in countries in West Asia, these protests are largely directed against their own governments that are accused of not doing enough for Palestine, or are directly involved in the occupation in Palestine and in the genocide in Gaza. Political protest, which is opposed to the state and government policy, inevitably runs the risk of being met with state repression.
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