Human Rights // Current

Cuban Blogger Yoani Sanchez detained and beaten

I was fascinated by her after the fantastic Vanguard report on Cuba. This is awful.... more

ClaudiaVanDamage
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15 hours ago
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ITALIAN COURT CONVICTS 23 CIA KIDNAPPER/TORTURERS!

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/5/italian_prosecutor_in_case_against_cia In a... more

asherp
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1 day ago
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2 comments

Congress Rejects Biased Goldstone Report

ADL Praises Moral Stance Of Congress In Rejecting Biased Goldstone Report

New York, NY, November 4, 2009 …The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) welcomed the moral stance taken by the U.S. House of Representatives in passing Resolution 867, which calls on the President and the Secretary of State "to oppose unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the 'Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict' in multilateral fora."

The resolution, which passed yesterday by a vote of 344-36, refers to the so-called "Goldstone Report," named for the head of the investigative mission, Justice Richard Goldstone, which was commissioned by the United Nations Human Rights Council in response to Israel's operation in Gaza in January 2009. The mission was mandated by the council to investigate "Israeli violations" during the war.

Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director, issued the following statement:

The U.S. House of Representatives took the moral high ground in rejecting the biased conclusions and undue recommendations of the Goldstone Report. If the Goldstone Report's conclusions and recommendations are pursued, it could undermine all states engaged in asymmetrical warfare against terrorist groups operating from within urban areas who use human shields.

The overwrought recommendations and flawed methodology and findings of the Goldstone Report disqualify it as a legitimate basis for action to address human rights violations. By approving a resolution which appropriately labels the report as fundamentally biased, Congress has created a model for action and response for all principled nations. Rejecting the prejudiced Goldstone report sets an example and a standard for other countries to follow. We urge other legislatures around the world to echo the sentiments expressed by the House vote.

ADL expressed appreciation to Reps. Howard Berman, D-CA, and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-FL, for their leadership on this important issue.

thank you, Congress, for once.ADL Praises Moral Stance Of Congress In Rejecting Biased Goldstone Report New... more

plusaf
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2 days ago
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Sri Lanka: Notes from a War on Terror

Vanguard correspondent Mariana van Zeller travels to Sri Lanka during the final days... more

MarianaVanZeller
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3 days ago
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17 comments

Journalism, the European protest

Stand up for Journalism: tomorrow we will celebrate, in Europe, the day for the press... more

bibabiba
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3 days ago
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Mexico Accused of Torturing Peasant Farmers

Amnesty International says Mexican authorities must carry out an impartial... more

The_Global_Report
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3 days ago
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Dunia Roh

http://www.scribd.com/doc/9687922

Shahrin_Abdullah
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4 days ago
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Youth For Human Rights - We Are All Born Free & Equal

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixjACBvv2mE

PepsiJuror
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4 days ago
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"Yes" Wins Question One in Maine with 53%

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091104/ap_on_el_st_lo/us_gay_marriage_maine PORTLAND,... more

asherp
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4 days ago
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Judge OKs Challenge to Human-Gene Patents

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/11/genes/ The patents at issue give Myriad... more

Tyrannous
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5 days ago
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5 comments

Rabbi's remarks sharpen differences between Jewish leaders and youth over human rights

How can one decry young American Jews' disaffiliation from Israel, while at the same... more

mobius1ski
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6 days ago
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1 comment

Dying in prison without justice

The death of Stefano Cucchi, 31, killed in prison in Rome in a beating for which we... more

hyperion74
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9 days ago
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0 comments

Tegan And Sara Interview: Gay Rights, Public Service And The Music Industry

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/29/tegan-and-sara-interview_n_338793.html... more

carolkras
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10 days ago
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7 comments

U.N. rights expert Nowak deported from Zimbabwe

United Nations human rights expert Manfred Nowak, who was detained by security... more

eva2
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10 days ago
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0 comments

Breakthrough documentary 'House of Numbers' challenges conventional thinking on HIV, AIDS by Mike Ad

http://www.NaturalNews.com/027355_AIDS_HIV_disease.html

mae37
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10 days ago
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Christian in Somalia Who Refused to Wear Veil is Killed

NAIROBI, Kenya, Three masked members of a militant Islamist group in Somalia last week shot and killed a Somali Christian who declined to wear a veil as prescribed by Muslim custom, according to a Christian source in Somalia.

Members of the comparatively “moderate” Suna Waljameca group killed Amina Muse Ali, 45, on Oct. 19 at 9:30 p.m. in her home in Galkayo, in Somalia’s autonomous Puntland region, said the source who requested anonymity for security reasons.

Ali had told Christian leaders that she had received several threats from members of Suna Waljameca for not wearing a veil, symbolic of adherence to Islam. She had said members of the group had long monitored her movements because they suspected she was a Christian.

The source said Ali had called him on Oct. 4 saying, “My life is in danger. I am warned of dire consequences if I continue to live without putting on the veil. I need prayers from the fellowship.”

“I was shocked beyond words when I received the news that she had been shot dead,” the source in Somalia told Compass by telephone. “I wished I could have recalled her to my location. We have lost a long-serving Christian.”

Ali had come to Galkayo from Jilib, 90 kilometers (56 miles) from Kismayo, in 2007. She arrived in Puntland at the invitation of a close friend, Saynab Warsame of the Darod clan, when the Islamic extremist group al Shabaab invaded Kismayo, the source said. Warsame was born in Kismayo and had lived in Jilib but moved to Puntland when war broke out in 1991.

The source said it is not known if even Warsame knew of Ali’s conversion from Islam to Christianity.

“She might not have known, because Warsame is not a Christian,” he said.

In 1997 Ali, an orphan and unmarried, joined the Somali Christian Brothers’ Organization, a movement commonly known as the Somali Community-Based Organization. As such she had been an active member of the underground church in the Lower Juba region.

Muslim extremists have targeted the movement, killing some of its leaders after finding them in possession of Bibles. The organization was started in 1996 by Bishop Abdi Gure Hayo.NAIROBI, Kenya, Three masked members of a militant Islamist group in Somalia last week... more

hpseaton
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11 days ago
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15 year old girl gang raped while onlookers do nothing

I am losing hope for humanity.. all men are not created equal..someone could've stopped this....
RICHMOND, Calif. (AP) -- The gang rape and beating of a 15-year-old girl on school grounds after her homecoming dance was horrific enough. But even more shocking, police say, was that up to 20 people watched and did nothing to stop it.

The attack over the weekend rattled this crime-ridden city of 120,000 in the San Francisco Bay area, where one police official called it one of the most heinous crimes he has ever seen. Some students have already left the school district in response to the attack.

"It's not safe there at all," said 16-year-old Jennie Steinberg, whose mother let her transfer out of the district Tuesday. "I'm not going back."

The victim, a sophomore, had left the dance and was drinking in a school courtyard with a group of students when she was attacked, police said.

Two suspects were in custody Monday, but police said as many as five others ranging in age from 15 to mid-20s attacked the girl for more than two hours at a dimly lit area near benches Saturday night. More than a dozen people saw the rape without notifying police.

The girl was found naked from the waist down near a picnic table. She remains hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries.

"This was a barbaric act. I still cannot get my head around the fact that numerous people either watched, walked away or participated in her assault," Lt. Mark Gagan said Tuesday. "It's one of the most disturbing crimes in my 15 years as a police officer."

Gagan would not comment on rumors that observers took video of the attack on cell phones and may have posted it online.

Manuel Ortega, a 19-year-old former student, was arrested after trying to flee the scene. He is being held on $800,000 bail for investigation of rape and robbery. A 15-year-old student also was booked late Monday on one count of sexual assault, Gagan said.

Even though he said as many as 20 people were witnesses, Gagan said officials are still trying to determine the exact number of people involved. "I'm confident that the list will expand and at the end of our investigation we will get a clear indication of who was there and who did what," Gagan said.

The attack occurred in a city that has dealt with its share of vicious crimes in recent years, and the school recently approved surveillance cameras after a series of violent crimes. In one case a few years back, a student was shot outside the school, ran inside and died in the then-principal's hands, said Marin Trujillo, a spokesman for the West Contra Costa Unified School District.

Richmond is an industrialized conclave near the San Francisco Bay that is known as one nation's most dangerous cities. In 2007, Richmond had 47 homicides, and the murder rate led the state for cities with populations of 100,000 or more, surpassing Los Angeles and Oakland.I am losing hope for humanity.. all men are not created equal..someone could've... more

ksutherland27
added this
11 days ago
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154 comments

Israel 'restricting' access to water for Palestinians

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL has reported that Palestinians living under Israeli occupation... more

blanch
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11 days ago
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10 comments

UN investigates US use of drones

Can you see the drone is this photo...neither can he... UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- A U.N.... more

ksutherland27
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11 days ago
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0 comments

Cuban Journalist Jose Alejandro is Silenced

[From Yoani Sanchez's blog Generation Y, from Cuba]

No one knows the mechanisms of censorship in Cuba better than those who write in the few newspapers of national circulation. The press here has been turned into a delicate profession required to measure adjectives, carefully weigh topics and often to hide personal opinions in order to keep a job. It is a life decision to be a journalist for the official media, I know, but I also know some who have been trapped in the twists and turns of complicity, waiting for the day when they can write what they think.

From the Juventude Rebelde newspaper office where Reinaldo Escobar (His blog: http://www.desdecuba.com/reinaldoescobar/) worked until 1988, there is very little left because most of his colleagues now live in Miami, Mexico and Spain. Others have retired from the profession, disillusioned with the aborted glastnost and the consecutive calls for criticism, which ended up being bait for the most daring. José Alejandro Rodríguez survived all this and carried his personal battle into the “Receipt Requested” section where he published readers’ letters with their complaints and questions. Every time I read his crusade against bureaucracy and poor work, I sense the regressive countdown that will probably culminate in his professional silencing.

A few days ago José Alejandro could take no more. He took everything he has accumulated about the “excessive centralization” that the press on this Island is subject to and condemned the secrecy surrounding government decisions. In his article “Against the demons of kidnapped information” he used the language of an honest man who always believed in the possibility of humanizing the current system through the transparency of information. I respectfully differ with him, because what has been built on a foundation of hiding, condemning and filtering cannot survive the clear light that emanates from an incisive and free journalism.

The three pages of his harangue lasted just a few hours on the on-line version of Juventud Rebelde. The article was kidnapped by the shrewd hawks of orthodoxy, who know well the danger of a Nation that begins to learn everything you have hidden.

A copy of the article “Against the demons of kidnapped information” can be read here (In Spanish only).
http://www.cubaencuentro.com/jorge-ferrer/blogs/el-tono-de-la-voz/juventud-rebelde-y-la-informacion-secuestrada

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BBC Latin America (Spanish) on the sudden disappearance of the article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/america_latina/2009/10/091020_cuba_articulo_ravsberg_jp.shtml[From Yoani Sanchez's blog Generation Y, from Cuba] No one knows the mechanisms of... more

UrbanGypsy
added this
11 days ago
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5 comments

tagged w/ Human Rights

Cuban Blogger Yoani Sanchez detained and beaten

ITALIAN COURT CONVICTS 23 CIA KIDNAPPER/TORTURERS!

Congress Rejects Biased Goldstone Report

Sri Lanka: Notes from a War on Terror

Journalism, the European protest

Mexico Accused of Torturing Peasant Farmers

Dunia Roh

Youth For Human Rights - We Are All Born Free & Equal

"Yes" Wins Question One in Maine with 53%

Judge OKs Challenge to Human-Gene Patents

Rabbi's remarks sharpen differences between Jewish leaders and youth over human rights

Dying in prison without justice

Tegan And Sara Interview: Gay Rights, Public Service And The Music Industry

U.N. rights expert Nowak deported from Zimbabwe

Breakthrough documentary 'House of Numbers' challenges conventional thinking on HIV, AIDS by Mike Ad

Christian in Somalia Who Refused to Wear Veil is Killed

15 year old girl gang raped while onlookers do nothing

Israel 'restricting' access to water for Palestinians

UN investigates US use of drones

Cuban Journalist Jose Alejandro is Silenced

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