· May, 2007

Stories about Human Rights from May, 2007

Iran: A Bloody Face Symbolizes the Violent Repression of Women

On Sunday a young woman in Tehran became the latest victim of the crackdown. Citizen reporters captured photographs of her bloodied face which were subsequently published on many Iranian weblogs. According to some reports she was filming the police crackdown on women when she was attacked herself by police. Some eyewitnesses say the police wanted to push her into their car because of how she was dressed and she resisted.

Colombia: Bloggers Campaign for the Release of a 3-Year Old Hostage

  25 May 2007

Libertad para Emanuel is a blog that was started in order to call for the release of a 3-year old hostage taken by FARC guerrillas. Many other Colombian bloggers joined the campaign and wrote their support for the cause, while others who supported the cause did not want to forget about the other thousands of hostages currently being held.

Hungary: Human Rights

“The annual Amnesty Report this week has charged Hungary with discrimination against the Roma, a lack of protection for women and not surprisingly, police abuses,” writes Further Ramblings of a N.Irish Magyar.

Kazakhstan against -bashization

Yesterday Sergey Duvanov, a journalist and a human rights activist was arrested for organising the protests on the square in Almaty against the constitutional amendments that exempt Nazarbayev from a limit on the number of the presidential terms. Casio Cisar writes: Duvanov was holding an unsanctioned protest against what he...

India: Child Labour and Trafficking

  25 May 2007

The Weight of Silence on child labour and trafficking. “The conditions these children are forced into essentially amount to nothing more than slavery, two hundred years after legislation was passed which made the practice illegal. And this is slavery at its ugliest, most evil core, slavery of the most vulnerable...

Sri Lanka: S. Bose(1975 – 2007), Poet, Editor & Writer

  25 May 2007

The following poem was written by S. Bose, a writer-poet (Tamil) from Vavuniya, Sri Lanka and was translated by a friend of mine for Global Voices Online readers. Chandrabose Sudhakar or S.Bose was shot dead by armed men in his own home on April 16th, 2007. The killers who spoke...

Belize: Supreme Court Rules Against Police

  25 May 2007

The Belize Supreme Court has ruled that the police cannot prevent citizens from protesting against the controversial Universal Health Services loan guarantee during today's House of Representatives meeting. Belizean quotes United Democratic Party leader Dean Barrow: “The will of the people obviously cannot be thwarted and the right to dissent...

Bahamas: Race Matters

  25 May 2007

“Race matters. And we need to talk about it in order to make it matter less.” Nicolette Bethel starts the discussion on race relations in the Bahamas.

Darfur: The Reality, the Agenda & the Proposed Solution

  24 May 2007

Darfur, in the minds of different people, constitutes and means different things. This is due to the fact that we, the general public around the world are getting exposed to a tirade of conflicting views and information. As that continues, so will our polarization. Therefore, the long and seemingly endless...

Join the Debate on Darfur 10am (EST) TODAY!

  24 May 2007

Further to our earlier post, here's a quick update on the Reuters Newsmaker event on Darfur, which takes place in New York starting at 10am EST today. Our Sub-Saharan Africa editor Ndesanjo Macha will be live-blogging the event at his blog, Jikomboe, so you'll be able to follow the proceedings there. Reuters will be tossing to the GV team from time to time for questions and feedback, so please leave any comments you may have either on this post or on Ndesanjo's blog. In related news, Reuters Alertnet this morning released the results of its poll on the situation of Aid workers in Darfur (full coverage here).

Bangla Blogs: Breaking Taboos and a Debate

  24 May 2007

The Bangla blogging platform Bandh Bhanger Awaaj is buzzing with discussions, debates, memes and literatures. Hundreds of bloggers and thousands of readers are keeping this space lively. It is generating a lot of interest among the bloggers and readers with its variety of posts. Recently there was a wave of...

Egypt: Human Rights Council

Egypt's bloggers held their own online protest on the eve of the election of Egypt to the UN Human Rights Council. Bloggers Nora Younis and the Free Kareem and the Free Monem blogs all posted a video stating why the country shouldn't be on the council. Kareem was jailed for...

Bosnia & Herzegovina: Mostar

  23 May 2007

Wu Wei visits Mostar (among other things, the unofficial capital of Herzegovina) and learns what Bosnia & Herzegovina has in common with Trinidad & Tobago: “At our meeting in Mostar, we were gently chided for talking about Bosnia. ‘Here in Herzegovina, we feel like Tobago must feel, when everyone talks...