The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) held on January 17 that a United Kingdom prisoner’s “whole life” sentence does not violate Article 3 (the prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) where the Secretary of State’s discretion to reduce the sentence is bound by domestic law that recognizes
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Civil Society In Jordan this week, a military court arrested and charged eight activists with “insulting the King,” and “incitement to spread chaos,” through social media posts. [Al Jazeera] On Wednesday, Turkish authorities denied entry to New York Times correspondent Rob Nordland allegedly based on Nordland’s prior coverage of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. [Al Jazeera] In Mexico, environmental and land
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The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) unanimously held last week that requiring two Muslim girls below the age of puberty to participate in a school’s compulsory mixed gender swim class did not violate their parents’ right to religious freedom under Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights (the Convention). See ECtHR, Osmanoǧlu and Kocabaş v. Switzerland, no.
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A trial chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) recently rejected defendant Bosco Ntaganda’s claim that the Court lacks jurisdiction to try him for the war crimes of rape and sexual slavery of child soldiers in his own forces. [ICC Press Release] The January 4 decision was issued in response to the defense’s claim that the Court cannot assert jurisdiction
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Civil Society On Thursday, Human Rights Watch launched its World Report 2017, a 687-page report that chronicles the situation of human rights and identifies impediments to human rights protections, such as the rise of demagogues. [Human Rights Watch] In Israel, Palestinian citizens launched a nationwide strike in response to government demolitions of Palestinian homes on Tuesday. [Al Jazeera] This week,
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The new United Nations Secretary General, António Guterres, recently appealed to Member States to join him in committing to ensuring and sustaining peace and has further called for a holistic approach to the UN’s work through close coordination between the UN’s three pillars: peace and security, sustainable development, and human rights policies. Guterres, who assumed office on January 1, 2017,
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Civil Society The United Nations requested the government of Burundi to remove a ban placed this week on a prominent rights group in the region, and to lessen other restrictions waged against civil society organizations in the past three months. [Washington Post] This Thursday, Bahrain reinstated arrest powers within its domestic spy service in a move that diverges from reforms
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The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) recently released a decision vindicating the rights of two undocumented workers in the United States whose employers denied them medical benefits and wage replacement after they were injured on the job, in a context of domestic jurisprudence and policy limiting labor protections for undocumented migrants. See IACHR, Merits Report No. 50/16, Case 12.834,
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The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) examined for the first time the issue of informed consent to medical treatment and forced sterilization, in its judgment in I.V. v. Bolivia, released last week. [IACtHR Press Release (in Spanish)] The case involves a Peruvian refugee who was sterilized by a tubal ligation performed without her informed consent in a Bolivian public
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Civil Society In Argentina this week, human rights advocate Milagro Sala, and other members of the organization Tupac Amaru, were sentenced to 2-3 years probation, or suspended prison, for “aggravated damage” after participating in a protest. [Telesur] A United Nations agency condemned the murder of journalist, Larry Que, of the Phillippines, and called for an investigation into the death as
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