Burkina Faso military claims to have taken power
24/1/2022: A group of soldiers in Burkina Faso has ousted President Roch Kabore, suspended the constitution, closed the borders and dissolved the parliament. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has condemned the military's move.
Source: DW
China Winter Olympics: time for action on human rights
14/1/2022: Amnesty International has drawn attention to the Beijing Winter Olympics and Paralympics as an opportunity to push for human rights improvements in China. The event will take place against a backdrop of myriad ongoing human rights violations in the country.
Source: Amnesty International
How democracy can defeat autocracy
14/1/2022: Autocratic leaders faced a significant backlash in 2021, says Kenneth Roth, executive director at Human Rights Watch. However, many democratic leaders have been too mired in short-term preoccupations to address serious problems such as climate change.
Source: Human Rights Watch
Egypt’s leading rights group forced to close
13/1/2022: A prominent rights group in Egypt, the Arabic Network for Human Rights, is ending operations following police arrests and threats against the network's team. A controversial new NGO law places severe curbs on the work of civil society groups.
Source: DW
Moscow court orders closure of Memorial Human Rights Center
29/12/2021: A Russian court has ordered the liquidation of the Memorial Human Rights Center, a group focused on helping political prisoners. The ruling has sparked an international outcry.
Source: DW
Unbridled loss of freedoms as Aung San Suu Kyi sentenced
6/12/2021: Amnesty International has condemned the sentencing of Aung San Suu Kyi to four years in prison as the latest example of the military's determination to eliminate all opposition and suffocate freedoms in Myanmar. It is clear that intervention by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations has failed to yield truly meaningful results.
Source: Amnesty International
Making the case for CEDAW ratification by the United States
7/9/2021: The US is one of only a handful of countries that has yet to ratify the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), in common with Sudan, Somalia, Iran, Tonga, and Palau. There are good reasons why the Biden administration should rally bipartisan support to ratify CEDAW to advance the human rights of women around the world.
Source: Inter Press Service
Beijing wants more children, but only a certain kind
15/6/2021: The Chinese government has announced that it will allow all couples to have three children, an increase from two. But one-child, two-child or three-child policies are all the same. All are infringements on women’s reproductive rights: treating human beings as instruments of achieving the goals of the state.
Source: The Interpreter
Pandemic sets back sexual and reproductive health rights
15/4/2021: The UN's State of the World Population 2021 report paints a disturbing picture of maternal health. The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in increasing sexual violence, more unintended pregnancies, and new barriers to reproductive health services, contributing to a maternal mortality ratio of 211 for every 100,000 live births.
Source: Devex
China considers new actions to lift flagging birth rate
19/2/2021: China's National Health Commission has issued a statement saying it will conduct research to “further stimulate birth potential". Despite ending its controversial one-child policy four years ago, the plunging birth rate continues to threaten to economic progress and social stability, .
Source: CNA