International Criminal Court Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said Friday that she intends to open an investigation into possible crimes committed during Islamist rebel group Boko Haram’s Nigerian insurgency that began in 2009. Bensouda indicated that a preliminary examination into the situation had found a reasonable basis to believe that Boko Haram and its splinter groups committed [...]
Morocco’s King Mohammed VI and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to normalize relations between their respective countries on Thursday, following the lead of other Arab states like Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Sudan, Jordan and Egypt. The US contributed to the deal between Israel and Morocco by recognizing Morocco’s sovereignty over West Sahara. Netanyahu [...]
A Kenyan High Court issued a declaratory order on Thursday in favor of four survivors subjected to rape and other sexual and gender based violence (SGBV) during post-election demonstrations spanning from December 2007 to March 2008, awarding them each 4 million shillings ($35,906). The survivors brought suit against the attorney general and inspector-general of the National [...]
Amnesty International called on Airbnb Thursday to remove its approximately 200 rental properties located within the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) before the company’s Initial Public Offering (IPO). Amnesty claims that these properties are in illegal Israeli settlements and “are at the heart of systematic human rights violations faced by Palestinians. In preparation for the IPO, [...]
Argentina’s lower house, the Camara de Disputado, voted to legalize abortion Thursday after 20 hours of floor debate. The vote was seen as a victory for the Marea Verde (“Green Sea”) movement which seeks to make abortion legal. The bid to legalize abortion had received support from President Alberto Fernandez and will allow “women and [...]
An Australian parliamentary committee investigating Rio Tinto’s blasting of a highly significant ancient rock shelter in the state of Western Australia released a scathing interim report Wednesday, describing “a ‘don’t care culture’ that infected Rio Tinto from the top down” and a “completely inadequate” legislative framework for Indigenous heritage protection. Juurkan Gorge, in Western Australias [...]
Democracy activist Agnes Chow was denied bail on Wednesday by a Hong Kong court pending her appeal of a 10-month jail sentence for unlawful assembly during the pro-democracy protests in the city last year. The 24-year old activist was one of several activists who pled guilty and sentenced this year for their roles in the [...]
The Cabinet of the Indian state of Maharashtra on Wednesday approved a draft of a bill setting extreme punishments for crimes against women and children. The Act is modeled after the Disha Act passed by the government of Andhra Pradesh state last year. Known as the “Shakti Act”, the Maharashtra bill makes numerous changes to [...]
Amnesty International Thursday urged Azerbaijani and Armenian authorities to conduct immediate investigations into war crimes committed during the recent Nagorno-Karabakh conflict after videos emerged from private social networks showing extrajudicial killings, torture, and severe abuse. In its press release, Amnesty said it analysed 22 videos that depicted, “extrajudicial executions, the mistreatment of prisoners of war [...]
The Lebanese judge investigating the Beirut shipping port explosion Thursday charged caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab and three former ministers with criminal negligence for the incident in August which killed more than 200 people, injured thousands more and destroyed large parts of the country’s capital. Fadi Sawan has charged former public works ministers Ghazi Zaeiter [...]
