At the UN Human Rights Council on Monday, the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR) and several other rights groups called for the release of imprisoned rights defenders in Venezuela, noting the prevalence of enforced disappearances used to silence opposition. Venezuela’s Bolívar Law gives the state wide discretion to impose prison sentences of 25-30 years [...]
In a letter addressed to Nepal Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel, rights groups on Sunday urged Nepal to protect the rights of children by accounting for an expansion of the child grant program in the forthcoming budget. The groups represented a coalition of 24 Nepali and international rights organizations that included the Human Rights Watch [...]
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Somalia repatriated 145 of its citizens from the Libyan cities of Tripoli and Sebha back to their homes in Mogadishu and Hargeisa on Monday. The government of Somalia, in collaboration with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the EU Migrant Protection, Return & Reintegration authority for North Africa, [...]
The UK government imposed sanctions Monday on four individuals held responsible for serious human rights abuses during Sri Lanka’s civil war. The 26-year conflict, which ended in May 2009, claimed an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 lives according to UN figures, with an estimated 40,000 Tamil civilians killed during the final stages of the war. The [...]
Turkish authorities formally arrested Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu Sunday on multiple corruption charges. A Turkish court remanded İmamoğlu in custody pending trial, prompting mass protests across Istanbul and other cities. İmamoğlu, a leading member of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), was detained on Wednesday, as part of a sweeping investigation into an alleged criminal [...]
The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders requested Monday the urgent intervention of Chinese authorities regarding the arbitrary detention and ill-treatment of citizen journalist Zhang Zhan. Zhang Zhan is accused of “picking quarrels and stirring up trouble.” Currently, there is no information about Zhang Zhan’s situation at the Pudong Detention Center in Shanghai [...]
The international Baloch Human Rights Council (BHRC) called upon UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday to urgently intervene in the repression of peaceful protests in Pakistan’s Balochistan province. The group urged Guterres to secure the immediate release of Dr. Mahrang Baloch and other members of the Baloch Yekjehti Committee, a local rights group. The BHRC [...]
The chief judge of the US District Court for the District of Columbia, James Boasberg, issued an opinion on Monday, denying the Trump administration’s request to lift the two-week deportation ban on Venezuelans. He stated: “There is…a strong public interest in preventing the mistaken deportation of people based on categories they have no right to [...]
The Trump administration urged the US Supreme Court Monday to stay a preliminary injunction reinstating thousands of federal employees, continuing its efforts to downsize the federal workforce. The Trump administration opposed a federal judge in the US District Court for the Northern District of California who “reinstated the 16,000 probationary employees who had been lawfully [...]
HRW reported Monday that Germany’s social security system inadequately protects women from poverty, breaching the state’s constitutional obligation to ensure that taxpayers can afford to pay for “necessary living expenses.” According to HRW, women in Germany are overrepresented among the population that is at risk of poverty. Women make up two-thirds of low-wage workers and [...]
