Stories about Human Rights from September, 2006
Senegal, Chad, Belgium: Where Will Hissene Habre be Judged?
Generation Consciente, Un Autre Afrique explains that (Fr) after a 5-year negotiation between Senegal, Belgium and the African Union on which of the two countries should host the trial of former Chadian leader Hissene Habre, “Abdoulaye Wade has decided at the African Union summit in Banjul that former Chadian leader...
Botswana: the plight of living near diamond mines
The San people of Botswana would like you to boycott Botswana diamonds until they are allowed back into their ancestral land, writes Ethnicloft, quoting an advocacy group supporting the San’s opposition of their eviction.
Kazakhstan: Nazarbaev in DC
Registan.net looks at media, editorial, and blog coverage of today's visit to the White House by Kazakhstani President Nursultan Nazarbaev.
Belarus: Protest Diaries and Opposition Leader
Ivan Lenin of Rush-Mush reports that the online diaries of a Belarusian protester Dasha Kostenko have been published in Moscow. He also criticizes the opposition leader Milinkevich: “It's a big shame that the brave Belarusians who were risking their health, their freedom, and their very lives didn't have a better...
Russia: Open Letter on Orphanage Child Abuse
Russia Blog posts an open letter from an American mother of three adopted Russian children: “While looking for articles about the orphanage abuse that occurred in late July, 2006 in Krasnoyarsk, I came across your story about the “Boys for Sale“. It has had a profound affect on me. Thank...
India: Child Marriage
Even as Child Marriage is illegal in India, parts of India continue the practice of child marriage. Especially on certain auspicious days when the practice intensifies. A flickr photo set by John and Sarah on the same.
South Africa: gay marriage debate
The man who wants to become the next president of South Africa, Jacob Zuma, believes that gay marriages are ungodly and unAfrican, via Reluctant Nomad.
Ethiopia: were blogs blocked?
“One day Ethiopia had one of the busiest and fastest-growing blogging scenes in the whole of Africa. The next, more than two-thirds of its online journals simply disappeared,” begins the BBC's Focus on Africa magazine article about the great Ethiopian blog blockage.
Palestine: Citizen Profile
Are Palestinians still romanticizing with the fantasies and daydreams of complete liberation and the return to a land they only heard and read about? Maybe these daydreams were legitimate and reasonable in the previous era of the struggle, but under the current necessity for re-evaluation, the options for realizing the...
Russia: Media Stereotypes Discussion
Yuri Mamchur's recent post on Russia Blog about media stereotypes has drawn some media response in Russia and the blogger has been interviewed on Radio Liberty (RUS).
Iran:A blog service was filtered by mistake!
According to Reportes without Borders,a blog service, Persianblog.com[Fa], was briefly blocked “by mistake” by Iranian Internet Service Providers. In Persian blog we read access to 650,000 blogs got blocked for a day [Fa].
Ukraine: Babiy Yar Massacre's 65th Anniversary
Stones and flowers were laid at the Babiy Yar Memorial in Kyiv Wednesday, to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the 1941 massacre – by Veronica Khokhlova In 1941, at least 33,771 Kyiv Jews were shot by the Nazis on Sept. 29 and Sept. 30, in the Babiy Yar ravine of...
South Korea: solidarity protest against military base
Days in Daechuri reports on the weekend solidarity protest in seoul against the expansion of military base in Pyeongtaek. There were also protests in New York and Los Angeles.
Russia: Chechnya Kidnappings
David McDuff of A Step At A Time translates a piece on the ongoing kidnappings in Chechnya.
Tunisia: Opening prisons to the world
At this site, I’m trying to show videos that show or speak about human rights abuses, and – as in the Tunisian video above – the impact of human rights abuses on ordinary people. I don’t speak Arabic, so how do I know what this video’s about? It's thanks to...
Ethiopian bloggers rally to save controversial bill
Ethiopia’s diaspora bloggers are flexing their political muscles in a bid to save a controversial bill they claim has been blocked in the US Congress. The highly-politicised groups of Ethiopian writers living in the USA published a flurry of posts over the past week to persuade Congress to pass House...
Sudan: divestment campaign
AfricaBeat on a divestment campaign in Sudan: I love how the entire Bush administration is mobilizing to “Save Darfur” even as it has worked to bury proposed legislation that is the centerpiece of a divestment campaign to force American investors pull money out of any company doing business in Sudan.
More banned journals and Khatami in the USA
According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and the International Federation of Journalists, the Iranian media is under an increasing amount of governmental pressure. More newspapers and magazines such as daily Shargh and the monthlies Nameh and Hafez have been shut down by the Commission for Authorizing and Monitoring the Press,...
Bulgaria: More on “Tripoli Six” Blog Campaign
Declan Butler, a senior reporter at Nature, reports that the blog campaign to help free the “Tripoli Six” seems to be gaining momentum. Also, he writes that “Mickey Grant, a filmmaker from Dallas, Texas, has, in response to the blog campaign, today made his full, 1h 22 min, 2003 documentary...
Botswana: removal of the Basarwa from ancestral land
Sotho opposes the removal of the Basarwa from their ancestral land in Botswana: “The Basarwa (Baroa in Sesotho) deserve to live on their land, as did the native American, in the same way they have been living on it since the dawn of man.”
Africa: dumping site for toxic waste
Grandiose Parlor asks whether Africa is a dumping site for global toxic waste: “The use of Africa as a dumping site for hazardous waste from industrialized nations is old news. The issue resurfaced again some weeks ago in Ivory Coast.”