Human Rights

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• Democratic Republic of Congo: Clandestine Abortions on the Rise in Goma

  Global Voices » Humanitarian Response

  Georgi McCarthy

  8 May 2012 | 3:05 pm

  [Testimonies for this post were collected by email or face-to-face interviews in French and all links forward to French articles]  Illegal abortion is a common practice in several provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo, particularly in Goma, Nord-Kivu, where the number of deaths recorded as caused by these back-door procedures is increasing day by day at a worrisome rate. Several foetuses have been found in recent weeks in parts of Goma, located in the east of the D.R.C., alarming many in the community. Local administrator Mapendo Victorine said in an email she is very concerned…

• Russia: A Sunday Stroll for Freedom

  hrw.org

  Human Rights Watch

  16 May 2012 | 4:27 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Police arrested hundreds of people following clashes with demonstrators at a major protest rally in Moscow on May 6, 2012, the day before Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as president of Russia. (Moscow) – Police arrested hundreds of people following clashes with demonstrators at a major protest rally in Moscow on May 6, 2012, the day before Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as presiread more

• THAILAND: Mapping urban farming

  IRIN

  16 May 2012 | 12:05 am

  BANGKOK, 16 May 2012 (IRIN) - A Geographical Information System (GIS) is being used to map vegetable production in the greater Bangkok region, seat of Thailand's capital, to analyse how urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) contribute to food security in the city of more than 14 million.

• An idea worth at least 40 nanoKardashians of your attention

  ...My heart's in Accra

  Ethan

  2 May 2012 | 10:28 pm

  In my class today, celebrated science journalist Alister Doyle shared an insight that crystalized for me a line of thinking I’ve been exploring about media attention, celebrity and charity. Doyle shared an idea he’s developing with Paul Salopek (and let me just pause and mention how intimidating it is to have characters like Doyle and Salopek as “students” in a class I’m teaching), in which journalists develop new units of measure to explain complex and elusive concepts. The unit he shared, which he credits to Salopek, is the Jolie. A Jolie is unit that denotes…

• 15 May 2012 | 3:40 pm

  UN Dispatch

  Insider

  15 May 2012 | 3:40 pm

  Syria: U.N.-Arab League mediator Kofi Annan is urging Syria’s government to accept U.N. conditions for expanding the distribution of humanitarian aid to roughly 1 million Syrians in need of assistance, the United Nations said today. Meanwhile, three vehicles belonging to a convoy of UN observers in Syria were damaged in a bomb blast near the city of Hama today, according to a UN spokesperson. “Three UN vehicles were damaged, no UN personnel were injured,” Mr. Fawzi said in response to questions. “The Mission has sent a patrol team to the area to extract the UN military…

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  hrw.org

• Russia: A Sunday Stroll for Freedom

  Human Rights Watch

  16 May 2012 | 4:27 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Police arrested hundreds of people following clashes with demonstrators at a major protest rally in Moscow on May 6, 2012, the day before Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as president of Russia. (Moscow) – Police arrested hundreds of people following clashes with demonstrators at a major protest rally in Moscow on May 6, 2012, the day before Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as presiread more

• US: Sexual Violence, Harassment of Immigrant Farmworkers

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 10:45 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Hundreds of thousands of immigrant farmworker women and girls in the United States face a high risk of sexual violence and sexual harassment in their workplaces because US authorities and employers fail to protect them adequately, Human Rights Watch said in its 95-page report, “Cultivating Fear: The Vulnerability of Immigrant Farmworkers in the US to Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment.” (New York) – Hundreds of thousands of immigrant farmworker women and girls in the United States face a high risk of sexual violence and sexual harassment in their…

• DR Congo: Bosco Ntaganda Recruits Children by Force

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 7:01 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Gen. Bosco Ntaganda, who mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in early April 2012, has forcibly recruited at least 149 boys and young men into his forces since April 19. Ntaganda, a former rebel leader turned army general, is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of war crimes for previous recruitment and use of child soldiers. (Goma) – Gen. Bosco Ntaganda, who mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in early April 2012, has forcibly recruited at least 149 boys and young men into his forces since April 19, Human…

• US/Burma: Don’t Lift Sanctions Too Soon

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 4:47 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like The US government should not ease sanctions on business activities in Burma until adequate safeguards are in place to prevent new investment from fueling human rights abuses. (Washington, DC) – The US government should not ease sanctions on business activities in Burma until adequate safeguards are in place to prevent new investment from fueling human rights abuses. A US presidential order imposing a ban on investment and financial services in Burma is scheduled to expire on May 20, 2012, unless it is renewed or revised.read more

• Jordan: Don’t Deport Eritrean Refugees to Yemen

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 1:34 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Jordanian authorities are about to deport nine detained Eritrean refugees, including a 7-year-old girl, to Yemen where they risk indefinite detention and possibly deportation to persecution in Eritrea. Jordan should allow the group to remain in Jordan and give the United Nations refugee agency access to the refugees. (Beirut) – Jordanian authorities are about to deport  nine detained Eritrean refugees, including a 7-year-old girl, to Yemen where they risk indefinite detention and possibly deportation to persecution in Eritrea.read more

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  IRIN

• THAILAND: Mapping urban farming

  16 May 2012 | 12:05 am

  BANGKOK, 16 May 2012 (IRIN) - A Geographical Information System (GIS) is being used to map vegetable production in the greater Bangkok region, seat of Thailand's capital, to analyse how urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) contribute to food security in the city of more than 14 million.

• PAKISTAN: Water woes compounded by internal disputes

  16 May 2012 | 12:05 am

  KARACHI, 16 May 2012 (IRIN) - The dead fish recently washed up on the shores of Lake Keenjhar, the largest fresh water lake in Pakistan, shocked nearby villagers in Thatta District in the southern province of Sindh.

• HEALTH: Treat the mother - save the baby

  16 May 2012 | 12:05 am

  LONDON, 16 May 2012 (IRIN) - The past decade has seen great advances in child survival, but while toddlers and small children are benefiting, the death rate for new-born babies remains stubbornly high. Now a new report suggests that paying more attention to their mothers' health, and focusing on certain damaging but treatable diseases, could be one key to tackling neonatal mortality.

• HEALTH: Airdrops to fight schistosomiasis in Ghana

  15 May 2012 | 12:05 am

  KPONG, 15 May 2012 (IRIN) - At the Kpong airfield, a few kilometres from Lake Volta in northern Ghana, Patricia Mawuli, pilot and co-founder of Medicine on the Move (MoM), a local NGO, is preparing her plane for takeoff. She is one of four health workers who fly weekly to isolated communities around the lake to raise awareness of the dangers of schistosomiasis, also called bilharzia.

• NEPAL: HIV widows on the edge

  15 May 2012 | 12:05 am

  RAKAM, 15 May 2012 (IRIN) - Widows living with HIV in Nepal's remote hill districts in some of the country's poorest and vulnerable communities face a particularly bleak future.

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  Global Voices » Humanitarian Response

• Democratic Republic of Congo: Clandestine Abortions on the Rise in Goma

  Georgi McCarthy

  8 May 2012 | 3:05 pm

  [Testimonies for this post were collected by email or face-to-face interviews in French and all links forward to French articles]  Illegal abortion is a common practice in several provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo, particularly in Goma, Nord-Kivu, where the number of deaths recorded as caused by these back-door procedures is increasing day by day at a worrisome rate. Several foetuses have been found in recent weeks in parts of Goma, located in the east of the D.R.C., alarming many in the community. Local administrator Mapendo Victorine said in an email she is very concerned…

• Bangladesh: Voices from the Korail slum

  Rezwan

  26 Apr 2012 | 2:19 pm

  Michelle Chaplin at BRAC Blog posts a video (with subtitles), which shares the initial reactions of some of the people who lost their homes in the recent Korail slum eviction in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Written by Rezwan · comments (0) Share: Donate · facebook · twitter · reddit · StumbleUpon · delicious · Instapaper

• Ecuador: Refugee Women and Girls Turning to Sex Work

  Juliana Rincón Parra

  24 Apr 2012 | 4:07 pm

  This post is part of our special coverage on Refugees. The VJ Movement video documentary Refugees turn to Sex Work in Ecuador examines the situation with many Colombian women who had to migrate across the border into Ecuador due to violence. In many cases, without being able to gain legal employment, the women and their daughters find themselves turning to sex-work to make a living. Amy Brown reports on the situation, interviewing women and agencies in the area. The stories are told by women who had to flee Colombia after threats from the guerrilla, many times leaving businesses and…

• Nigeria: Virality is a Cause

  Ndesanjo Macha

  16 Apr 2012 | 1:20 pm

  Emannuel Iduma discusses #SaveOke campaign in the context of Kony 2012: “I am interested, in joining my voice to #SaveOke, in telling ways in which KONY 2012 implicate readings of virality…If a #SaveOke video is made, and it goes viral, the complex questions of white supremacy and black inactivity will not arise. We might just ask, ‘is this real?’ or ‘why exhibit his ailment?’ Those questions are within the realm of simplicity. This is a simple, human, matter.” Written by Ndesanjo Macha · comments (0) Share: Donate · facebook · twitter ·…

• Italy: Netizens Ponder the April 2009 L'Aquila Earthquake

  Superjules

  12 Apr 2012 | 7:09 pm

  [All links lead to Italian language pages, except when otherwise noted] As still marked by many church clocks and bell towers at the center of L'Aquila [en], at 3:32 am of April 6, 2009, a 6.3 magnitude earthquake broke the silence of the sleeping town and destroyed the lives of many of its inhabitants. To remember the third anniversary of the tragic event, citizens came together in support and remembrance, created numerous web pages for retelling and commenting upon the earthquake and its far-reaching effects. Church clock stuck at 3:32 am of April 6, 2009 in L'Aquila. Photo by…

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  ...My heart's in Accra

• An idea worth at least 40 nanoKardashians of your attention

  Ethan

  2 May 2012 | 10:28 pm

  In my class today, celebrated science journalist Alister Doyle shared an insight that crystalized for me a line of thinking I’ve been exploring about media attention, celebrity and charity. Doyle shared an idea he’s developing with Paul Salopek (and let me just pause and mention how intimidating it is to have characters like Doyle and Salopek as “students” in a class I’m teaching), in which journalists develop new units of measure to explain complex and elusive concepts. The unit he shared, which he credits to Salopek, is the Jolie. A Jolie is unit that denotes…

• Opening notes from Media Lab spring meeting

  Ethan

  24 Apr 2012 | 8:59 am

  Radio host John Hockenberry introduces the first day of the Media Lab’s spring sponsor meeting. He suggests that the lab is an “infectious idea”, a way of working and thinking that spreads well beyond the walls of the building. He warns the crowd, packed into the third floor atrium at the Lab, and fourth and fifth-floor balconies, that this isn’t “some sit back in your seats TED conference experience” – instead, we need to work to get the most out of our experience. Joi Ito, director of the lab, lets us know that this is the most open meeting…

• The tweetbomb and the ethics of attention

  Ethan

  19 Apr 2012 | 11:03 pm

  Bachir (Chiren) Boumaaz, known as “Athene”, is an online gamer known for his prowess at World of Warcraft and other multiplayer games. His YouTube channel, which describes him as “world’s most famous record-breaking professional gamer” includes hundreds of videos, boasts over 600,000 subscribers and over 300 million video views. Athene and his friend Reese Leysen have been building a community focused not just on gaming, but on “leading a pro-active lifestyle.” Their postings on ipowerproject.com have turned towards activism, starting with online…

• Tim O’Reilly at MIT Media Lab

  Ethan

  18 Apr 2012 | 4:58 pm

  Legendary technology publisher Tim O’Reilly is the speaker at today’s Media Lab Conversations with Joi Ito. O’Reilly Media is one of the best respected technology publishers in the industry, producing many of the books working programmers rely on to build their software and systems. O’Reilly is also an important convener – the conferences his organization hosts are important in shaping the dialog about the internet and innovation. Tim opens his talk with two quotes, one from Oscar Wilde (“Quotation is a serviceable substitution for wit”) and a second…

• The Passion of Mike Daisey: Journalism, Storytelling and the Ethics of Attention

  Ethan

  28 Mar 2012 | 4:34 pm

  I am telling you that I do not speak Mandarin, I do not speak Cantonese, I have only a passing familiarity with Chinese culture and to call what I have a passing familiarity is an insult to Chinese culture—I don’t know fuck-all about Chinese culture. But I do know that in my first two hours of my first day at that gate, I met workers who were fourteen years old, I met workers who were thirteen years old, I met workers who were twelve. Do you really think Apple doesn’t know? In a company obsessed with the details, with the aluminum being milled just so, with the glass being fitted…

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  UN Dispatch

• 15 May 2012 | 3:40 pm

  Insider

  15 May 2012 | 3:40 pm

  Syria: U.N.-Arab League mediator Kofi Annan is urging Syria’s government to accept U.N. conditions for expanding the distribution of humanitarian aid to roughly 1 million Syrians in need of assistance, the United Nations said today. Meanwhile, three vehicles belonging to a convoy of UN observers in Syria were damaged in a bomb blast near the city of Hama today, according to a UN spokesperson. “Three UN vehicles were damaged, no UN personnel were injured,” Mr. Fawzi said in response to questions. “The Mission has sent a patrol team to the area to extract the UN military…

• Video Shows UN Monitoring Mission Under Attack

  Mark Leon Goldberg

  15 May 2012 | 1:17 pm

  This recently uploaded video from YouTube shows an attack against a convoy of four clearly marked UN cars belonging to the small monitoring mission. No one was killed in the blast. From CNN A four-vehicle U.N. convoy was struck by an improvised explosive device Tuesday in Syria, the United Nations said. No U.N. personnel were injured, but three vehicles were damaged, said Ahmad Fawzi, spokesman for Kofi Annan, special envoy to Syria for both the United Nations and the Arab League. A video posted on YouTube shows what appears to be the U.N. observers’ vehicles in the midst of chaos in…

• The Artificial Leaf and Sustainable Energy for All

  Mark Leon Goldberg

  15 May 2012 | 9:06 am

  In case you missed it, do check out the New Yorker profile of Daniel Nocera, a scientist who has designed a “a cheap, playing-card-size coated-silicon sheet that, when placed in a glass of tap water and exposed to sunlight, split the water into hydrogen and oxygen.” The device is able to produce energy through a modified form of photosynthesis. He calls this system an “artificial leaf” and it could be a huge breakthrough in the field of of sustainable energy. The key, though, is that Nocera did not design this system with wealthy consumers in mind. Rather,…

• Top of the Morning: UN and Syria Tussle over Humanitarian Aid; Palestinians End Hunger Strike; WHO To Declare Polio Emergency

  Mark Leon Goldberg

  15 May 2012 | 7:59 am

  Top stories from the Development and Aid World News Service — DAWNS Digest.  UN and Syria at Tussle Over Who Gets to Deliver Humanitarian Aid Humanitarian aid is not reaching Syrian people in need. In part, because the Syrian government is insisting on full control of the aid flow. “The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and Damascus have been negotiating for weeks on a plan for the distribution of aid throughout Syria, but U.N. envoys familiar with the talks said the government and OCHA are deadlocked on the issue of who will be in charge. ‘The Syrians…

• Sustainable Future Symposium; ICT for Development; IAEA/Iran; Global Financial Transaction Tax; and more

  Insider

  14 May 2012 | 4:24 pm

  Shaping a Sustainable Future: Partnerships and development cooperation among countries will play a key role in accelerating sustainable development, the Secretary-General of the UN Sustainable Development Conference (Rio+20), Sha Zukang said today, stressing that assistance will need to focus on helping developing countries find longer-term solutions to eradicate poverty and transition into a green economy. The two-day Australia High-Level Symposium, “Shaping a Sustainable Future – Partners in Development Cooperation,” which began today, seeks to facilitate an informal dialogue on…

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  Human Rights Now » Women’s Rights

• Afghan Women to NATO: Don’t Bargain Our Rights Away

  Jungwon Kim

  15 May 2012 | 12:30 pm

  Afghan teacher Meher Afroza with her students at an Islamic school in Kabul. Under the Taliban, few girls attended school. Today 3 million girls go to school, and 20 percent of university of graduates are women. (Photo: ADEK BERRY/AFP/Getty Images) World leaders, dignitaries and reporters will convene in Chicago next week for the 2012 NATO summit, and among the urgent questions they will consider is that of Afghanistan’s future after the 2014 withdrawal of U.S. and allied troops. Yet Afghanistan’s female leaders were denied a place at the table for these critical discussions—despite…

• Violence Against Armenian Women is a Crime, Not a Tradition

  Simon Maghakyan

  7 May 2012 | 9:13 am

  Will Armenia step up protections for women? (Photo KAREN MINASYAN/AFP/Getty Images) The smallest yet probably oldest of the successive Soviet nations, Armenia prides itself for its ancient traditions. In his International Women’s Day statement, President Serge Sarkissian wishes women “happiness, luck, and healthy and strong families,” commending the preservation of women’s “traditional role.” Does the latter include being a victim of violence? The Armenian government’s very poor record on combating widespread violence against women may suggest so.

• Is the US Abandoning Afghan Women?

  Govind Acharya

  3 May 2012 | 11:11 am

  Afghan Young Women for Change (YWC) activists, holding placards which read "where is justice?", take part in a protest denouncing violence against women in Afghanistan in Kabul on April 14, 2012. President Obama made an announced visit to Afghanistan on May 1 to sign an agreement intended to lead to a pullback of US troops from Afghanistan by 2014. The document is very specific on issues around the arrangements related to security and interestingly, trade and commerce but inadequate when talk to turns to human rights in general and specifically women’s rights. Amnesty will…

• 5 Reasons Congress Shouldn't Gut Violence Against Women Act

  Cristina Finch

  19 Apr 2012 | 2:27 pm

  © STR/AFP/Getty Images The U.S. Senate is poised to vote to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA)– a key piece of legislation that, since 1994, aims to protect women in the U.S. from terrible acts of violence and exploitation. But critical new protections in the bill – to protect Native American women, LGBT people and immigrant women in particular – are in danger of being left out. For example, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and others have indicated they may introduce an alternative bill that would strip out the amendments in VAWA that protect Native American and Alaska…

• Punishing "Moral Crimes" in Afghanistan

  Govind Acharya

  16 Apr 2012 | 12:23 pm

  Afghan Young Women for Change (YWC) activists, holding placards which read "where is justice?", take part in a protest denouncing violence against women in Afghanistan in Kabul on April 14, 2012. Despite enormous improvements to women’s livelihoods in the decade since the fall of the Taliban, much action is needed by the Afghan government and the international community. For example, women in Afghanistan face some of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world, more than half of all girls in the country do not attend school, and many women are forced into marriage…

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  The Ushahidi Blog

• Mapping the Mission: Ushahidi + Liberia’s UN Mission team up

  kate

  15 May 2012 | 10:54 am

  [Post co-written with John Etherton and Lt. Col. Dave Foster] Building on a partnership established during Liberia’s 2011 General Elections, Ushahidi Liberia has been working with the United Nation’s Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) to create an Ushahidi instance that facilitates information coordination for UN field-based operations across West Africa. In collaboration with Lt. Col. David Foster, founder of the UNMIL Situational Awareness Visualization Environment (USAVE) Initiative, Ushahidi Liberia has developed a pilot instance populated with sample data from the Mission. If it proves…

• Weekly: Mapstars, Security and more

  Heather

  10 May 2012 | 11:45 am

  What a week! We have an important security update, news about a few community award winners/nominees, some code changes and a community meetup in Panama: Code: A vulnerability has been discovered in the Ushahidi Admin API. A fix has been issued, please update your deployments. Full details. (Crowdmap was updated.) Evan Sims and Brian Herbert moved Crowdmap to new infrastructure. Databases are now properly replicated, the webserver has been switched to Nginx and is being load balanced. Crowdmap will now be able to handle larger loads of traffic and should have less disruption to individual…

• Weekly: Elections, Security & Crowdmap Maintenance

  Heather

  2 May 2012 | 2:58 pm

  We have few major updates this week including a security patch, our community developer call recording and an upcoming research workshop. Here are some highlights from the Ushahidi weekly: Citizen Lab Cyber Security Research and Policy Workshop Citizen Lab, Canada Centre for Global Security Studies and the Open Net Initiative are hosting a Cyber Security Research and Policy Workshop: Issues for Latin America (Panama). I’ll will be sharing some Lessons Learned from Emergency Response and Election Monitoring. Miradorelectoral Guatemala (note: this website auto-plays radio) I’ve…

• It’s all Greek to me! Localization is a bumpy road

  Heather

  1 May 2012 | 1:58 pm

  [Post co-written with Michelle Lee, our intern. Michelle is an ex-journalist, freelance writer, now a MA student doing Creating Social Media, Goldsmiths College, University of London.] How can we serve a global community? Ushahidi is translated into 18 languages and has been downloaded in 159 countries. We’ve grown fast and our community of translators contributed to many great projects from U-shahid to Qiantang River. Ushahidi’s translators need a new engine with fresh coat of paint. We’d love your input as we navigate this complex issue. Does not Translate Imagine you are…

• Relaunching OccupyMap for May Day

  Heather

  30 Apr 2012 | 11:35 am

  [Guest Post: Tom Gillis is a software developer for Occupy.net and the NYCGA Tech Ops Working Group] OccupyMap launched in November 2011, the night before the November 17 Day of Action. We got some impressive coverage in the technology press that morning and the site saw a fair amount of usage around NYC form both web submissions and people tweeting with the #occupymap hashtag. However, after that initial burst of activity, site usage fell off sharply, and NYCGA Tech Ops (the working group that develops and maintains the map) was left to come up with a new strategy for how to use the site. We…

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  united-nations « WordPress.com Tag Feed

• Obama Adopts UN Codex Alimentarius to Collaborate With Drug Corporations

  Ken McMurtrie

  14 May 2012 | 7:14 pm

  Source: Blacklisted News   (H/T TIP)   By Susanne Posel Occupy Corporatism The US government will as

• Pity the UN

  fromthefourthcorner

  14 May 2012 | 7:01 pm

  I pity the poor old United Nations. It seems to get a lot of stick from people – often for wil

• Apple demanding iPhone5.com domain be handed over

  David Kolle

  14 May 2012 | 6:30 pm

  Apple is aiming to take ownership of the iphone5.com domain, fuelling speculation that the company will use the long-rumored name for its next version of  iPhone.  Current iPhone 4 and 4s The Cupertino, Calif. electronics maker has filed a claim with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), a United Nations agency that arbitrates Web domain disputes in cases of “cybersquatting,” naming iphone5.com as the target. The domain is currently active and hosts a discussion forum devoted to smartphones. It’s unclear who owns iphone5.com since the domain, which was…

• Amanda Peet Steps-Up For UN's Vaccines For The World's Children With "Shot@Life" Campaign

  ssnewsimages

  14 May 2012 | 4:13 pm

• 14 May 2012 | 3:17 pm

  First Peoples Worldwide

  14 May 2012 | 3:17 pm

  For the first time ever, First Peoples Worldwide will be attending and participating in the Eleventh Session of United Nations’ Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, May 7-18 at the United Nations headquarters in New York City. We invite you to join us for our workshop, co-sponsored by the Centro para la Autonomia y Desarollo de los Pueblos Indigenas (CADPI), on “Implementing Corporate Responsibility and Free, Prior, and Informed Consent: A new resource guide for Indigenous Peoples’ engagement with Corporations, Financial Institutions and Investors using a human rights framework”.

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  Forced Migration Current Awareness

• Focus on Statelessness

  EEM

  15 May 2012 | 9:30 am

  The RSC is offering a short course on "Statelessness and International Law," scheduled for 27-28 October 2012 in Oxford.  Follow this link for more information and an application form. Other related items: "Institutionalizing Statelessness: The Revocation of Residency Rights of Palestinians in East Jerusalem," International Journal of Refugee Law, Advance Access, 9 May 2012 [abstract] - Eprint available via SSRN. Kuwait: Security Forces Forcibly Disperse Stateless Residents (Human Rights Watch, May 2012) [text] "People of Nowhere: Stateless in South Asia," Refugee Watch Online (May 2012)…

• Impact of Climate/Environmental Change

  EEM

  15 May 2012 | 9:00 am

  Climate and Conflict in the Sahel (Refugees International Blog, May 2012) [text] Climate Change and Fragile States: Rethinking Adaptation, SOURCE, no. 16 (UNU-EHS & Munich Re, 2012) [text] Climate Change, Environmental Degradation and Migration, International Dialogue on Migration Publication Series, no. 18 (IOM, 2012) [text via ReliefWeb] - Report from previously-reported conference. Climate Change Roundtable for Researchers and Practitioners, Washington, DC, 3 April 2012 [access] - Follow link for meeting report and list of participants. Countering Climate Extremes Really Does…

• New Items from UNHCR

  EEM

  11 May 2012 | 9:45 am

  Six years after the last edition, a new State of the World's Refugees is due to be published this month by Oxford University Press (OUP).  The theme is "In Search of Solidarity."  Previous editions are available on the Publications page of the UNHCR web site (right side). For more information on this flagship publication, check out the table of contents; here is part of the description: Drawing on UNHCR's direct experience, eight chapters address key challenges, starting with the diminishing space for humanitarian action in places like Somalia and Afghanistan. Protracted conflicts…

• Focus on Human Trafficking

  EEM

  10 May 2012 | 1:00 pm

  For information about a recent asylum case involving a family targeted by an Albanian human trafficker, read "DHS Grants Asylum in Demiraj v. Holder Case" on the ImmigrationProf Blog.  Some background on the case is here, and briefs and documents are available on the the SCOTUSBlog. Publications: Asylum Seeking Victims of Human Trafficking in Ireland: Legal and Practical Challenges (Immigrant Council of Ireland, Nov. 2011) [text] Children, Adolescents and Human Trafficking: Making Sense of a Complex Problem, Issue Paper, no. 5 (Rights Work, May 2012) [text] Hidden Exploitation: Women in…

• Focus on Australia

  EEM

  10 May 2012 | 11:30 am

  "Acculturation Challenges that Confront Sudanese Former Refugees in Australia," Journal of Intercultural Communication, no. 28 (March 2012) [full-text] Boats, Camps and Barbed Wire Fences: Forced Migration and the Law Conference, Brisbane, 13 April 2012 - See UNHCR Australia news story for overview of conference; audio is available here. Case Analysis: Sayed Abdul Rahman Shahi v Minister for Immigration and Citizenship (Asylum & Refugee Law Project, posted April 2012) [text] - Concerns "the rights of unaccompanied minors to sponsor immediate family members to join them in Australia."…

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  Brain Off

• Moabi and Big Important Challenges for the GeoWeb

  mikel

  24 Apr 2012 | 5:10 am

  Recently finished a technical review of WWF’s Moabi platform, their geodata sharing platform to track deforestation, and came out with some important technical challenges for the GeoWeb I want to share with the mapping nerds. Just following TAI’s bridging session on natural resource governance, I met Charles Huang of the World Wildlife Fund at a similarly styled event at the World Bank. After self-identifying as a developer, Charles asked if I’d like to talk more about Moabi … they needed a developer’s eye on the platform as they considered how to move to their…

• All I Want for OpenStreetMap is … Social and Attention

  mikel

  30 Mar 2012 | 8:18 am

  Kate posted her wishlist for OpenStreetMap and I second everything she wrote … OSM can be fine tuned to be even easier. In my wishlist post, I want to cover improving connections between mappers, and focusing mappers attention. In short, OSM should be more like Facebook. Seriously. A news feed should show you the most relevant activity and news for you personally, and the profile page should show what you’re about in OSM in a more approachable way. The sociality of OSM is its biggest strength. The intricacies of maps, tags, places are discussed in minute detail, and are ultimately…

• When it comes to politics, crowds can be manipulated, but not communities

  mikel

  17 Feb 2012 | 1:41 am

  The women and children in the photo are suffering, and the story tells of hidden revolutionaries challenging brutal rule in all arenas, and victorious on the maps of the most powerful company on the planet. They’re renaming the infrastructure after revolutionary heroes. You can’t help but cheer on such clever efforts for freedom. Google supports liberation! Another front in American online diplomacy?! How far from the truth. Another lame attempt to boost American companies sales with puff pieces about their support for the Arab Spring. Let’s watch and see how long before…

• Only Possible With Open Data

  mikel

  2 Feb 2012 | 1:35 pm

  Arguments about the importance of Open Data often come down to a principled stance, or a licensing discussion … that kind of argument doesn’t make much impression on folks who aren’t way in the weeds. And it’s more than just licensing … there are equal parts issues of legality, technical freedom, and community. Clear examples of what you can do only with OpenStreetMap, and not with say, Google Map Maker, makes this stuff real. Here are just a few, among many. Mapping of Jalabad and surrounding countryside is unique to OSM. They collect data with GPS and Smart…

• A Week for the Record Books

  mikel

  24 Jan 2012 | 7:09 am

  That was a week where I really was truly and completely welcomed to DC. Some great things, some other things, and some things I can’t talk about yet. Social Technologies at the GWU Humanitarian Mapping Workshop View more presentations from mikel_maron Was invited to fill for Kate Chapman at the Mapping the World of Humanitarianism workshop (not the geo kind of mapping). Talked about the challenges with community centered social technologies, within the humanitarian system. Most difficult question “Do you consider yourself a humanitarian?” Open Mapping and Community…

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  ICT for Peacebuilding (ICT4Peace)

• Data-driven peacebuilding and ICTs

  Sanjana

  9 May 2012 | 8:11 pm

  Google recently invited me to write up 500 words for their Policy by the Numbers blog on big data and peacebuilding, taking points and examples from a much longer paper I wrote recently (A brief exploration of Open and Big Data: From investigative journalism to humanitarian aid and peacebuilding). My submission is now live on Google’s blog. As I note after a very limited snapshot of some data driven examples of peacebuilding, All of these early examples hint at data’s potential to meaningfully impact the domain of peacebuilding and peacekeeping, but we cannot simply assume that…

• Not In Our Name initiative in Sri Lanka: TV trailer

  Sanjana

  4 May 2012 | 9:35 am

  Young Asia Television kindly produced this 15 second TV spot for the Not In Our Name initiative. Filed under: ICT for Peacebuilding, ICTs in general

• Not In Our Name initiative in Sri Lanka: TV interview

  Sanjana

  2 May 2012 | 10:34 pm

  Young Asia Television recently asked me the following questions about the Not In our Name initiative for their weekly Connections TV digest. Not in Our Name: Is it focusing just only on the incident in Dambulla or is it looking broadly at religious extremism in Sri Lanka ? Judging from the responses so far , what do you feel is the general pulse on the role of the State in addressing religious extremism in Sri Lanka ? How will such incidents impact on communal relations and attempts at bringing about ‘National Reconciliation’? Im the end what purpose will this initiative serve? I recorded…

• Online security for journalists and activists

  Sanjana

  27 Apr 2012 | 3:34 am

  I was invited by the International Center for Journalists to give two lectures to a group of South Asian journalists on digital media strategies and online safety. The first I gave a couple of days ago, and today I gave a presentation on how they could navigate online security issues. As expected, the questions ranged from how secure Skype was to questions over email security and safety. I’ve often wondered how this region’s investigative journalists get away with such a poor knowledge of online security, both in the sense of how tools and platforms can aid their work, and also…

• Not In Our Name: Against religious extremism in Sri Lanka

  Sanjana

  26 Apr 2012 | 12:47 pm

  A week ago, a violent a mob of about 2,000 Sinhalese, including a group of Buddhist monks led by the Mahanayaka of the Rangiri Dambulu chapter Inamaluwe Sumangala thero, stormed and vandalised a mosque in Dambulla. The mosque was declared an illegal structure, but it is unclear how this far this is accurate. The shameful behaviour and expression employed by the Mahanayaka of the Rangiri Dambulu chapter Inamaluwe Sumangala thero, along with the monks he led and the crowd of thugs is not remotely associated with or reflective of the philosophy of the Dhamma, the teachings of the Buddha, or the…

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  Phayul Latest News

• Tibetan singer to carry out a coffin march from Bern to Geneva

  16 May 2012 | 1:06 am

  A renowned Tibetan singer is all set to march, dragging a coffin as a symbol of the slow death of Tibet, from the Swiss capital of Bern to the United Nations Headquarters in Geneva beginning today.

• British PM David Cameron meets the Dalai Lama, Expresses concern over Tibet

  15 May 2012 | 4:44 am

  Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama met with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg on Monday in London. According to reports, both leaders expressed concern for the situation in Tibet

• Tsetan Dorjee marches alone in Nepal

  15 May 2012 | 1:33 am

  Days after the three members of the exile family on their March to Tibet were stopped and returned back to India by Nepali border police, Tsetan Dorjee, one of the marchers has successfully entered Nepal.

• TYC to build statue in honour of Jamphel Yeshi

  14 May 2012 | 9:24 pm

  Tibetan Youth Congress, the largest pro-independence group in exile said that a statue of Jamphel Yeshi will be built to remember and honour his sacrifice for the Tibetan freedom struggle.

• China closes Tibetan orphanage school in Amdo

  14 May 2012 | 3:21 am

  Chinese authorities in Lhu Chu region of Amdo, eastern Tibet have forcibly closed down a Tibetan orphanage and arrested two of its teachers. Exile sources have said that the school’s strict adherence to teaching Tibetan language and culture was the reason

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  Tibet Will Be Free

• Run for SFT International’s Board of Directors

  kate

  14 May 2012 | 4:16 pm

  Do you believe Tibet will be free? Are you committed to youth empowerment and leadership? Can you help SFT grow and inspire people to act for Tibet? If you answered yes, you should consider running for SFT International’s Board of Directors and help lead the organization that is coordinating a nonviolent force of Tibetan youth, students, and supporters for Tibetan freedom. In spite of Beijing’s ruthless crackdown and merciless policies, Tibetans inside Tibet courageously resist China’s occupation every day. SFT’s leadership develops policies and strategies to amplify…

• Remembering Adam Yauch – Tendor’s tribute on Huffington Post

  tendor

  7 May 2012 | 11:16 pm

  I met Adam Yauch only once. It was during a bathroom break, which came at the end of a heated session in a Tibet-China conference at Harvard in 2002. I rushed to the bathroom and found myself standing next to Adam Yauch, who was using the urinal to my right. We greeted each other in Tibetan. I was an international relations student at Brown University at the time. “Isn’t it appalling, what they were saying?” I said, referring to a couple of Chinese academics who had been arguing that the Chinese Communists truly wanted to liberate the Tibetans, almost “out of…

• IN MEMORY OF ADAM YAUCH – by Kurt Langer

  kate

  4 May 2012 | 11:17 pm

  photo by Kiino Villand ©1996 Earlier today, Adam Yauch, founding member of the Beastie Boys passed away after a three year fight against cancer.   Adam was a good friend of mine, and one of my oldest friends in New York. But more than being a friend, he was an inspiration. I am so privileged to have known him. Adam is well known for his many talents — musician, film-maker, snowboarder and world champion alpen horn blower — but he was as generous as he was creative.  It’s well known that Adam cared deeply about seeing a Free and Independent Tibet in his lifetime, and he used every…

• SFT’s Statement on the Passing of Adam Yauch

  Nick G

  4 May 2012 | 6:20 pm

  Adam Yauch, the co-founder of Beastie Boys and a longtime Tibet activist has passed away at age 47. All of us at Students for a Free Tibet are deeply saddened to hear of Adam Yauch’s passing. Our heartfelt condolences go out to his family. As the co-founder of the Tibetan Freedom Concerts, Adam played a vital role in building the grassroots global solidarity movement for human rights and freedom in Tibet. The concerts inspired countless young people to learn about Tibet and become engaged in the issue, and many of them went on to join and become leaders in Students for a Free Tibet,…

• Where is the Panchen Lama?

  tendor

  26 Apr 2012 | 5:08 pm

  What government kidnaps a 6-year-old boy? One that is deeply insecure and fears what this boy represents. The kidnapped boy is Gendhun Choekyi Nyima. In 1995, six-year-old Gendhun was recognized as the 11th Panchen Lama, one of Tibet’s most important religious leaders. Two months later, he was abducted by the Chinese government, which fears the Tibetan people’s allegiance to him. Gendhun Choekyi Nyima turns 23 years old today. For almost two decades, he has been a prisoner of the Chinese government. Send a letter to Vice-Minister Zhu Weiqun, China’s official spokesperson on…

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  hrw.org

• Russia: A Sunday Stroll for Freedom

  Human Rights Watch

  16 May 2012 | 4:27 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Police arrested hundreds of people following clashes with demonstrators at a major protest rally in Moscow on May 6, 2012, the day before Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as president of Russia. (Moscow) – Police arrested hundreds of people following clashes with demonstrators at a major protest rally in Moscow on May 6, 2012, the day before Vladimir Putin’s inauguration as presiread more

• US: Sexual Violence, Harassment of Immigrant Farmworkers

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 10:45 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Hundreds of thousands of immigrant farmworker women and girls in the United States face a high risk of sexual violence and sexual harassment in their workplaces because US authorities and employers fail to protect them adequately, Human Rights Watch said in its 95-page report, “Cultivating Fear: The Vulnerability of Immigrant Farmworkers in the US to Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment.” (New York) – Hundreds of thousands of immigrant farmworker women and girls in the United States face a high risk of sexual violence and sexual harassment in their…

• DR Congo: Bosco Ntaganda Recruits Children by Force

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 7:01 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Gen. Bosco Ntaganda, who mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in early April 2012, has forcibly recruited at least 149 boys and young men into his forces since April 19. Ntaganda, a former rebel leader turned army general, is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of war crimes for previous recruitment and use of child soldiers. (Goma) – Gen. Bosco Ntaganda, who mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in early April 2012, has forcibly recruited at least 149 boys and young men into his forces since April 19, Human…

• US/Burma: Don’t Lift Sanctions Too Soon

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 4:47 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like The US government should not ease sanctions on business activities in Burma until adequate safeguards are in place to prevent new investment from fueling human rights abuses. (Washington, DC) – The US government should not ease sanctions on business activities in Burma until adequate safeguards are in place to prevent new investment from fueling human rights abuses. A US presidential order imposing a ban on investment and financial services in Burma is scheduled to expire on May 20, 2012, unless it is renewed or revised.read more

• Jordan: Don’t Deport Eritrean Refugees to Yemen

  Human Rights Watch

  15 May 2012 | 1:34 pm

  Tweet Widget Facebook Like Jordanian authorities are about to deport nine detained Eritrean refugees, including a 7-year-old girl, to Yemen where they risk indefinite detention and possibly deportation to persecution in Eritrea. Jordan should allow the group to remain in Jordan and give the United Nations refugee agency access to the refugees. (Beirut) – Jordanian authorities are about to deport  nine detained Eritrean refugees, including a 7-year-old girl, to Yemen where they risk indefinite detention and possibly deportation to persecution in Eritrea.read more

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  UUSC Blog

• All of Us Together on the Path to Justice

  Wendy Flick

  8 May 2012 | 2:50 pm

• Hope in Haiti: Hard to Imagine, Easy to Find

  Guest

  8 May 2012 | 2:21 pm

• Many Ways to Build a Foundation

  Guest

  8 May 2012 | 2:03 pm

• Thinking about Earthquakes in Haiti

  Guest

  4 May 2012 | 1:35 pm

• Bringing Your Truest Self to Haiti

  Charles Huschle

  3 May 2012 | 7:45 am

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  PhD studies in human rights

• Samuel Moyn, Peng-chun Chang and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

  13 May 2012 | 2:28 am

  It isn’t every day that the name of Peng-Chun Chang appears in the New York Times. But there it is, in today’s newspaper, in an op-ed written by Columbia University historian Samuel Moyn. Professor Moyn is the author of The Last Utopia: Human Rights in History, which was published a couple of years ago.Peng-chun Chang and Eleanor Roosevelt in 1948.The occasion for Moyn’s article is the release of Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng a few days ago. Professor Moyn mentions Peng-Chun Chang because he uses the recent events to return to the thesis he sets out in his book about the…

• First Ratification of Aggression Amendment to Rome Statute

  9 May 2012 | 2:31 am

  Liechtenstein is the first State Party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court to ratify the amendments incorporating the crime of genocide within the jurisdiction of the Court. Thirty such ratifications are required for the amendments to enter into force. In addition, the Assembly of States Parties will be required to adopt a resolution confirming the entry into force of the amendments. This cannot take place before 2017.This is a first step towards completing the process that began with adoption of the amendments at the Kampala Review Conference in June 2010.It is fitting…

• Charles Taylor Judgment Suggests a More Modest Level of Participation in the Sierra Leone Conflict

  28 Apr 2012 | 1:31 am

  To much general rejoicing, Charles Taylor was convicted by the Special Court for Sierra Leone in a long-awaited judgment delivered on 26 April 2012. The delays in issuing the judgment are inexcusable. And we are in fact still waiting for the real judgment. Instead, the judges have given us a 44-page summary. The Court’s press release on the judgment makes the simplistic assertion that ‘Charles Taylor was convicted on all 11 counts‘. This somewhat distorts the reality, because much of the Prosecutor’s case was not in fact upheld in the decision.The press release also boasts that…

• Put North Korea on Trial

  27 Apr 2012 | 11:55 pm

  See the op-ed in Thursday's International Herald Tribune by Sir Geoffrey Nice QC and myself.

• Katyn at Strasbourg and Nuremberg

  22 Apr 2012 | 8:52 am

  In what is known as the Katyn forest massacre, perhaps as many as 20,000 Polish officers and other officials were summarily executed by the Soviets, then buried in mass graves in what is today Belarus.An application by several relatives of those who were murdered was granted in part by a chamber of the European Court of Human Rights in a decision released last week, in the case of Janowiec et al. v. Russia. The seven-judge chamber was quite divided, as can be seen in the various dissenting opinions. Typically, this sort of case works its way to the Grand Chamber, where 17 judges will…

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  Chez Rémi

• The Long and Winding Road Towards Rio+20

  8 May 2012 | 12:28 pm

  On Monday 23rd April, when the last two weeks' session of informal negotiations for the Rio+20 conference began at UN Headquarters in New York, I took this photo and posted it on my Facebook page with the following comment: "The sign on the photo says 'one way'; so why can't governments agree?"Two weeks later when the talks ended on Friday 4 May in the evening, I got this other photo taken in a nearby street corner to illustrate the state of the negotiations.A clumsy process had failed to break the deadlock; government delegates continued to disagree on most key issues; there…

• Impasse

  22 Apr 2012 | 12:27 pm

  When in the mid 1970s I've first known Brice Lalonde, now Executive Coordinator of the Rio+20 Conference, he was correcteur d'imprimerie  in Paris for a living. It was before personal computers, word processors and spellcheck programmes existed (if you were saying "le PC" in those days you could only be talking of "le Parti Communiste"), thus the correcteurs were a very powerful guild. No editorial business, big or small,  could operate without them; they were uniquely skilled to correct in record time typos, grammar and spelling mistakes of course but also…

• Summit 2.0

  1 Apr 2012 | 2:25 pm

  Has the UN Secretariat lost faith in the ability of the 193 UN Member States to negotiate and agree a meaningful document for the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) to be held in two months and a half in Rio de Janeiro?I just spent the last two weeks in New York at what the UN jargon calls Informal-informals. The aim of these consultations is to be in a position to present to the Heads of State and Government in Rio a draft declaration that is both meaningful and concise. We started in January with an original "zero draft" of 19 pages, and after the Informals this week everyone…

• Safe Mariana Trench

  26 Mar 2012 | 1:48 pm

  James Cameron's dive into the Mariana Trench this week-end inevitably evokes for me the long campaign against radioactive waste dumping at sea I ran with Greenpeace for many years. During that campaign, we prevented the governments of the US, Japan and Taiwan from using the Mariana Trench as a radioactive waste graveyeard. Hadn't we been successful, James Cameron could have found a very different ocean floor, with mountains of radioactive waste barrels, crushed and leaking because of the water pressure (the nuclear industry was calling this the dilute and disperse approach to waste…

• Guide for not Getting Lost in Rio+20

  26 Feb 2012 | 10:51 am

  The Spanish news agency's environment service EFE-Verde who hosts my blog in Spanish has published last week my "Guide for not getting lost in Rio+20" as a six-parts series. If you read Spanish you can find information on Rio+20 and the expectations around it. 

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  Foreign Policy BlogsChildren | Foreign Policy Blogs

• International Day of Families

  Cassandra Clifford

  15 May 2012 | 5:45 pm

  Today, May 15 is International Day of Families.  The day highlights the importance families play in our global world.  The Day was proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in 1993 with resolution A/RES/47/237 and reflects the importance the international community attaches to families.  The International Day provides an opportunity to promote awareness of issues relating to families and to increase knowledge of the social, economic and demographic processes affecting families.  The goal of the day aims at fostering equality, bringing about a fuller sharing of domestic responsibilities and…

• The Joy and Burden of Motherhood

  Cassandra Clifford

  13 May 2012 | 6:01 pm

  The joy of motherhood has long since been praised over and over again.  The greatest joy of motherhood is seen as the sheer gift of bringing a life into this world and helping to shape them from the moment of birth and then to watch them grow into a happy, productive and successful member of society.  However, along with the many great joys of motherhood, often comes unimaginable pain and suffering. The role of a mother is one of the most demanding roles a woman may ever have to undergo. From the moment her child is conceived a mother takes on the burden of life as now she is entailed with…

• UN Campaign Seeks to Give all Children a Shot at Life

  Cassandra Clifford

  10 May 2012 | 11:28 am

  The word immunizations is just a simple vocabulary word to most of us in developed nations, however for those in developing countries the word means a ‘shot at life’ for their child.  One in five children does not have access to vaccines that prevent deadly diseases, like measles, pneumonia or diarrhea.  Nonetheless some 2.5 million children, under the age of 5, die every year as the result of preventable infectious diseases…mostly due to funding gaps.  Ninety-nine percent of those children live in developing countries around the world.  Mothers in many countries…

• News…

  Cassandra Clifford

  4 May 2012 | 2:30 pm

  GAVI’s Berkley resolved to vaccinate all kids against preventable diseases Seth Berkley recalls the work that preceded his appointment as head of the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, and his goal of vaccinating every child in need against every preventable disease. “It’s only a matter of political will, a little bit of money and some systems to do it,” says Berkley, who adds that while he is pragmatic, his determination is “almost like a religious belief.” Photographer helping to give kids Shot@Life Photographer Anne Geddes, whose work has…

• Making Child Abuse Prevention Awareness a Daily Activity

  Cassandra Clifford

  30 Apr 2012 | 6:28 pm

  As we concluded the month of April, we also brought to an end National Child Abuse Prevention Month in the United States.  However in light of the fact that each year there are more than 3 million child abuse reports (often containing the abuse of more than one child) made in the United States alone (Child Help), it seems that the idea of merely having a month dedicated to preventing child abuse isn’t nearly enough.  Additionally should we ever stop raising awareness and seeking to protect children?  Of course not, thus take this moment to now make each day one to prevent child…

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  MEC blog

• Evolution of MEC packs

  ArianeT

  14 May 2012 | 6:34 am

  This spring marks the launch of several redesigned MEC packs and not only are they looking mighty fine, they also have all sorts of awesome function-based improvements. For starters, we now have women-specific backpacks. I can hear half of you saying “What’s the big deal?” and the other half chiming in with “It’s about time.” Let’s start with the timing issue: there was a major shift about five years ago when outdoor gear manufacturers clued in and realised that designing women-specific gear meant more than just “shrinking and pinking it”. Back then, we did carry some…

• MEC Sleeping Bags Improved

  Philip Torrens

  12 May 2012 | 8:00 am

  James Brittain got his start designing toys (as some say he still does). He worked as a product designer in the UK developing new Super Soakers and Nerf Guns. “Not as much fun as it sounds,” he said. For years, James made multi-hour journeys every weekend to escape London for hiking and camping in the Lake District or surfing in Cornwall. His next gig was closer to his heart: a three-year stint with a major UK outdoor equipment maker. Two years ago, he brought his passion for the outdoors to Canada to work for MEC as a hard goods designer. Since arriving, James has added snowboarding and…

• MEC Races: The Complete Rundown and a Slice of Life

  GenevièveT

  9 May 2012 | 6:00 am

  The sun finally decided to come out for the final MEC race of the spring. And last Sunday, at Michel-Chartrand Park in Longueuil, Québec I was one of the lucky runners who got to  enjoy it. When I woke up on the morning of the race, I asked myself, seriously, what possessed me to enter a race this early in the season? But once I set foot in the venue, a familiar park where I bring my kids and go running regularly, the anxiety I had when I woke up disappeared among the smiles, handshakes, and words of encouragement from the other racers. I don’t want to sound biased, but this race had…

• Mother’s Day: Gifts to Make Mom’s Heart Flutter

  NoemiL

  7 May 2012 | 2:30 pm

  Mother’s Day is often all about flowers, Sunday brunch, and for the lucky ones, a foot massage and a break from the dishes. To make an active mom really happy, forget the flowers and give her something she’ll remember instead: whatever she needs for her favourite activity. I don’t mean a shorts and t-shirt set bought on the fly, but a more personal gift. As a mom who does lots of different sports, I’m delighted to give you all kinds of themed gift ideas. Here’s a guide for children, husbands and grandchildren, with my suggestions for moms who like jogging, yoga,…

• Children’s Books: A Fine Balance Between Humans and Nature

  Theo

  4 May 2012 | 5:00 am

  Take a moment to step back in time through memory and imagination. Do you remember the children’s books you grew up with? More than 8,100 illustrations and 300 children’s books later, researchers have found a steady decline in images that depict scenes from nature. This according to a new study by a team at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and featured in the Globe and Mail. They examined the top books honoured by the Caldecott Medal, a prestigious literary award, between 1938 and 2008. It’s an award that researchers say influences book sales, schools, libraries and…

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  UNICEF News

• Partnership helps restore public services in rural Sri Lanka

  14 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  TRINCOMALEE, Sri Lanka, 15 May 2012 – It’s the morning rounds of the village mothers’ support group. Today, they’re visiting one of the poorest families in this remote village in eastern Sri Lanka.

• Ghana Health Service and UNICEF encourage mothers to deliver with help from skilled birth attendants

  13 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  TAMALE, Ghana, 14 May 2012 – Midwife Doris Azuma Bugri was sitting on the veranda of the Moglaa clinic, in northern Ghana, when she saw a pregnant woman walk into a compound across the street.

• In Madagascar, urban children highlight their needs through video

  13 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  ANTANANARIVO, Madagascar, 14 May 2012 - Fanomezanjanahary Lantoniaina sits in the training room of the Antananarivo-based French Institute of Madagascar. Born and raised at the outskirts of Madagascar’s capital city, she eagerly awaits the start of UNICEF’s OneMinutesJr. video workshop.

• FC Barcelona and UNICEF strengthen their shared commitment to children's sports and education

  10 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  BARCELONA, Spain, 11 May 2012 – In an event held yesterday at Camp Nou, the stadium of legendary football team FC Barcelona (FCB), the FC Barcelona Foundation and UNICEF reaffirmed their promise to work together to improve the lives of millions of children through sports and education.

• In Nepal, a collaboration between UNICEF and the Nepal Press Institute draws attention to the lives of women and children

  10 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  KATHMANDU, Nepal, 11 May 2012 – Fifty journalists in Nepal have been awarded for highlighting the harsh realities facing the country’s children and women.

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  Oxfam International RSS main feed

• Bold food security initiative needed from G8

  Joel M Bassuk

  16 May 2012 | 4:47 am

  On the eve of the G8 Summit, international agency Oxfam called on world leaders heading to Camp David to make predictable, measureable funding and policy commitments that will help 50 million people lift themselves out of poverty through sustainable, small-scale agriculture by 2015. Washington, DC— On the eve of the G8 Summit, international agency Oxfam called on world leaders heading to Camp David to make predictable, measureable funding and policy commitments that will help 50 million people lift themselves out of poverty through sustainable, small-scale agriculture by 2015. Almost a…

• Oxfam reaction to EU Finance Ministers’ talks on climate finance for the world’s poor

  Angela Corbalan

  15 May 2012 | 9:08 am

  At the start of the latest round of UN climate talks in Bonn, EU Finance Ministers today debated the state of play of Europe’s commitment to help fight climate change in developing countries. Lies Craeynest, Oxfam’s EU climate change expert, said: “Europe’s promise to help poor countries adapt to climate change and curb emissions when existing pledges run out this year appears to be on life support. It is unacceptable that Ministers only gave the faintest signal that developing countries will get any cash next year and beyond. “On a positive note, EU Ministers re-committed to…

• Imminent rains will jeopardize response to Sudans conflict, aid agencies warn

  Joel M Bassuk

  15 May 2012 | 6:25 am

  Seasonal rains due in Sudan and South Sudan will exacerbate already dire conditions in refugee camps, restrict travel and access, and heighten the risk of disease, a group of leading humanitarian agencies warned today. Refugee numbers soaring as violence continues Seasonal rains due in Sudan and South Sudan will exacerbate already dire conditions in refugee camps, restrict travel and access, and heighten the risk of disease, a group of leading humanitarian agencies warned today. The rains, which in some places have already started, will make many roads impassable, trapping people in unstable…

• Oxfam welcomes Europe’s unprecedented criticism of the Israeli Government’s West Bank policies

  Joel M Bassuk

  14 May 2012 | 11:45 am

  International humanitarian agency Oxfam welcomes the unprecedented stance taken by EU Foreign Ministers, meeting in Brussels today, which strongly criticizes Israeli government policies towards ‘Area C’ of the occupied West Bank. Demolition of Palestinian infrastructure by Israeli authorities, including EU-funded aid projects, such as water cisterns and animal shelters, has been on the rise [i], hindering Palestinian development and increasing the risk of displacement for already vulnerable communities. Tidhar Wald, Oxfam’s EU humanitarian policy advisor, said: "Europe has issued today…

• Oxfam & ONE welcome EU initiative to prevent yet another crisis in the Horn of Africa

  Joel M Bassuk

  14 May 2012 | 7:49 am

  EU Development Ministers, meeting today in Brussels, gave the green light to SHARE - a new European initiative to boost the prevention of hunger and famine in the Horn of Africa. Leading NGO agencies Oxfam and ONE welcomed the project as action is needed now to help people get back on their feet and be better prepared for the future. 13 million people have been affected by drought throughout the region. SHARE (Supporting Horn of Africa Resilience) aims to improve the transition from emergency assistance to long-term development aid. It also aims to strengthen food security and build disaster…

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  ONE

• World economists agree: child nutrition is a best buy in development

  Kelly Hauser

  15 May 2012 | 2:56 pm

  What would you do if you had $75 billion and four years to improve the world’s well-being? Recently 65 world-renowned researchers, economists and Nobel laureates got together and answered that question. They released their findings yesterday after more than a year of reviewing proposals and evidence, thanks to the Copenhagen Consensus Center. Being economists, they weighed their choices carefully using cost-benefit analyses. Seventy-five billion dollars may sound like a lot, but $18.75 billion (1/4 of $75 billion) represents only a 15 percent increase on top of the current $130 billion that…

• Peter Braid MP attends ONE Canada event in Ottawa

  Field

  15 May 2012 | 2:30 pm

  When Ben Leo, director of ONE’s global policy team and Sara Messer, policy manager from ONE in Washington, D.C., recently traveled to Ottawa, it seemed like a great chance to have a meet up with some of our ONE members in the Ottawa area. From left to right, Mark Entwhistle, Sara Messer, Peter Braid, MP for Kitchener-Waterloo, Sarah Stone, Ben Leo The event drew about 25 local members, many of whom were also members of our partner organization Engineers Without Borders Canada (EWB). Ben Leo talked about the exciting campaigns that ONE is currently running –- the Beginning of the End…

• What We’re Reading: African growth depends on food security

  Emily Walker

  15 May 2012 | 1:20 pm

  Africa must end hunger to sustain growth – U.N. – The United Nations Development Program said on Tuesday that “Africa needs to boost agricultural productivity and address the debilitating hunger that affects 27 percent of its populations if it is to sustain its economic boom.” The report highlighted that “investment in agricultural productivity was important not only for reducing hunger but also in creating jobs for Africa’s rapidly growing population.” (Reuters, Katy Migiro) Business, NGO leaders join hands to push progress on health goals – The MDG Health Alliance is a new…

• Bob Geldof: G8 leaders still capable of ending poverty

  Peter Taylor

  15 May 2012 | 12:31 pm

  This week Bob Geldof returned to Ethiopia to highlight various issues in the country including food security, in the run up to the G8 Summit due to take place at Camp David this weekend. Bob Geldof has called on the leaders of the G8 to make good on their promises to tackle extreme poverty and hunger. Over 290,000 ONE members have signed our Thrive petition calling on the G8 to support a global plan to ensure 50 million people escape poverty through agriculture and 15 million children no longer endure chronic malnutrition. Plus, this week thousands of ONE members have been sending messages to…

• A human yardstick

  Guest Blogger

  15 May 2012 | 9:12 am

  Victoria Quinn, senior vice president of programs at Helen Keller International discusses why a child’s first 1,000 days of life are the most important. This piece was republished from the Huffington Post with permission from the author. There is a time in a child’s life that has a profound impact on her ability to grow, learn and rise out of poverty. It’s the 1,000 day window beginning with a mother’s pregnancy through to her child’s 2nd birthday. During these critical 1,000 days, ensuring that mothers and children have proper nutrition can have a profound…

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  Business & Human Rights Resource Centre: Latest News

• [PDF] Report of the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences, Gulnara Shahinian

  3 Jul 2012 | 7:00 pm

  Children working in artisanal mines and quarries are subject to a series of violations of human rights and very often find themselves in conditions that amount to contemporary forms of slavery...Children are often treated by their employers as commodities – replaceable cheap labour to be thoroughly exploited...Children working in this sector face particular, and in some cases a combination of, physical, psychological, economic and sexual exploitation not found in other areas where children work...Root causes, manifestations and aggravating factors that lead to child slavery in the mining…

• ‘Pakistan facing workplace safety challenges’ [Pakistan]

  28 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  Pakistan is facing immense challenges in the fields of safety, health and environment at workplaces, which are mounting as result of globalization…Punjab needs to adopt law on occupational safety and health to protect the workers. These views were expressed by experts at a seminar on the occasion of World Day for Safety and Health at Work...

• Virginia ruling aids Alaska climate suit [USA]

  25 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  The Virginia Supreme Court has handed down an unprecedented ruling on companies’ liability for global warming-related damages — a first-in-the-nation decision that could portend massive consequences for energy companies and environmental lawyers. The ruling stems from an ongoing case in federal court, in which the Alaskan island town of Kivalina accused a handful of mostly U.S. energy companies of contributing to global warming, which it says has rendered the town uninhabitable...One of the energy companies...Arlington-based AES..., was then sued in Virginia by its insurance carrier,…

• [PDF] Penan ask Norwegian manager to respect their rights [Malaysian]

  19 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  The six Penan communities of Long Lutin, Long Pakan, Long Lilim, Ba Abang, Long Kawi and Long Item have sent letters to Torstein Dale Sjotveit, CEO of Sarawak Energy...the Malaysian power supplier in charge of the implementation of Sarawak’s dam projects, demanding that a stop be put to all further work on the proposed Baram mega-­‐dam. The people are against Torstein Dale Sjotveit’s plans for the dam, since the 1,200 MW Baram dam would flood their ancestral lands and villages, affecting a total of 20,000 natives...

• [PDF] Shiny Phone - Paltry Pay: How poorly paid mobile phone workers in South India Try To Make Ends Meet

  15 May 2012 | 7:00 pm

  ...[T]his report focuses on the living conditions of workers in the Nokia SEZ [in Sriperumbudur, South India] and examines the standard of life they can afford from the wages they receive. Nokia and its suppliers Foxconn and Wintek, all multi-national companies with operations worldwide should in principle be able to pay workers a living wage...[responses by Foxconn and Wintek below. Business & Human Rights Resource Centre also invited Nokia to respond but it declined to do so. If it does respond at a later date we will add its response here]

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  Aid Worker Daily

• Franck AYNES – “Kibati” (feat. Alain TUMAINI – DR Congo – Goma)

  Jon Thompson

  30 Apr 2012 | 10:41 am

  My friend and former colleague, Franck Aynes, just posted this video on on YouTube. Franck wrote, performed, filmed, and produced this video from his base in Goma, DRC where he works for the World Food Programme. Humanitarian logistics officers are incredibly talented individuals. Enjoy. Be sure to stop by Franck’s Facebook page and say hello.

• BBC – Syria crisis: Red Cross trying to negotiate ceasefire

  Jon Thompson

  20 Feb 2012 | 11:41 am

  Copyright: BBC/Reuters From the BBC World News site: The International Committee of the Red Cross says it is in talks with “all those concerned” in Syria’s conflict to negotiate a ceasefire. The group says it wants to negotiate a truce in the most affected areas to allow it to deliver aid packages. Correspondents say the fact that the ICRC has spoken publicly about the negotiations shows just how concerned it is by the situation in Syria. Click here to read the full story  

• MSF (Live Online Event) – At Any Price? Negotiating Access to Crisis Zones

  Jon Thompson

  20 Jan 2012 | 4:46 pm

  Copyright: MSF/H.J. Burkard If you want to know how hard it is to save a life you should definitely tune in for this event on January 31, 2012. From the site: Humanitarian negotiations are life-and-death issues for people in need, but they also raise troubling political and ethical dilemmas for the organizations that are engaged in them. In the forthcoming book Humanitarian Negotiations Revealed: The MSF Experience, published by Columbia University Press, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) takes a critical look at how its teams have negotiated to gain access to people…

• Photo Adventure in Vietnam with William Thompson

  Jon Thompson

  22 Dec 2011 | 2:23 pm

  For over 40 years my uncle, William Thompson, has been shooting photos for in some of the world’s most remote locations. He has shot throughout Asia, Africa, Europe, North South and Central America. He is well know for his work with National Geographic, the Marlboro cowboy and Wells Fargo. He even shot Bill Gates in his early 20′s when Microsoft was still a small company. Bill will lead a small group of individuals through northern Vietnam for 14 days where he will teach them the art of fine photography. If you would like to join this adventure, stay in the mountaintop Topas…

• Slowy App – A Great New App For Testing Your Sites In Low Bandwidth / High Latency Environments

  Jon Thompson

  2 Dec 2011 | 11:42 am

  I just came across this great little app on Y Combinator’s Hacker News site. Slowy markets itself as a “real-world connection simulator and bandwidth limiter” and it seems to work quite well. I am running it on a Mac and it was easy to install and switch on and off. I can test my sites in 56K and LTE network (mobile) environments. The folks over at Aptivate have spend a lot of time on the low bandwidth/ high latency issue and have created tools like Loband. Loband is fantastic but I still want to see all those images and video. Slowy provides a reality check for those of us…

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  Survival International Blog

• How to save Earth’s most threatened tribe.

  27 Apr 2012 | 8:05 am

  How to save Earth’s most threatened tribe.

• Photo

  25 Apr 2012 | 11:46 am

• "‘Dove!’ an Awá woman named Parakeet said. ’Let’s call her Dove Awá – doves sing and walk on the..."

  25 Apr 2012 | 11:43 am

  “‘Dove!’ an Awá woman named Parakeet said. ’Let’s call her Dove Awá – doves sing and walk on the ground.’ The Awá wait to choose their children’s names until they reach an age when the right name presents itself. Another of Parakeet’s daughters is called Forest Tree. One particularly wriggly child has just earned the name Earthworm.” - from How to save Earth’s most threatened tribe

• "I do not think the measure of a civilisation is how tall its buildings of concrete are, but rather..."

  12 Apr 2012 | 10:28 am

  “I do not think the measure of a civilisation is how tall its buildings of concrete are, but rather how well its people have learned to relate to their environment and fellow man.” - Sun Bear, Chippewa, USA

• ‘It was beautiful here,’ an Enawene Nawe man...

  11 Apr 2012 | 10:28 am

  ‘It was beautiful here,’ an Enawene Nawe man laments.

• 

  News from Survival International

• ‘Inside job’ as Peru eyes gas in uncontacted tribes' land

  16 May 2012 | 4:03 am

  A Nanti man. His tribe's land is set to be invaded as Peru furthers its gas exploration into protected areas. © Survival Secret plans reveal Peru is actively pursuing new gas reserves inside protected tribal land, a flagrant violation of laws that prevent such projects. The Nahua-Nanti Reserve in southeast Peru is known for its uncontacted Amazon tribes, but more controversially, for a wide stretch of gas fields called the Camisea project. Only last month, despite 75% of one gas block already dominating the reserve, Peru’s Ministry of Mines and Energy gave the Camisea consortium the…

• Tribal girl raped and murdered in Chittagong Hill Tracts as repression continues

  15 May 2012 | 6:33 am

  A family from the Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh, where killings, torture and rape against tribal people are common.© Mark McEvoy/Survival An eleven-year old girl from the Chakma tribe in Bangladesh has been raped and murdered by a settler. Sujata Chakma and her younger brother were grazing cows near their village when she was attacked on 9 May. A suspect has been arrested, but local indigenous people have little faith he will be brought to justice. Between January and May this year, at least six Jumma girls and women have been raped. Rina Dewan of the Hill Women’s Federation says,…

• Paraguay overflight confirms Brazilians’ destruction of Ayoreo land

  14 May 2012 | 6:19 am

  © Survival A Survival International overflight of the Chaco forest in Paraguay has confirmed fears that cattle ranchers are destroying the last hiding place of uncontacted Ayoreo Indians. Aerial views of the Chaco in northern Paraguay show large tracts of barren land that have been deforested to make way for hundreds of cattle. Brazilian owned companies River Plate S.A. and BBC S.A have both been caught illegally clearing land that belongs to the Ayoreo. Contacted members of the tribe have repeatedly expressed their fear for the lives of their relatives who remain hidden in the forest. But…

• Indians ‘cry with happiness’ at Brazilian Court ruling

  11 May 2012 | 5:27 am

  Pataxó Hã Hã Hãe Indians lobby the Brazilian authorities to uphold their land rights© José Cruz/ABr The Pataxó Hã-Hã-Hãe Indians of Brazil are celebrating a Supreme Court decision to allow them to live undisturbed on their land. The Pataxó, of Bahia state, have been subjected to violent conflict for decades as ranchers have been occupying their indigenous territory. They have been pushing to be able to live undisturbed on their ancestral land, a right guaranteed to them by Brazil’s constitution and by international law. After a long judicial battle, Brazil’s Supreme Court ruled…

• Bushmen’s fear as Botswana’s security forces return to the Kalahari

  10 May 2012 | 3:54 am

  Bushmen are being arrested despite their right to live and hunt in the CKGR.© Survival Botswana’s security forces are arresting and intimidating Bushmen, despite the tribe’s legal right to live and hunt in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR). Survival has received several reports that a large group of police officers have set up a permanent camp close to the community of Metsiamenong, which famously resisted Botswana’s brutal evictions. So far police have made at least 5 arrests after finding hunted meat in the community. No charges have been brought so far. Soldiers and…

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  About.com Civil Liberties

• The Long Political Afterlife of Joseph McCarthy

  30 Apr 2012 | 1:03 pm

  If you've been following recent statements by Rep. Allen West (R-FL) to the effect that "there are 78 to 81" socialists in the U.S. House, and that President Obama ...Read Full Post

• Derrick Bell and the Permanence of Segregation

  31 Mar 2012 | 4:10 pm

  Before the murder of Trayvon Martin and subsequent police coverup rightly became the most-covered news story of 2012, conservative bloggers criticized Barack Obama for his history of supporting Derrick Bell ...Read Full Post

• Not Kidding: Rush Limbaugh Supports Joseph Kony

  9 Mar 2012 | 10:21 am

  You've probably been following the Rush Limbaugh misogyny scandal, and you've probably also seen at least a link to the viral video calling for the capture of Ugandan terrorist and child-killer Joseph Kony. But did you know these two stories are connected?...Read Full Post

• The Gap Between Human Rights and Civil Liberties

  29 Feb 2012 | 2:37 pm

  As I was writing a definition of human rights, I remembered a conversation I'd had with several Indonesian human rights activists who asked, understandably, why the U.S. human rights debate ...Read Full Post

• Civil Liberties and Anamnesis

  31 Jan 2012 | 11:26 am

  I've expanded my coverage of the history of ...Read Full Post

• 

  INTER PRESS SERVICE

• Manila and Moscow Inch Closer to Labour Agreement

  15 May 2012 | 4:42 pm

  As the number of migrant Filipino workers in Russia inches closer to 5000, Moscow and Manila are busy negotiating a bilateral labour agreement that could allow thousands more overseas workers into various sectors of the Russian economy.

• EU Feels Force of Israeli Demolitions

  15 May 2012 | 4:14 pm

  All 27 foreign ministers of the European Union have strongly spoken out against Israeli demolitions in Area C of the West Bank. Since the beginning of 2011 not less than 60 EU-funded projects have been demolished while 110 others are currently at risk. Several analysts claim the Israeli authorities are specifically targeting EU-funded projects.

• Public Funds Could Help Provide Water and Electricity, Researchers Say

  15 May 2012 | 4:00 pm

  For several decades, governments around the globe have turned to privatisation as the best option to help relieve the world's destitute by providing them with health care services, water and electricity. By and large, however, this effort has failed.

• Adding Rice Farmers to the Rio+20 Agenda

  15 May 2012 | 3:09 pm

  The year 2011 was one of extremes for the small Sri Lankan village of Verugal.

• GEORGIA: Tbilisi Walks Diplomatic High Wire on Iranian Nuclear Issue

  15 May 2012 | 2:14 pm

  Georgia is clearly the closest U.S. ally in the South Caucasus, moving in lockstep with American interests on just about every foreign policy issue – except one: Iran.

• 

  EarthRights International

• Fourth Circuit allows case to proceed against private military contractors for torture at Abu Ghraib

  benjamin

  15 May 2012 | 4:50 pm

  On Friday, May 11, 2012, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, sitting in a rare 14-judge en banc panel, determined that claims can move forward in the Al-Shimari and Al-Quraishi cases against two private military contractors (L-3—formerally Titan—and CACI) alleged to have tortured and abused the plaintiffs at Abu Ghraib and other detention centers. In so doing, the Fourth Circuit nullified an earlier three-judge panel decision that both dismissed the cases and threatened to impose an expansive and dangerous limit on the ability of victims of abuses by military contractors to use state…

• "Law in the grand manner" at MLAI 2012

  bobbie

  11 May 2012 | 1:26 pm

  There is a void in my daily routine that only 16 crazy lawyers could fill. It has been about a week since we closed the 2012 session of the Mekong Legal Advocacy Institute, and with the e-mail and Facebook comments being exchanged, most of us are clearly still recovering from the high of living with newfound family for two weeks; or in my case, from the highlight of my nine months with ERI. My colleagues and I had spent most of the preceding month preparing to train public interest lawyers from the Mekong region – making travel arrangements, communicating with resource persons, preparing a…

• Be a citizen, too, not just a consumer

  colleen

  1 May 2012 | 1:00 pm

  Annie Leonard, blogging on the Huffington Post, recently asked her readers to view themselves as citizens first, not simply as consumers, and to push their governments to pass stronger regulations to protect human rights and the environment. Corporations, she argues, manufacture needs that don’t really exist, then blame consumer demand when their products are found to have been made using morally questionable practices. Obviously, consumers should choose sustainable products over those made using child labor, toxic chemicals, and other destructive actions, but the real changes won’t…

• Expanding Public Interest Law in the Mekong

  brad

  27 Apr 2012 | 1:50 pm

  Sixteen public interest lawyers and legal activists from around Southeast Asia have gathered in Chiang Mai for ERI’s two-week Mekong Legal Advocacy Institute (MLAI). Foremost on the agenda is an intensive training on human rights, environmental law and effective public interest practice by legal experts. Just as vibrant are the ongoing discussions about practice, strategy and the shared commitment to use the law to protect people and the environment. Concluding next week, the training will serve as a vehicle not only for enriching the legal knowledge of lawyers from the Mekong, but also for…

• As expected, Bowoto v. Chevron petition is denied after Mohamad decision

  marco

  24 Apr 2012 | 10:34 am

  As I noted last week, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Mohamad v. Palestinian Authority that only human beings - not corporations or organizations - could be sued under the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA). Yesterday, the Supreme Court denied our petition for certiorari in Bowoto v. Chevron Corp., which means an end to that lawsuit. The decision on the Bowoto petition was expected, because the only issue in the petition was whether corporations could be sued under the TVPA. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled that the Bowoto plaintiffs could not sue Chevron under the TVPA…

• 

  Peace and Justice from YES! magazine

• North Carolina's Fight for Marriage Equality Continues

  Sue Sturgis

  15 May 2012 | 3:04 pm

  In the wake of North Carolina's new amendment banning same-sex marriage, couples across the state are protesting by requesting marriage licenses.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/yes/peace-justice/~4/MZrkSxsbTfI" height="1" width="1"/>

• Ilana "Invincible" Weaver: Hip-Hop Activist

  Shannan Stoll

  14 May 2012 | 5:41 pm

  Powerful, passionate, and politically charged rhymes that speak for marginalized people.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/yes/peace-justice/~4/yybQHoqQAik" height="1" width="1"/>

• Rabbi Steven Greenberg: Advocate for Acceptance

  Shannan Stoll

  14 May 2012 | 5:01 pm

  Bringing personal warmth and serious scholarship to advocacy for marriage equality in Orthodox Judaism.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/yes/peace-justice/~4/G4jDDn1Vdc8" height="1" width="1"/>

• “You Have My Permission to Wear a Hoodie Every Day”

  Rasha Hamid

  11 May 2012 | 12:49 pm

  In the wake of Trayvon Martin’s death, what advice should a mother give to her young, brown son? Rasha Hamid pondered that question, and wrote this poem to her son Jibreel.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/yes/peace-justice/~4/TV0YkVMtx4Y" height="1" width="1"/>

• Same-Sex Marriage Brings Healing to Me—and My Tribe

  Madeline Ostrander

  11 May 2012 | 12:26 pm

  Heather Purser set out to win gay marriage rights within the Suquamish Tribe and found herself on a personal journey toward self-acceptance.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/yes/peace-justice/~4/3dbd7QzBrNo" height="1" width="1"/>

• 

  Women News Network

• Nepal: Concern over condition of elderly, women and children homeless by evictions

  Women News Network

  16 May 2012 | 5:17 am

  BM - Bikyamasr – Wednesday, 16 May 2012 (originally published 13 May)   The Asian Human Rights Commission condemns the excessive use of force and the lack of due process in the eviction of the community living in the squatter settlements in Thapathali, Kathmandu on the banks of the Bagmati River on 8 May 2012. [...]

• U.S. FBI works to stop discrimination of Muslims

  Women News Network

  15 May 2012 | 5:40 pm

  Nadia S. Mohammad - WNN Opinion (WNN/CGN) New York, N.Y.: New York, New York – As the American public reads of yet another report released on governmental surveillance of Muslim American communities, it is refreshing to know that for the first time since the 9/11 attacks, the US Senate Judiciary Committee, along with various state legislatures [...]

• INDIA: Magida dalit woman hero moves beyond caste and ‘untouchability’

  Women News Network

  15 May 2012 | 5:15 pm

  Mary Madiga as told to Stella Paul – WNN MDG Stories (WNN/PL) Warangal, Andhra Pradesh, INDIA: When I was 25 I went to jail for demanding jobs and civic facilities for Madigas, the Dalit community that I belong to. I was dragged into the police van by constables who pulled my hair, slapped and kicked [...]

• International Red Cross works with widows to track the missing

  Women News Network

  15 May 2012 | 4:50 pm

  WNN Breaking (WNN/ICRC) Kathmandu, NEPAL: Laxmi Devi Khadka has been in the dark about the fate of her husband for over nine years. In 2003, armed people came to her house in Bardia, southern Nepal, and took her husband, saying they wanted to speak to him for a few minutes. He has never been seen [...]

• Native American women have little recourse against attackers

  Women News Network

  15 May 2012 | 4:02 pm

  Katie Reilly with Marielle DeJong – WNN Opinion (WNN/PM) Washington, DC, U.S.: As a result of the unprecedented rates of violent crimes against Native American women, there has been an increase in legislation dealing with criminal investigations and legal procedures on Native American reservations. For example, the Stand Against Violence and Empower Native Women Act (SAVE [...]

• 

  New Internationalist - The people, the ideas, the action in the fight for global justice

• Murder won't stop the fight for Cambodia's forests

  New Internationalist

  15 May 2012 | 10:38 am

  The killing of activist Chut Wutty by the military on April 26 must not be swept under the carpet, says Fran Lambrick.

• Hunger and the 0.7% aid debate

  New Internationalist

  14 May 2012 | 10:06 am

  Poor people need aid but it needs to be targeted and the structures that perpetuate global inequality must also be tackled, says Natasha Adams.

• Tips for searching newint.org

  New Internationalist

  14 May 2012 | 7:30 am

  Charlie Harvey looks at some top tips for searching the New Internationalist website.

• Climate-proofing projects: a map

  New Internationalist

  14 May 2012 | 5:28 am

  From air-conditioned bus stops in Dubai to painting Peruvian hill tops: a graphic guide to humankind's steps to adapt to global warming.

• Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing

  New Internationalist

  11 May 2012 | 8:55 am

  And the winner was.....