Nafees Ahmad Archives - JURIST - Commentary

Commentaries by Nafees Ahmad

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Refugee Rights and Health: The Impact of COVID-19 on Refugee Camps

April 5, 2020 05:02:41 am

At the moment, there are over 70.8 million people forcibly displaced from their homes. The fast mobility of large populations is an inalienable part of humanity that is driven by drought, famine, earthquake, climate change, political opinion, massive violation of human rights, religious persecution, racial discrimination, ideological conflict, war, and pandemic diseases. People fleeing such [...]

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Netherlands becomes the first country to legalize same-sex marriage and euthanasia

On April 1, 2001, the Netherlands became the first country to legalize same-sex marriage. The nation then became the first country to legalize euthanasia on April 1, 2002.

First US wartime conscription law took effect

On April 1, 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, the first wartime conscription law passed in the United States went into effect. It included a clause allowing a person to pay $300 to avoid military service, a controversial "rich man's" exception that precipitated the July 1863 New York City Draft Riots.

The riots, the worst in US history to that point, killed as many as 100 people and had to be quelled by troops, some of whom had recently fought at the Battle of Gettysburg. Learn more about the Draft Riots.