Miyoko Schinner, a pioneer of the plant-based dairy space, is the latest instructor to teach a course at online learning platform Meet The Vegans.
Months before the launch of her seventh cookbook, Miyoko Schinner is back doing what she best loves: making dairy-free cheese.
Two years after she left the brand she founded, Miyoko’s Creamery, Schinner has joined forces with online learning platform Meet The Vegans to lead a masterclass on all things plant-based dairy.
The course is inspired by the forthcoming book The Homemade Vegan Creamery, whose recipes and techniques will form the basis of the digital cooking class, which will feature cheeses, butter, and snacks made from leftover ingredients.
Schinner has been making and selling plant-based cheese for decades, but the latest cookbook contains “new ways to make cheese, using fermentation and coagulation”, and ingredients she hasn’t publicly explored before.
“I’ve gotten back into the kitchen over the last year, back on the bench, and I have been working and innovating all these new recipes on making fresh and hard cheeses using a variety of plant milks, whether it’s watermelon seeds or sunflower seeds,” she said.
Miyoko Schinner looks to promote artisanal vegan cheese
The course, which will set you back $149 and features over 30 videos, has a range of innovative cheeses devised by Schinner. The Golden Sunshine cream and mascarpone are meant for both sweet and savoury dishes, the Reggie vegan goat’s cheese is a chèvre-style offering, joined by another French favourite, a truffle-infused vegan brie.
There’s also an Angel’s sharp Cheddar made from potatoes, and a watermelon seed mozzarella. Schinner will also be teaching participants how to make culinary butter with high-fat content for baking, cooking and spreading. And for all the pulp leftover from making the base milks and cheeses, she has devised a recipe for zero-waste crackers.
“Plant-based cheeses today, commercially, are sometimes… I would have to classify them as ultra-processed foods. A lot of the stuff that’s available today is unfortunately just made out of oil and starch. You know, usually the worst forms of oil,” Schinner told the Meet The Vegans podcast.
“And so I can’t really recommend them, which is why I really thought that it was important to try to discover a new way to make cheese, embracing whole foods,” she added, outlining how she ended up publishing her 2012 title, Artisan Vegan Cheese.
She added that vegan cheesemakers around the world are now taking a more whole-food-forward approach. “Collaborating with Meet The Vegans allows me to share my passion for artisanal vegan cheese with a global audience,” she said, outlining her aim to inspire “both new and seasoned chefs” about plant-based cuisine.
“Miyoko is truly the queen of vegan cheese, and sharing her latest groundbreaking innovations ahead of her cookbook launch means our community gets an exclusive glimpse into her unmatched expertise,” said Meet The Vegans co-founder Laura Belyea. “This course marks a milestone not only for our platform but for plant-based cuisine as a whole.”
Meet The Vegans was established in January this year, and features courses from a host of plant-based chefs around the world, including Wicked Kitchen co-founder Chad Sarno and former Unity Diner head chef Greg Hanger.
Moreover, the platform also offers an AI Chef tool to help home cooks decide what to make with the ingredients they have, in a bid to reduce food waste and promote plant-based versions of conventional meat dishes.
Celebrating plant-based milk for what it is
Courtesy: Celeste Noche
Schinner made her name through an all-vegan eatery called Now and Zen, which became popular for its plant-based turkey. After selling the restaurant, she started a namesake natural foods company business, which shut a few years later. At the time, the chef already had three cookbooks to her name, and in the years that followed, she doubled down on the vegan cheese world and created Miyoko’s Creamery (then Miyoko’s Kitchen) in 2014.
The business rapidly became a leader in the alternative dairy space, selling non-dairy cheeses, butters, and spreads. But in 2022, Schinner was ousted as CEO, following internal disputes with executives. The company sued its founder for alleged breach of contract, a violation of trade secrets, and stealing company IP, but Schinner countersued, saying she was “blindsided” and alleging that sexism led to her dismissal.
Months later, the two parties came to a resolution, with Miyoko’s Creamery installing former Beyond Meat CMO Stuart Kronauger as CEO, and Schinner going back to the bench as well as building her animal sanctuary, Rancho Compasión, in San Francisco.
“I’ll be sharing new ideas for many plant dairy foods, including new methods for making cheese and butter (no, the experimentation hasn’t stopped, and I’m at the top of my game again),” she told Green Queen in an interview last year.
While her masterclass does have analogues like Cheddar, chévre, mozzarella and brie, she posited the idea that plant-based milk should be celebrated for its own flavours. “We have cow’s milk cheese and then we have sheep’s milk and goat’s milk, and they don’t try to imitate each other. Each milk has its own characteristics and they create their different varieties of cheeses,” she said on the platform’s podcast.
“If we evolve that into the realm of plant milk, we can think about cheese in the same way. Why not let each plant milk express its own unique properties? Let’s create new cheeses. I believe the future of cheese is getting back to plant milks, rather than trying to replicate animal cheeses using oil and starch,” she added.
“Let’s explore the world of plant milk and find out what flavours and textures can we create from them. It’s an entire evolution that will continue into the future. We’ve got a couple thousand years to get it right.”
China’s Communist Party is clamping down on the secret hobby of some high-ranking officials: reading banned books, a series of state media reports suggest.
Officials from glitzy Shanghai to poverty-stricken Guizhou have been accused in recent months of “privately possessing and reading banned books and periodicals,” according to state media reports, which typically surface when the officials are probed by the party’s disciplinary arm.
Senior officials have traditionally enjoyed privileged access to materials banned as potentially subversive for the wider population, via the “neibu,” or internal, publishing system, former Communist Party officials told RFA Mandarin in recent interviews.
Now it appears that President Xi Jinping is coming for their personal libraries and private browsing habits in a bid to instill the same ideas in all party members regardless of rank.
A man walks past posters about Chinese political books displayed at the Hong Kong Book Fair in Hong Kong, July 18, 2012. (Philippe Lopez/AFP)
During the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, any foreign book could be considered a “poisonous weed that promotes the bourgeois lifestyle.”
Overseas publications are often banned or tightly controlled in China, either online, or via a complex process of political vetting by the authorities, including a 2017 requirement that anyone selling foreign publications in China must have a special license.
Wider knowledge makes better leaders
Former Party School professor Cai Xia said officials were generally allowed to read whatever they liked until the turn of the century. The arrangement encouraged officials to broaden their perspective, making them better leaders.
“Politics, like art, requires imagination,” Cai said.
“Because experience shows that the more single-minded and closed-off the thinking of the Communist Party, especially the senior cadres, the narrower their vision and the poorer their thinking, and the harder it is for them to grasp the complex phenomena and situations that have emerged in China’s rapid development,” she told Radio Free Asia.
Wider reading encourages deeper thought, which helps China “to move forward,” she said.
Masks, goggles and books collected from the Occupy zone are seen on the table at guesthouse in Hong Kong Dec. 30, 2014. (Tyrone Siu/Reuters)
Du Wen, former executive director of the Legal Advisory Office of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region government, said the purge of readers of banned publications is worrying.
“This phenomenon is so scary, because it sends the message that there is no independence in the ranks of the Chinese Communist Party,” Du said. “Even dialectical materialism and critical thinking have become evidence of guilt.”
Nearly 20 officials have been accused of similar infractions, Du said, basing the number on his observation of media reports.
Officials have been tight-lipped about the names of the books and periodicals these officials were reading, yet the accusations keep coming.
Those targeted
In November 2023, the party launched a probe into former Zhejiang provincial Vice Gov. Zhu Congjiu, accusing him of losing his way ideologically.
In addition to making off-message comments in public, Zhu had “privately brought banned books into the country and read them over a long period of time,” according to media reports at the time.
In June 2023, the Beijing branch of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection expelled former state assets supervisory official Zhang Guilin for “possessing and reading books and periodicals with serious political issues,” alongside a slew of other alleged offenses including “engaging in power-for-sex and money-for-sex transactions.”
Many of those targeted have been in the state-controlled financial system, while some have been concentrated in the central province of Hunan and the southwestern megacity of Chongqing, according to political commentator Yu Jie.
A vendor attends to a customer next to images and statues depicting late Chinese chairman Mao Zedong, at the secondhand books section of Panjiayuan antique market in Beijing, China, Aug. 3, 2024. (Florence Lo/Reuters)
“Interestingly, a lot of officials in the political and legal system, national security and prison systems, which are responsible for maintaining stability and persecuting dissidents, are also keen on reading banned books,” Yu wrote in a recent commentary for RFA Mandarin, citing the case of former state security police political commissar Li Bin.
In Hubei province, the commission went after one of their own in party secretary Wang Baoping, accusing him of “buying and reading books that distorted and attacked the 18th Party Congress.”
“Monitoring what people are reading shows the authoritarian system’s determination and ability to maintain its power and to destroy any resources that could be subversive and any doubts about the legitimacy of the authorities’ rule,” Yu wrote in a Chinese-language commentary on May 28.
“Xi Jinping’s … goal is to turn more than 80 million party members into marionettes or zombies, and follow him, like the Pied Piper, in a mighty procession that leads to hell,” he said.
Categories
Zhang Huiqing, a former editor at the People’s Publishing House, told RFA Mandarin that “gray” books were allowed to be published under the watchful eye of the party’s Central Propaganda Department, which also reviewed and vetted foreign-published books for translation into Chinese, for distribution as “neibu” reading material.
Divided into categories A, B and C, where A was restricted to the smallest number of officials, “reactionary” books were those that could potentially cause people to challenge the party leadership, and they were once distributed in a highly controlled manner, Zhang said.
Du Wen said that while he was an official in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region government, he had access to a slew of foreign news outlets not usually sold on the streets of Chinese cities, including Bloomberg, The New York Times, The Washington Post and newspapers published in democratic Taiwan.
“These were all allowed because if you want to do research, you have to understand what’s going on overseas,” Du said. “How can you research something if you don’t understand the situation?”
A visitor walks past an exhibit featuring a large portrait of Chinese President Xi Jinping at the newly-completed Museum of the Communist Party of China in Beijing, June 25, 2021. (Mark Schiefelbein/AP)
Yet recent changes to party disciplinary regulations have brought more publications into the danger zone.
Nowadays, any publication not entirely in line with orthodox Marxism-Leninism or the official view of Communist Party history is likely to be seen as “reactionary,” as is any information about China’s highest-ranking leaders, both past and present, according to a senior figure in the Chinese publishing industry who spoke to RFA Mandarin on condition of anonymity.
“There’s a lot of randomness and contingency that affects whether something winds up being labeled as reactionary,” the person said. “It also depends on the level of understanding and personal ambition of the person in charge of an investigation.”
And times change, making it hard for officials to stay on the right side of the rules.
“A book that was reactionary yesterday may not be reactionary today, and vice versa,” the person said.
Public hotline
Typically, Chinese publishing houses take direct instructions from the General Administration of Press and Publication and its provincial branches about what they can and can’t publish.
But a public hotline and a highly cautious attitude in recent years has meant that a book can be banned on the basis of a single phone call from a concerned individual.
A class in the China Executive Leadership Academy in Yan’an, the headquarters of the Chinese Communist Party from 1936 to 1947, in Shaanxi province, May 10, 2021. (Hector Retamal/AFP)
The senior publishing industry figure said one work of non-fiction was canned on the say-so of the widow of a senior cadre because she didn’t like the way her late husband was portrayed. The man had only played a minor role in the book.
“All of our editing, proofreading, binding, design, printing, marketing and distribution work was wasted,” the person said. “We had already printed several thousand copies of the book, but we had to send them to be pulped.”
The Chinese Communist Party’s internal rule-book entry on what constitutes a banned book offense has been amended three times since 2015, with categories being added each time.
Article 47 of the original regulations issued in 2003 warn: “Anyone who brings reactionary books, audio-visual products, electronic reading materials and so on into the country from abroad shall be criticized and educated; if the circumstances are serious, they will be given a warning or a serious warning; more serious offenses will be disciplined by removal from party post, probation or expulsion from the party.”
Since 2015, the rules have been updated three times to include anyone “reading privately, browsing or listening” to banned material, which now includes “online text, images and audiovisual material.”
Another senior media figure who requested anonymity said the key factor that makes a book reactionary these days is whether or not it tells the truth, especially about the Chinese government.
“Actually, the most reactionary thing is the truth,” the person said, “because the truth could shake the foundations of party rule.”
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Luisetta Mudie and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Zhu Liye for RFA Mandarin.
According to a new report by Global Witness released on 10 September, more than 2,100 land and environmental defenders were killed globally between 2012 and 2023.
An estimated 196 land and environmental defenders were killed in 2023 around the world, according to a new Global Witness report published today
The new figures take the total number of defenders killed between 2012 to 2023 to 2,106
For the second year running, Colombia had the highest number of killings worldwide – with a record 79 defenders killed last year, followed by Brazil (25), Mexico (18) and Honduras (18)
Once again, Latin America had the highest number of recorded killings worldwide, with 166 killings overall – 54 killings across Mexico and Central America and 112 in South America
Environmental defenders are also being increasingly subject to range of tactics for silencing those who speak out for the planet across Asia, the UK, EU and US
The new figures bring the total number of defender killings to 2,106 between 2012 and 2023.
Overall, Colombia was found to be the deadliest country in the world, with 79 deaths in total last year – compared to 60 in 2022, and 33 in 2021. This is the most defenders killed in one country in a single year Global Witness has ever recorded. With 461 killings from 2012 to 2023, Colombia has the highest number of reported environmental defender killings globally on record.
Other deadly countries in Latin America include Brazil, with 25 killings last year, and Mexico and Honduras, which both had 18 killings.
Central America has emerged as one of the most dangerous places in the world for defenders. With 18 defenders killed in Honduras, the country had the highest number of killings per capita in 2023. A total of 10 defenders were also killed in Nicaragua last year, while four were killed in Guatemala, and four in Panama.
Worldwide, Indigenous Peoples and Afrodescendents continue to be disproportionately targeted, accounting for 49% of total murders.
Laura Furones, Lead Author and Senior Advisor to the Land and Environmental Defenders Campaign at Global Witness, said:
“As the climate crisis accelerates, those who use their voice to courageously defend our planet are met with violence, intimidation, and murder. Our data shows that the number of killings remains alarmingly high, a situation that is simply unacceptable.
While establishing a direct relationship between the murder of a defender and specific corporate interests remains difficult, Global Witness identified mining as the biggest industry driverby far, with 25 defenders killed after opposing mining operations in 2023. Other industries include fishing (5), logging (5), agribusiness (4), roads and infrastructure (4) and hydropower (2).
In total, 23 of the 25 mining-related killings globally last year happened in Latin America. But more than 40% of all mining-related killings between 2012 and 2023 occurred in Asia – home to significant natural reserves of key critical minerals vital for clean energy technologies.
As well as highlighting the number of killings worldwide, the report unearths wider trends in non-lethal attacks and their harmful impacts on communities globally. It highlights cases of enforced disappearances and abductions, pointed tactics used in both the Philippines and Mexico in particular, as well as the wider use of criminalisation as a tactic to silence activists across the world.
The report also explores the crackdown on environmental activists across the UK, Europe and the US, where laws are increasingly being weaponised against defenders, and harsh sentences are more frequently imposed on those who have played a role in climate protests. The findings form part of a concerning trend of criminalisation cases emerging worldwide.
Despite the escalating climate crisis – and governments pledging to achieve the Paris Agreement target of 1.5C – land and environmental defenders are being increasingly subject to a wide range of attacks to stop their efforts to protect the planet. At least 1,500 defenders have been killed since the adoption of the Paris Agreement on 12 December 2015.
Nonhle Mbuthuma, author of the report’s foreword and Goldman Environmental Prize Winner 2024, said:
“Across every corner of the globe, those who dare to expose the devastating impact of extractive industries — deforestation, pollution, and land grabbing — are met with violence and intimidation. This is especially true for Indigenous Peoples, who are essential in the fight against climate change, yet are disproportionately targeted year after year.
The New York Times (8/21/24), knowing that “outrage” sells, saves for the last paragraph the information that a supposedly canceled author turned down an offer to reschedule his talk in the same bookstore.
Author and journalist Joshua Leifer is the latest scribe to be—allegedly—canceled. A talk for his new book, Tablets Shattered: The End of an American Jewish Century and the Future of Jewish Life, at a Brooklyn bookstore was canceled when a member of the store’s staff objected to Leifer being joined by a liberal rabbi who was also a Zionist, although still critical of Israel’s right-wing government (New York Times, 8/21/24).
Leifer’s book is doing well as a result of the saga (Forward, 8/27/24). Meanwhile, the bookstore worker wasn’t so lucky, when the venue’s owner said “he would try to reschedule the event” and said “that the employee” responsible for canceling the event “‘is going to be terminated today’” (New York Jewish Week, 8/21/24).
It’s worth dissecting the affair and its impact to truly assess who can gain popular sympathy in the name of “free speech,” and who cannot, and how exactly Leifer has portrayed what happened.
‘One-state maximalism’
To Joshua Leifer (Atlantic, 8/27/24), opposition to platforming Zionists is “straightforwardly antisemitic.”
Leifer is a journalist who has produced nuanced coverage of Israel and Jewish politics for Jewish Currents, the New York Review of Books and other outlets. Reflecting on the bookstore affair, Leifer said in the Atlantic (8/27/24) that Jewish writers like him are in a bind because of the intransigence of the left, saying “Jews who are committed to the flourishing of Jewish life in Israel and the Diaspora, and who are also outraged by Israel’s brutal war in Gaza, feel like we have little room to maneuver.”
He added:
My experience last week was so demoralizing in part because such episodes make moving the mainstream Jewish community much harder. Every time a left-wing activist insists that the only way to truly participate in the fight for peace and justice is to support the dissolution of Israel, it reinforces the zero-sum (and morally repulsive) idea that opposing the status quo requires Israel’s destruction. Rhetorical extremism and dogmatism make it easier for right-wing Israel supporters to dismiss what should be legitimate demands—for instance, conditions on US military aid—as beyond the pale.
The new left-wing norm that insists on one-state maximalism is not only a moral mistake. It is also a strategic one. If there is one thing that the past year of cease-fire activism has illustrated, it is that changing US policy on Israel requires a broad coalition. That big tent must have room for those who believe in Jewish self-determination and are committed to Israel’s existence, even as they work to end its domination over Palestinians.
No ‘destruction’ required
For me, personally, canceling Leifer’s talk was a bad move. No one would have been forced to listen or attend, and if someone wanted to challenge the inclusion of a moderate Zionist at the event, they could have done so in the question and answer session. Speech should usually be met with more speech.
But Leifer is somewhat disingenuous about a “zero-sum” game that forces people into the “morally repulsive” concept that “requires Israel’s destruction.” Many anti-Zionists and non-Zionists believe that the concept of one state, “from the river to the sea,” means a democratic state that treats all its people—Arab, Jew and otherwise—equally. Leifer’s counterposing being “committed to Israel’s existence” with “one-state maximalism” suggests that the Israel whose “existence” he is committed to is one in which one ethnic group is guaranteed supremacy over others. People who are committed to the preservation of Israel as an ethnostate are probably going to have a hard time being in a “big tent” with those who “work to end its domination over Palestinians.”
It is understandable, given the context, that some people might object to a Zionist speaker on a panel while a genocide is being carried out in Zionism’s name. Would the Atlantic have reserved editorial space if an avowed Ba’athist was booted from a panel on Syria?
And Leifer is hardly being censored, and he has much more than a “little room to maneuver.” He has access to a major publisher and the pages of notable periodicals, and is pursuing a PhD at Yale University. His book sales are doing fine, and the event’s cancellation has, if anything, helped his reputation. (It got him a commission at the Atlantic, after all.)
Free speech protects everyone
Osita Nwanevu (New Republic, 7/6/20) writes in defense of “freedom of association, the under-heralded right of individuals to unite for a common purpose or in alignment with a particular set of values.”
Meanwhile, a bookstore worker who expressed a questionable opinion got fired. Free speech debates tend to value the importance and rights to a platform of the saintly media class—the working class, however, doesn’t get the same attention, despite the fact that “free speech” is meant to protect everyone, not just those who write and talk for a living.
And expressing the opinion that a bookstore should not be promoting Zionism is just as much a matter of free speech as advocating Zionism itself. The First Amendment doesn’t stop publications, university lecture committees, cable television networks and, yes, bookstores from curating the views and speech they want to platform. As FAIR has quoted Osita Nwanevu at the New Republic (7/6/20) before:
Like free speech, freedom of association has been enshrined in liberal democratic jurisprudence here and across the world; liberal theorists from John Stuart Mill to John Rawls have declared it one of the essential human liberties. Yet associative freedom is often entirely absent from popular discourse about liberalism and our political debates, perhaps because liberals have come to take it entirely for granted.
Whose speech is punished?
eLife‘s Michael Eisen’s approval of an Onionheadline (“Dying Gazans Criticized for Not Using Last Words to Condemn Hamas”) was deemed to be “detrimental to the cohesion of the community we are trying to build” (Science, 10/23/23).
Worse is what Leifer leaves out. While his event should not have been canceled, he fails to put this in the context of many other writers who have suffered more egregious cancellation because they exercised free speech in defense of Palestinians. Those writers include Masha Gessen (FAIR.org, 12/15/23), Viet Thanh Nguyen (NPR, 10/24/23) and Jazmine Hughes (Vanity Fair, 11/15/23).
New York University has “changed its guidelines around hate speech and harassment to include the criticism of Zionism as a discriminatory act” (Middle East Eye, 8/27/24). Artforum fired its top editor, David Velasco, for signing a letter in defense of Palestinian rights (New York Times, 10/26/23). Dozens of Google workers were “fired or placed on administrative leave…for protesting the company’s cloud-computing contract with Israel’s government” (CNN, 5/1/24). Michael Eisen lost his job as editor of the science journal eLife (Science, 10/23/23) because he praised an Onion article (10/13/23).
Leifer’s Atlantic piece erroneously gives the impression that since the assault on Gaza began last October, it has been the pro-Palestinian left that has enforced speech norms. A question for such an acclaimed journalist is: Why would he omit such crucial context?
‘Litmus test’
The lead example of “antisemitism on…the left” offered by the Atlantic (3/4/24) was a high school protest of the bombing of Gaza at which “from the river to the sea” was reportedly chanted.
Leifer has allowed the Atlantic to spin the narrative that it is the left putting the squeeze on discourse, when around the country, at universities and major publications, it’s pro-Palestinian views that are being attacked by people in power. The magazine’s Michael Powell (4/22/24) referred to the fervor of anti-genocide activists as “oppressive.” Theo Baker, son of New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker, claimed in the Atlantic (3/26/24) that his prestigious Stanford University was overrun with left-wing “unreason” when he came face to face with students who criticized Israel.
Franklin Foer used the outlet (3/4/24) to assert that in the United States, both the left and right are squeezing Jews out of social life. Leifer is now the latest recruit in the Atlantic’s movement to frame all Jews as victims of the growing outcry against Israel’s genocide, even when that outcry includes a great many Jews.
Leifer’s piece adds to the warped portrait painted by outlets like the New York Times, which published an op-ed (5/27/24) by James Kirchick, of the conservative Jewish magazine Tablet, that asserted that “a litmus test has emerged across wide swaths of the literary world effectively excluding Jews from full participation unless they denounce Israel.” A great many canceled pro-Palestine voices would have something to add to that, but they know they can barely get a word in edgewise in most corporate media—unlike Kirchick, Foer or Leifer.
Leifer’s event should not have been canceled, and I would have been annoyed if I were in his position, but he continues to have literary success and is smartly cashing in on his notoriety. He should not, however, have lent his voice to such a lopsided narrative about free speech.
This conference, the first of its kind in 20 years, served as a crucial platform to address the pressing challenges and core issues faced by Pacific media.
Associate Professor Shailendra Singh, the convenor of the conference and co-editor of the new book, emphasised the conference’s primary goals — to stimulate research, discussion, and debate on Pacific media, and to foster a deeper understanding of its challenges.
“Our region hasn’t escaped the calamitous impacts of the two biggest events that have shaken the media sector — digital disruption and the covid-19 pandemic,” he said.
“Both events have posed significant challenges for news media organisations and journalists, to the point of being an existential threat to the industry as we know it. This isn’t very well known or understood outside the news media industry.”
Waves of Change: Media, Peace, and Development in the Pacific, authored by Dr Singh, Fiji Deputy Prime Minister Professor Biman Prasad, and Dr Amit Sarwal, offers a comprehensive collection of interdisciplinary research, insights, and analyses at the intersection of media, conflict, peacebuilding, and development in the Pacific – a region experiencing rapid and profound change.
Dr Singh noted that media issues had grown increasingly complex due to heightened poverty, underdevelopment, corruption, and political instability.
“Media and communication play vital roles in the framing of conflict, security, and development in public and political discourses, ultimately influencing progression or regression in peace and stability. This is particularly true in the era of digital media,” Dr Singh said.
Launching the Waves of Change book . . . contributor Dr David Robie (from left), co-editor Fiji Deputy Prime Minister Professor Biman Prasad, PNG Minister of Information and Communication Technology Timothy Masiu, co-editor Associate Professor Shailendra Singh, and co-editor Dr Amit Sarwal. Image: The Australia Today
Dr Amit Sarwal said that the primary aim of the new book was to address and revisit critical questions linking media, peacebuilding, and development in the Pacific. He expressed a desire to bridge gaps in training, publishing, and enhance practical applications in these vital areas particularly amongst young journalists in the Pacific.
Winds of Change . . . shedding light on the intricate relationship between media, peace, and development in the Pacific. Image: APMN
Professor Biman Prasad is hopeful that this collection will shed light on the intricate relationship between media, peace, and development in the Pacific. He stressed the importance of prioritising planning, strategising, and funding in this sector.
“By harnessing the potential of media for peacebuilding, stakeholders in the Pacific can work towards a more peaceful and prosperous future for all,” Professor Prasad added.
Waves of Change: Media, Peace, and Development in the Pacific has been published under a joint collaboration of Australia’s Kula Press and India’s Shhalaj Publishing House.
The book features nine chapters authored by passionate researchers and academics, including David Robie, John Rabuogi Ahere, Sanjay Ramesh, Kalinga Seneviratne, Kylie Navuku, Narayan Gopalkrishnan, Hurriyet Babacan, Usha Sundar Harris, and Asha Chand.
Dr Robie is founding editor of Pacific Journalism Review, which also celebrated 30 years of publishing at the book launch.
The 2024 Pacific International Media Conference was organised in partnership with the Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) and the Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN).
As an economy, Fiji has paid a “very high price for being unable to protect freedom” but people can speak and criticise the government freely now, says Deputy Prime Minister Professor Biman Prasad.
Prasad, a former University of the South Pacific (USP) economics professor, said that he, in a deeply personal way, knew how the economy had been affected when he saw the debt numbers and what the government had inherited.
Professor Prasad says the government had reintroduced media self-regulation and “we can actually feel the freedom everywhere, including in Parliament”.
USP head of journalism associate professor Shailendra Singh and former USP lecturer and co-founder of The Australia Today Dr Amrit Sarwal also co-edited the book with Professor Prasad.
While also speaking during the launch, PNG Minister for Information and Communications Technology Timothy Masiu expressed support for the Fiji government repealing the media laws that curbed freedom in Fiji in the recent past.
He said his Department of ICT had set up a social media management desk to monitor the ever-increasing threats on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram and other online platforms.
Fiji Deputy Prime Minister Professor Biman Prasad speaking at the book launch. Video: Fijivillage News
The new book, Waves of Change: Media, Peace, and Development in the Pacific. Image: Kula Press
promote media self-regulation;
improve government media capacity;
roll out media infrastructure for all; and
diversify content and quota usage for national interest.
He said that to elevate media professionalism in PNG, the policy called for developing media self-regulation in the country without direct government intervention.
Strike a balance
Masiu said the draft policy also intended to strike a balance between the media’s ongoing role in transparency and accountability on the one hand, and the dissemination of developmental information, on the other hand.
He said it was not an attempt by the government to restrict the media in PNG and the media in PNG enjoyed “unprecedented freedom” and an ability to report as they deemed appropriate.
The PNG Minister said their leaders were constantly being put in the spotlight.
While they did not necessarily agree with many of the daily news media reports, the governmenr would not “suddenly move to restrict the media” in PNG in any form.
The 30th anniversary edition of the research journal Pacific Journalism Review, founded by former USP Journalism Programme head Professor David Robie at the University of Papua New Guinea, was also launched at the event.
The PJR has published more than 1100 research articles over the past 30 years and is the largest media research archive in the region.
Republished from Fijivillage News with permission.
A book of first-hand accounts of the war in Ukraine by Victoria Amelina is to be published posthumously by William Collins. Publication for Looking at Women Looking at War: A War and Justice Diary is scheduled for February 2025. It will be followed by a novel in 2026.
Amelina, who died exactly a year ago as a result of a missile strike in Kramatorsk, was a well-known novelist and children’s author in Ukraine. Rights to her unfinished non-fiction book were pre-empted by Arabella Pike at Williams Collins from Emma Shercliff at Laxfield Literary Associates. It will be published in the US by St Martin’s Press and translation rights have been sold in France (Gallimard), Italy (Guanda), Korea and Georgia.
Amelina’s book follows 11 female journalists, human rights defenders, lawyers, and volunteers documenting war crimes in Ukraine while the war is still ongoing. It includes Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Oleksandra Matviichuk, and chronicles Amelina’s own transformation from novelist and mother into a war crimes researcher.
Pike said: “After hearing the cruel news of Victoria’s death, it was a small consolation to us that she knew her vitally important book would be published in English. We at William Collins are so proud to publish her account of the hideous war crimes happening daily in Ukraine and regret deeply that this must be posthumous.”
Arabella Tetyana Teren, head of PEN Ukraine, said: “This book is the voice of Ukraine fighting for its freedom and future. This book is the voice of a writer who, in the most difficult time for her country, chose the role of testifying about the war crimes of the Russians and seeking punishment for the perpetrators. This book was born from love—the author’s love for her country and her heroines, and our love for the talented Ukrainian writer, brave woman, and our dear friend, whose life was taken by Russia.”.”
Amelina, who was 37 when she died, worked in the high-tech industry for ten years before becoming a writer and lived in the US in 2019/20. She travelled extensively to talk about her work with Truth Hounds, and her poetry, essays and prose have appeared in publications including the Irish Times, the Dublin Review of Books, The Guardian and the New Yorker. Victoria was the founder of a literary festival in a city named New York in the Donetsk region, Ukraine. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2023/10/12/5th-dublin-arts-and-human-rights-festival-in-october-2023/]
Here is a painting that will appear on the front cover of my new book. ‘WALKING WITH THE MAN, but not to Church.’ The painting, plus 104000 words, is now with my publisher, Clark and Mackay. The paperback, ebook & audiobook will be launched at the Royal on the Park in Brisbane at lunch on …
As the story of Juneteenth is told by modern-day historians, enslaved Black people were freed by laws, not combat.
Union Gen. Gordon Granger said as much when he read General Order No. 3 in Galveston, Texas, in front of enslaved people who were among the last to learn of their legal freedom.
According to the order, the law promised the “absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves.”
But the new laws guaranteeing legal protections for equal rights – starting with the Emancipation Proclamation in January 1863 and followed by the ratification of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments after the U.S. Civil War had ended in April 1865 – did not eliminate the influence of slavery on the laws.
The legacy of slavery is still enshrined in thousands of judicial opinions and briefs that are cited today by American judges and lawyers in cases involving everything from property rights to criminal law.
For example, in 2016 a judge on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cited Prigg v. Pennsylvania, an 1842 U.S. Supreme Court case that held that a state could not provide legal protections for alleged fugitive slaves. The judge cited that case to explain the limits of congressional power to limit gambling in college sports.
In 2013, a judge on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cited Prigg for similar reasons. In that case, involving challenges to an Indian tribe’s acquisition of land, the judge relied on Prigg to explain how to interpret a federal statute.
Neither of these judges acknowledged or addressed the origins of the Prigg v. Pennsylvania case.
That is not unusual.
What I have learned by researching these slave cases is that the vast majority of judges do not acknowledge that the cases they cite involve the enslaved. They also almost never consider how slavery may have shaped legal rules.
The Citing Slavery Project
To place these laws in historical context for modern-day usage and encourage judges and lawyers to address slavery’s influence on the law, I started the Citing Slavery Project in 2020. Since then, my team of students and I have identified more than 12,000 cases involving enslaved people and more than 40,000 cases that cite those cases.
We have found dozens of citations of slave cases in the 2010s. Such citations appear in rulings from the U.S. Supreme Court and in state courts across the country. Citation by lawyers in briefs is even more prevalent.
An ethical obligation?
Addressing slavery’s legal legacy is not just an issue for historians.
It is also an ethical issue for legal professionals. The code of conduct for U.S. judges recognizes that “an independent and honorable judiciary is indispensable to justice in our society.” The code further calls for judges to “act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity … of the judiciary.”
Lawyers share in this obligation.
The American Bar Association notes the profession’s “special responsibility for the quality of justice.” It also calls for lawyers to further “the public’s understanding of and confidence in the rule of law and the justice system.”
Such actions are particularly important because of the rising importance of the Supreme Court’s history-and-tradition test, which uses analysis of historical traditions to determine modern constitutional rights. Courts risk undermining their legitimacy by paying attention to some legal legacies while ignoring others.
It is my belief that lawyers and judges must confront slavery’s legacy in order to atone for the legal profession’s past actions and to fulfill their ethical duties to ensure confidence in our legal system.
Official from ruling BJP party allows action against Booker winner under controversial anti-terrorism law
Indian authorities have granted permission for the prosecution of the Booker prize-winning Indian novelist Arundhati Roy over comments she made about Kashmir at an event in 2010.
The top official in the Delhi administration, VK Saxena, gave the go-ahead for legal action against Roy, whose novel The God of Small Things won the Booker prize in 1997, under anti-terrorism legislation, alongside a former university professor, Sheikh Showkat Hussain.
Was browsing through a book shop a few days ago and found this one. It is so fascinating I read it within 48 hours. A real page turner. Its about the close friendship of our former Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, and the founder of Hillsong Church, Brian Houston, that hugely embraced religion, politics, power and …
In the study The Landscape of Public International Funding for Human Rights Defenders, released on 12 June 2024, ProtectDefenders.eu sheds light on the critical challenges faced by human rights defenders (HRDs) worldwide, specifically focusing on their financing by public actors.
The research, which combines an analysis of financial data over a period of four years with interviews, investigations, and input from defenders, underscores the pressing need for greater financial support and resources to safeguard the invaluable work of human rights defenders in promoting and protecting human rights globally.
The ProtectDefenders.eu study reveals and documents a concerning trend: while the need for support for HRDs has never been greater, funding levels have stagnated, with only marginal increases observed over the examined period. Despite rhetoric emphasising the importance of prioritising human rights prioritisation, the actual allocation of resources has failed to keep pace with the deteriorating global situation, representing a mere 0.11% of total Official Development Assistance (ODA) annually.
Key findings from the study include:
Disparity in funding: While some donors have demonstrated a strong commitment to supporting HRDs, others have allocated minimal resources, with wide variations observed among donor contributions. This disparity is also evident among different groups of defenders and thematic areas, as well as in funding dynamics by region, with a concerning decrease in attention to the MENA region
Challenges in accessing funds: HRDs continue to face obstacles in accessing international funds, including restrictive funding requirements and bureaucratic hurdles
Need for core funding: There is a critical need for core, flexible, and sustainable funding to enable HRDs to effectively carry out their vital work
Lack in localisation efforts: The study emphasises the importance of localising HRD protection programs and ensuring that funding reaches grassroots organisations and movements.
“This research underscores the urgent need for action to better support human rights defenders and is a call to action for donors, policymakers, and stakeholders to stand in solidarity with human rights defenders,” said Gerald Staberock, Chair of the Board of ProtectDefenders.eu and Secretary-General of the World Organisation against Torture. “HRDs play a vital role in advancing human rights and democracy worldwide, yet they continue to face increasing risks and challenges. It is imperative that donors and stakeholders heed the recommendations outlined in this study to ensure that HRDs receive the support they need to carry out their crucial work.”
In response to these findings, the study presents a series of detailed recommendations aimed at addressing the funding gap and improving support for HRDs. These recommendations include increasing overall funding levels, reducing restrictions on grants, enhancing political and diplomatic support, and investing in donors’ own capacities to better understand the needs and contexts of HRDs.
ProtectDefenders.eu issues a clear call to all donors and public actors to urgently address this situation. Specifically, the demands include:
Increase in public funding: Advocating for an increase in public funding for HRDs from 0.11% to 0.5% for the period 2025-2028.
Building trust through core grants: Urging for more core grants with reduced restrictions, audits, lower result expectations, and extended support horizons.
Directing more grants locally: Advocating for a higher proportion of grants to be allocated to local NGOs to ensure funding reaches grassroots organizations and movements.
Establishment of HRD principles for regranting: Calling upon the community of donors and financiers of HRD work to establish HRD Principles for Regranting, outlining guidelines for more effective and equitable distribution of funds.
On 12 June 2024, Human Rights Watch published a useful, short “questions-and-answers” document which outlines key questions on the global trend of transnational repression.
The term “transnational repression” is increasingly used to refer to state actors reaching beyond their borders to suppress or stifle dissent by targeting human rights defenders, journalists, government critics and opposition activists, academics and others, in violation of their human rights. Particularly vulnerable are nationals or former nationals, members of diaspora communities and those living in exile. Many are asylum seekers or refugees in their place of exile, while others may be at risk of extradition or forced return. Back home, a person’s family members and friends may also be targeted, by way of retribution and with the aim of silencing a relative in exile or forcing their return.
Transnational repression can have far-reaching consequences, including a chilling effect on the rights to freedom of expression and association. While there is no formal legal definition, the framing of transnational repression, which encompasses a wide range of rights abuses, allows us to better understand it and propose victim-centered responses.
What tactics are used?
Documented tactics of transnational repression include killings, abductions, enforced disappearances, unlawful removals, online harassment, the use of digital surveillance including spyware, targeting of relatives, and the abuse of consular services. Interpol’s Red Notice system has also been used as a tool of transnational repression, to facilitate unlawful extraditions. Interpol has made advances in improving its vetting systems, yet governments continue to abuse the Red Notice system by publishing unlawful notices seeking citizens who have fled abroad on spurious charges. This leaves targets vulnerable to arrest and return to their country of origin to be mistreated, even after they have fled to seek safety abroad.
Is transnational repression a new phenomenon?
No, the practice of governments violating human rights beyond their borders is not new. Civil society organizations have been documenting such abuses for decades. What is new, however, is the growing recognition of transnational repression as more than a collection of grave incidents, but also as an increasing phenomenon of global concern, requiring global responses. What is also new is the increasing access to and use of sophisticated technology to harass, threaten, surveil and track people no matter where they are. This makes the reach of transnational repression even more pervasive.
Where is transnational repression happening?
Transnational repression is a global phenomenon. Cases have been documented in countries and regions around the world. The use of technology such as spyware increases the reach of transnational repression, essentially turning an infected device, such as a mobile phone, into a portable surveillance tool, allowing targeted individuals to be spied on and tracked around the world.
Do only “repressive” states commit transnational repression?
While many authoritarian states resort to repressive tactics beyond their own borders, any government that seeks to silence dissent by targeting critics abroad is committing transnational repression. Democratic governments have also contributed to cases of transnational repression, for example through the provision of spyware, collaborating with repressive governments to deny visas or facilitate returns, or relying upon flawed Interpol Red Notices that expose targeted individuals to risk.
Are steps being taken to recognize and address transnational repression?
Increasingly, human rights organizations, UN experts and states are documenting and taking steps to address transnational repression.
For example, Freedom House has published several reports on transnational repression and maintains an online resource documenting incidents globally. Human Rights Watch has published reports, including one outlining cases of transnational repression globally and another focusing on Southeast Asia. Amnesty International has published a report on transnational repression in Europe. Many other nongovernmental organizations are increasingly producing research and reports on the issue. In her report on journalists in exile, the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression dedicated a chapter to transnational repression. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights used the term in a June 2024 statement.
Certain governments are increasingly aware of the harms posed by transnational repression. Some are passing legislation to address the problem, while others are signing joint statements or raising transnational repression in international forums. However, government responses are often piecemeal, and a more cohesive and coordinated approach is needed.
What should be done?
Governments should speak out and condemn all cases of transnational repression, including by their friends and allies. They should take tangible steps to address transnational repression, including by adopting rights-respecting legal frameworks and policies to address it. Governments should put victims at the forefront of their response to these forms of repression. They should be particularly mindful of the risks and fears experienced by refugee and asylum communities. They should investigate and appropriately prosecute those responsible. Interpol should continue to improve vetting process by subjecting governments with a poor human rights record to more scrutiny when they submit Red Notices. Interpol should be transparent on which governments are continually abusing the Red Notice system, and limit their access to the database.
At the international level, more can be done to integrate transnational repression within existing human rights reporting, and to mandate dedicated reporting on cases of transnational repression, trends, and steps needed to address it.
In the NHRF Annual Report for 2023, you will find comprehensive information on the NHRF’s activities and the remarkable work carried out by its grantee partners throughout the year.
In 2023, NHRF supported 153 projects and 131 grantee partners in 7 priority countries. Through these projects, 16,072 human rights defenders were supported, of which at least 56% were women human rights defenders.
Scroll down this page to read the full annual report or open it here. You will find annual reports from previous years at the end of this page.
On 22 May 2024 Front Line Defenders launched its Global Analysis 2023/24 on the situation of human rights defenders (HRDs) at risk around the world, an in-depth annual publication detailing the variety of risks, threats and attacks faced by HRDs around the world.
The report also reveals statistics gathered and verified by the HRD Memorial initiative – which Front Line Defenders coordinates – documenting the killings of at least 300 HRDs in 28 countries in 2023. Almost a third of those killed (31%) were Indigenous people’s rights defenders. This brings the total documented killings of HRDs in the last decade to nearly 3,000.
“This appalling wave of attacks on human rights defenders is a direct result of an international human rights framework left in tatters and governments’ double standards when it comes to respecting human rights,” said Alan Glasgow, Executive Director of Front Line Defenders. “A quarter decade after the UN adopted a Declaration on human rights defenders, not enough progress has been made to ensure defenders are valued and protected. In this time, thousands of defenders have paid with their lives and many more face ongoing attacks and intimidation for their peaceful work. Urgent action is needed to change this.”
Wide-ranging risks to HRDs
Globally, the violation most commonly cited by HRDs was arbitrary arrest/detention (15%), followed by legal action (13%), continuing an ongoing trend of criminalisation as the most-reported risk. This was followed by death threats (10.2%), surveillance (9.8%) and physical attacks (8.5%). Trans and non gender-conforming HRDs reported slightly higher rates of physical attacks, and a much greater risk of smear campaigns. Globally, the five most targeted areas of human rights defence were: LGBTIQ+ rights (10.2%); Women’s rights (9.7%); Human rights movements (8.5%); Indigenous peoples’ rights (7.1%); and Human rights documentation (5.2%).
The statistics in the Global Analysis are derived from Front Line Defenders’ casework and approved grant applications between 1 January and 31 December 2023. The statistics are based on 1,538 reported violations in 105 countries. Front Line Defenders documents multiple violations per case or grant, as this is the reality of the situation for human rights defenders. For more details on how these and the HRD Memorial data are gathered, please refer to the Methodology section at the end of the report.
A New Zealand author, journalist and media educator who has covered the Asia-Pacific region since the 1970s says liberation “must come” for Kanaky/New Caledonia.
Professor David Robie sailed on board Greenpeace’s flagship Rainbow Warrior until it was bombed by French secret agents in New Zealand in July 1985 and wrote the book Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior.
The Labour peer and former Liberty director makes a clear, impassioned case for human rights law, but steers surprisingly clear of thorny political arguments
It may sound a little melodramatic to say that human rights are under attack in Britain. But in the week I opened this book, it certainly didn’t feel that way. Parliament was locked in battle over the Rwanda bill, widely seen as driving a coach and horses through human rights obligations, with Shami Chakrabarti herself in the thick of the fray as a Labour peer. Nigel Farage was once again demanding Britain leave the European convention on human rights – the new passion project for Brexiters who would rather not talk about how Brexit itself is going, and who see the convention as a haven of suspiciously lefty values – while Rishi Sunak was bending over backwards not to rule that out. There’s still something faintly surreal about having to actively make a case for the right to life, liberty, or freedom from being tortured – who doesn’t automatically value these things? – but if Brexit taught us anything, it’s that liberals are surprisingly bad at defending truths that seem so obvious we’ve never given them much thought. This time, it pays to be ready.
Chakrabarti has already covered some of this ground in her brilliant first book, On Liberty, in which she reflected on her time running the civil liberties organisation of that name and somehow pulled off the rare feat of tackling extremely serious issues without taking herself too seriously. This third book, however, feels more like sitting through an undergraduate lecture, albeit an absorbing one.
My poems were written in anger after Tiananmen Square. But what motivates most prison writing is a fear of forgetting. Today I am free, but the regime has never stopped its war on words
Most of my manuscripts are locked up in the filing cabinets of the ministry of security, and the agents there study and ponder them repeatedly, more carefully than the creator himself. The guys working this racket have superb memories; a certain chief of the Chengdu public security bureau can still recite the poems I published in an underground magazine in the 1980s. While the literati write nostalgically, hoping to go down in literary history, the real history may be locked in the vaults of the security department.
The above is excerpted from my book June 4: My Testimony, published in Taiwan in 2011. I wrote that book three times, the later drafts on paper much better than the paper I used for writing in prison, which was so soft and brittle I had to write very lightly. Paper outside prison is solid and flexible enough that you don’t have to worry about puncturing it with the tip of a pen. Thus, I restrained myself and filled in a page of paper, and then how many thousand – ten thousand? More? How many ant-sized words can be packed on to a page? Who knows.
On 10 October 1995, at two in the afternoon, three police cars carrying about a dozen special agents burst in on me. Everything was carried out in accordance with “legal procedures”, the officers’ IDs and search warrant were presented, the entire search process was meticulously videotaped, and all written matter in the house (including manuscripts, letters, and notes) was confiscated. And this included the very nearly completed draft of this testimony – more than 300,000 characters representing my painstaking efforts of the past year and a half.
I was breathing normally, signed with a smile, and asked: “Should I bring clothes?” The answer: “No.” I was uneasy leaving my money and valuables at home as I prepared to be the guest of the state for a long time. The agents laughed.
At 10 o’clock in the evening, I exited the Baiguolin police station in the Xicheng district of Chengdu and was politely told: “Don’t leave the city for the next month.” Thank God, my head was still on my shoulders and I could still write.
I cursed my carelessness with the foulest language imaginable and set about rewriting with all my might. Without inspiration or passion, the pen slashed the paper to ribbons, and often I could only produce a few hundred words a day. Staring at the paper was useless, and cold sweat couldn’t solve my writer’s block. But I’d made a bet; I couldn’t admit defeat. I wanted to use this to validate my own stupid way of living as an insignificant individual – a bet with the world’s largest dictatorship – with writing materials, so that in future my kids won’t think their dad was just talking big.
In an age of climate crisis and AI, equal treatment is nothing less than essential
In the three decades since I became a lawyer, human rights – once understood as an uncomplicated good, a tool for securing dignity for the vulnerable against abuses by the powerful – have increasingly come under assault. Perhaps never more so than in the current moment: we are constantly talking about human rights, but often in a highly sceptical way. When Liz Truss loudly proclaims “We’ve got to leave the ECHR, abolish the supreme court and abolish the Human Rights Act,” she’s not the fringe voice she might have been in the 1990s. She represents a dangerous current of opinion, as prevalent on parts of the radical left as on the populist right of politics. It seems to be gaining momentum.
As an idealistic youngster, I would have been shocked to know that in 2024 it would be necessary to return to the back-to-basics case, to justify the need for fundamental rights and freedoms. But in a world where facts are made fluid, what were once thought of as core values have become hard to distill and defend. In an atmosphere of intense polarisation, human rights are trashed along all parts of the political spectrum – either as a framework to protect markets, or as a form of undercover socialism. What stands out for me is that the most trenchant critics share a profound nationalism. Nationalists believe that universal human rights – the clue’s in the name – undermine the ability of states to agitate for their narrower interests.
On 2 May 2023 Angelica Dino in the Canadian Lawyer summarizes the latest annual Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, released by the U.S. Department of State on the 75th anniversary of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
The Human Rights Report evaluated the status of internationally recognized individual, civil, political, and worker rights in nearly 200 countries and territories, leveraging insights from various sources, including government agencies, NGOs, and media. According to the State Department, this documentation serves as a critical tool in connecting U.S. diplomatic and foreign aid efforts to the foundational American values of human rights protection and promotion.
The release coincides with the third Summit for Democracy, led this year by the Republic of Korea. The summit emphasizes a collective international effort to strengthen democratic governance and address human rights abuses. Its goals include expanding media freedom, enhancing women’s rights, combating corruption, and ensuring that technology supports democratic processes rather than acting as a tool of repression.
This year’s report detailed significant human rights violations across several countries, with stark abuses noted in Russia’s ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Russian military actions have been characterized by violent assaults on civilians, with extensive documentation of crimes potentially amounting to crimes against humanity. The report also highlighted the forced transfer and assimilation of Ukrainian children into Russian territories, marking a severe violation of international law.
In Iran, the regime’s crackdown on dissent extended beyond its borders, posing grave risks to its citizens both domestically and internationally. Similarly, the report condemned the Taliban’s discriminatory actions against women and girls in Afghanistan, which starkly undermined their societal roles and freedoms.
Conversely, the report identified positive strides in several nations. Notably, Kenya has upheld freedom of expression for LGBTQI+ individuals, and Estonia and Slovenia have recognized marriage equality. Additionally, labour reforms in Mexico have empowered workers to improve conditions and assert their rights more effectively.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken emphasized the report’s role and expressed hope that the findings will support and inspire human rights defenders globally. “I hope that the honest and public assessments of human rights abuses, as well as the reports of progress, reflected in these pages give strength to these brave individuals across the globe who often put their lives at risk to improve conditions in their own countries, and, ultimately, make the world a freer, safer place for us all,” Blinken said.
Fifteen years ago, Human Rights Watch approached celebrity portrait photographer Platon with a pitch: They wanted him to help educate the public on the human rights crisis in Myanmar by capturing imagery of the people there. The trip swerved the trajectory of Platon’s career, putting him on a years-long path of putting a face to those affected by and fighting against human rights violations. Now, Platon is releasing those photographs in an ambitious book titled The Defenders: Heroes of the Global Fight for Human Rights, which is accompanied by a major exhibition of portraits at UTA Artists Space in Los Angeles, on view from May 3 to 25.
“You photograph them the way you photograph celebrities and world leaders and models,” Platon says of his subjects in Myanmar. “I photographed them not as victims; I photographed them as powerful, resilient human beings who refuse to be broken.” When he returned from Myanmar, he went to The New Yorker and urged them to publish the photos; after those ran, the media began “seeing human rights defenders and activists as heroes,” he says. “It was a different mindset.”
In 2013, Platon formed his own human rights foundation, which gave him the resources to document the Egyptian Revolution, as well as to Russia, where he photographed dissidents under Vladimir Putin’s regime. He went to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, capturing images of people fighting against sexual violence. He spent a whole year crossing the Mexican-American border, taking photos of families torn apart by immigration policy. The Defenders is a compilation of all this work over the last 15 years.
“I’ve spent so much time in front of powerful people,” Platon says. “They say I’ve photographed more world leaders than anyone in history now. I’ve seen dandruff on world leaders. I see if they’re nervous and their eyelids flutter. I feel their pulse. People ask me a lot what I think power is. I think power is something that, if you are lucky to acquire any at all, you have to share it. You have to use it to help others.”
Last year, the Helpline received a total of 3,709 requests for digital security assistance.
To put this in perspective, the Helpline received 10,000 requests in total between 2014 and 2021, but more than double that number in the three years that followed.
Most (82%) of the cases we dealt with in 2023 were reactive in nature, meaning they related to unfolding incidents or emergencies that required beneficiaries to take rapid measures to strengthen their digital security. The remaining 18% were preventative, whereby beneficiaries preemptively sought out digital security advice, tools, and solutions.
In recent years, the Helpline has been investing in our ability to operate 24/7, 365 days a year, and to deliver more substantial and engaged forms of support. For instance, we’ve been conducting analysis of advanced threats and producing collaborative research in places such as Armenia, Serbia, and Jordan.
In 2023, the regional distribution of cases was as follows:
Our work supports a wide spectrum of civil society stakeholders; from individual activists, human rights defenders, and members of marginalized communities, to journalists and media workers. For it to be as impactful as possible, we work closely with the wider digital security community, through networks like CiviCERT. This allows us to deliver adequate support to each of our beneficiary groups, which were distributed as follows in 2023:
In 2024, the Helpline will continue improving and increasing how we collaborate with activist groups around the world, as well as working to meet the evolving needs of the global rapid response community. If you are a member of civil society in need of digital security assistance, you can find details about how to get in touch on our website page.
On 25 April 2024, ProtectDefenders.eu, the European Union (EU) Human Rights Defenders Mechanism, presented its comprehensive annual report entitled “REACHING FURTHER,” covering the period November 2022 – October 2023. This report illustrates the support provided and efforts made by ProtectDefenders.eu to support human rights defenders (HRDs) around the world, and especially to reach those who are the most at risk.
In November 2022, ProtectDefenders.eu entered the third phase of its implementation, marking a milestone in its commitment to safeguarding human rights defenders worldwide. Throughout the first year of this new phase, the renewed and consolidated EU HRD Mechanism has provided direct protection, support, and empowerment to over 6,700 at-risk HRDs, with a particular focus on those facing the highest risks. Notably, 50% of beneficiaries were young defenders, and 58% identified as women human rights defenders (WHRDs), trans-male, trans-female, genderqueer, or gender non-conforming individuals.
Despite facing extraordinary challenges amidst protracted crises globally, ProtectDefenders.eu has demonstrated remarkable effectiveness, efficiency, and adaptability in addressing the pressing needs of HRDs. The mechanism has extended support not only to individual defenders but also to their families, communities, and organizations. This comprehensive support, including financial aid, technical assistance, and guidance, has been delivered through collaboration among consortium partners, showcasing flexibility, creativity, and responsiveness in the face of evolving challenges.
ProtectDefenders.eu has actively responded to increased requests for protection support amid protracted crises in various regions, including Belarus, Myanmar, Afghanistan, Nicaragua, Sudan, Tanzania, and beyond. Emergency protection measures have been consistently provided, alongside investments in the capacity and resilience of human rights organisations and communities. The international temporary relocation system supported by ProtectDefenders.eu, including through the Shelter Initiatives program, further exemplifies the mechanism’s commitment to HRD safety.
Through reactive and preventative advocacy efforts, ProtectDefenders.eu has achieved multiple successes globally, pioneering a collective advocacy approach on shared concerns such as international funding for HRDs and EU visas. The enhanced coordination among consortium partners has facilitated continuous improvements and innovation, addressing challenges faced by HRDs and organizations at risk more effectively.
Moreover, significant progress has been made in enhancing outreach efforts to new groups, including young defenders and those with disabilities. Increased collaboration with local actors, context-specific support, and prioritized coordination have extended the impact of ProtectDefenders.eu widely, with 93% of supported organizations not affiliated with consortium partners.
Looking ahead, ProtectDefenders.eu will remain particularly committed to fulfilling its protection mandate by addressing comprehensively the unique vulnerabilities and barriers faced by HRDs with disabilities. The EU HRD mechanism will actively engage in finding innovative solutions to ensure their protection, inclusion, and access to resources.
Imagine you are a clown fish. A juvenile clown fish, specifically, in the year 2100. You live near a coral reef. You are orange and white, which doesn’t really matter. What matters is that you have these little ear stones called otoliths in your inner ear, and when sound waves pass through the water and then through your body, these otoliths move and displace tiny hair cells, which trigger electrochemical signals in your auditory nerve. Nemo, you are hearing.
But you are not hearing well. In this version of century’s end, humankind has managed to pump the climate brakes a smidge, but it has not reversed the trends that were apparent a hundred years earlier. In this 2100, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have risen from 400 parts per million at the turn of the millennium to 600 parts per million — a middle‑of‑the-road forecast. For you and your otoliths, this increase in carbon dioxide is significant, because your ear stones are made of calcium carbonate, a carbon-based salt, and ocean acidification makes them grow larger. Your ear stones are big and clunky, and the clicks and chirps of resident crustaceans and all the larger reef fish have gone all screwy. Normally, you would avoid these noises, because they suggest predatory danger. Instead, you swim toward them, as a person wearing headphones might walk into an intersection, oblivious to the honking truck with the faulty brakes. Nobody will make a movie about your life, Nemo, because nobody will find you.
Author Clayton Page Aldern. Bonnie Cutts / Dutton
It’s not a toy example. In 2011, an international team of researchers led by Hong Young Yan at the Academia Sinica, in Taiwan, simulated these kinds of future acidic conditions in seawater tanks. A previous study had found that ocean acidification could compromise young fishes’ abilities to distinguish between odors of friends and foes, leaving them attracted to smells they’d usually avoid. At the highest levels of acidification, the fish failed to respond to olfactory signals at all. Hong and his colleagues suspected the same phenomenon might apply to fish ears. Rearing dozens of clown fish in tanks of varying carbon dioxide concentrations, the researchers tested their hypothesis by placing waterproof speakers in the water, playing recordings from predator-rich reefs, and assessing whether the fish avoided the source of the sounds. In all but the present-day control conditions, the fish failed to swim away. It was like they couldn’t hear the danger.
In Hong’s study, though, it’s not exactly clear if the whole story is a story of otolith inflation. Other experiments had indeed found that high ocean acidity could spur growth in fish ear stones, but Hong and his colleagues hadn’t actually noticed any in theirs. Besides, marine biologists who later mathematically modeled the effects of oversize otoliths concluded that bigger stones would likely increase the sensitivity of fish ears — which, who knows, “could prove to be beneficial or detrimental, depending on how a fish perceives this increased sensitivity.” The ability to attune to distant sounds could be useful for navigation. On the other hand, maybe ear stones would just pick up more background noise from the sea, and the din of this marine cocktail party would drown out useful vibrations. The researchers didn’t know.
The uncertainty with the otoliths led Hong and his colleagues to conclude that perhaps the carbon dioxide was doing something else — something more sinister in its subtlety. Perhaps, instead, the gas was directly interfering with the fishes’ nervous systems: Perhaps the trouble with their hearing wasn’t exclusively a problem of sensory organs, but rather a manifestation of something more fundamental. Perhaps the fish brains couldn’t process the auditory signals they were receiving from their inner ears.
The following year, a colleague of Hong’s, one Philip Munday at James Cook University in Queensland, Australia, appeared to confirm this suspicion. His theory had the look of a hijacking.
A neuron is like a house: insulated, occasionally permeable, maybe a little leaky. Just as one might open a window during a stuffy party to let in a bit of cool air, brain cells take advantage of physical differences across their walls in order to keep the neural conversation flowing. In the case of nervous systems, the differentials don’t come with respect to temperature, though; they’re electrical. Within living bodies float various ions — potassium, sodium, chloride, and the like — and because they’ve gained or lost an electron here or there, they’re all electrically charged. The relative balance of these atoms inside and outside a given neuron induces a voltage difference across the cell’s membrane: Compared to the outside, the inside of most neurons is more negatively charged. But a brain cell’s walls have windows too, and when you open them, ions can flow through, spurring electrical changes.
In practice, a neuron’s windows are proteins spanning their membranes. Like a house’s, they come in a cornucopia of shapes and sizes, and while you can’t fit a couch through a
porthole, a window is still a window when it comes to those physical differentials. If it’s hot inside and cold outside, opening one will always cool you down.
Until it doesn’t.
Here is the clown fish neural hijacking proposed by Philip Munday. What he and his colleagues hypothesized was that excess carbon dioxide in seawater leads to an irregular accumulation of bicarbonate molecules inside fish neurons. The problem for neuronal signaling is that this bicarbonate also carries an electrical charge, and too much of it inside the cells ultimately causes a reversal of the normal electrical conditions. At the neural house party, now it’s colder inside than out. When you open the windows — the ion channels — atoms flow in the opposite direction.
Munday’s theory applied to a particular type of ion channel: one responsible for inhibiting neural activity. One of the things all nervous systems do is balance excitation and inhibition. Too much of the former and you get something like a seizure; too much of the latter and you get something like a coma — it’s in the balance we find the richness of experience. But with a reversal of electrical conditions, Munday’s inhibitory channels become excitatory. And then? All bets are off. For a brain, it would be like pressing a bunch of random buttons in a cockpit and hoping the plane stays in the air. In clown fish, if Munday is right, the acidic seawater appears to short-circuit the fishes’ sense of smell and hearing, and they swim toward peril. It is difficult to ignore the question of what the rest of us might be swimming toward.
This excerpt was originally published in Grist and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.
Powerful governments cast humanity into an era devoid of effective international rule of law, with civilians in conflicts paying the highest price
Rapidly changing artificial intelligence is left to create fertile ground for racism, discrimination and division in landmark year for public elections
Standing against these abuses, people the world over mobilized in unprecedented numbers, demanding human rights protection and respect for our common humanity
The world is reaping a harvest of terrifying consequences from escalating conflict and the near breakdown of international law, said Amnesty International as it launched its annual The State of the World’s Human Rights report, delivering an assessment of human rights in 155 countries.
Amnesty International also warned that the breakdown of the rule of law is likely to accelerate with rapid advancement in artificial intelligence (AI) which, coupled with the dominance of Big Tech, risks a “supercharging” of human rights violations if regulation continues to lag behind advances.
“Amnesty International’s report paints a dismal picture of alarming human rights repression and prolific international rule-breaking, all in the midst of deepening global inequality, superpowers vying for supremacy and an escalating climate crisis,” said Amnesty International’s Secretary General, Agnès Callamard.
“Israel’s flagrant disregard for international law is compounded by the failures of its allies to stop the indescribable civilian bloodshed meted out in Gaza. Many of those allies were the very architects of that post-World War Two system of law. Alongside Russia’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine, the growing number of armed conflicts, and massive human rights violations witnessed, for example, in Sudan, Ethiopia and Myanmar – the global rule-based order is at risk of decimation.”
Lawlessness, discrimination and impunity in conflicts and elsewhere have been enabled by unchecked use of new and familiar technologies which are now routinely weaponized by military, political and corporate actors. Big Tech’s platforms have stoked conflict. Spyware and mass surveillance tools are used to encroach on fundamental rights and freedoms, while governments are deploying automated tools targeting the most marginalized groups in society.
“In an increasingly precarious world, unregulated proliferation and deployment of technologies such as generative AI, facial recognition and spyware are poised to be a pernicious foe – scaling up and supercharging violations of international law and human rights to exceptional levels,” said Agnès Callamard.
“During a landmark year of elections and in the face of the increasingly powerful anti-regulation lobby driven and financed by Big Tech actors, these rogue and unregulated technological advances pose an enormous threat to us all. They can be weaponized to discriminate, disinform and divide.”
Amnesty International’s report paints a dismal picture of alarming human rights repression and prolific international rule-breaking, all in the midst of deepening global inequality, superpowers vying for supremacy and an escalating climate crisis. Amnesty International’s Secretary General, Agnès Callamard
Janine Jackson interviewed author Dave Lindorff about his book Spy for No Country for the April 19, 2024, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.
Janine Jackson: The success of the movie Oppenheimer showed that there is interest in the human beings involved in the Manhattan Project: the choices, beliefs, situational ethics, if you will, of those involved in the World War II program to develop the atomic bomb.
Another key figure, likewise reflective of the human complexities involved in creating and deploying this devastating technology, has remained relatively unknown, until now. Ted Hall was just 18 years old when he was recruited to Los Alamos, where he became a key scientist behind the bombs known as Little Boy and Fat Man, and eventually a spy, delivering nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union. His story was the subject of the 2022 documentary A Compassionate Spy, by acclaimed Hoop Dreams director Steve James.
Our guest was a co-producer of that film, and is author of a new book, Spy for No Country: The Story of Ted Hall, the Teenage Atomic Spy Who May Have Saved the World, from Prometheus Books. Veteran investigative journalist Dave Lindorff has reported for numerous outlets, and is author of Marketplace Medicine, and This Can’t Be Happening, among other titles. He joins us now by phone. Welcome back to CounterSpin, Dave Lindorff.
Dave Lindorff: Thanks for having me on.
JJ: Well, we can’t presume listeners who knew who Robert Oppenheimer was even before the movie have even heard the name Ted Hall before. So in bold strokes, what did he do, and when or in what context?
DL: Ted Hall is really fascinating; because he was so young, he’s been overlooked, I think, by historians, even of that era of the development of atomic energy. And part of the reason, too, is that he was never prosecuted, even though, in 1950, he was one of the first people identified as an atomic spy at Los Alamos, with the final decryption starting to happen of the Soviet spy cables that the precursor to the NSA had been collecting from Soviet consulates.
Yet, despite Hoover getting that information in 1950, and interrogating him, and his Harvard roommate courier, for three hours, the case went nowhere. And the book explains why.
JJ: Folks may not remember, or it might be a little confuddled: The Soviet Union was an ally during World War II.
DL: That’s a very important point to make, that people have to realize as they learn about this guy.
JJ: Yeah. So as much as we might want to ascribe motivation, especially after the fact, we can never see inside another person’s head. But what is the sense of what Hall thought he was doing? He wasn’t, for instance, a Communist himself.
DL: No, he was not a Communist when he was a spy. He did briefly join the party, he and his wife that he married after the war; they both became party members for a few months because, as they said, it was the only organization they felt was combating the segregation in the US, and that was defending workers’ right to organize.
JJ: When we say: “what did Ted Hall do?” What did he do, and why do we think he did it?
DL: Well, he was so smart, incredibly brilliant, and it was recognized when he got there. He was assigned to be working on the development of the implosion system for the plutonium bomb, which was a very complicated bomb. The uranium bomb was very simple, you just had to refine enough U-235, which is a minute portion of uranium ore, in order for it to work. But with plutonium, it was so unstable that it was very hard to work with in large quantities.
So he was working on that project. He understood the entire details of the plutonium bomb, and he realized that Germany was not going to get the bomb—it was being bombed to smithereens in 1944, when he was hired—and that the US was going to come out of the war with a monopoly on the bomb, which he thought would be a catastrophe for the world, I think, correctly.
So he decided the only thing to do was to give Soviets the bomb, so that there would be two countries with the bomb, that would prevent each of them from using it.
JJ: I’ve heard it said that, put simply, Oppenheimer thought he could somehow get nuclear weaponry eliminated, or under international control, but, as you say, Hall thought that mutually assured destruction would keep this technology from being used. Is that it?
JJ: I appreciated a review of the film A Compassionate Spy in Decider that said: “Is Ted Hall a hero or a traitor? Note to everyone everywhere: You don’t need to answer that question.” In other words, agreeing with him and his actions isn’t necessary. It’s really more about the complexity of truth, that questions exist for which there are no satisfying answers. But I think it’s difficult for folks to put themselves back in the head of a person making that choice at that time.
DL: Well, you have to know what people were thinking at that time. At that time, for example, there was a dinner hosted by the British scientists who’d been brought over at a late period; I guess they came in early 1944 from England to help speed up the development of the bomb. And there was a dinner that they hosted, and they had invited Gen. Leslie Groves, the head of the whole Manhattan Project. And over dessert, people were starting to say—this happened in the spring of 1944—that they shouldn’t really build the bomb, because the Germans weren’t going to get the bomb. And why were they developing it? And Grove said, well, as you know, the bomb was not really to target Germany; it was to help control the Soviet Union.
And that went around the camp. Because Los Alamos had these rules, that Oppenheimer insisted on, that there was absolute openness within the heavily guarded walls of the camp. But outside, there was no discussion about what they were doing. It was all top secret, and nobody knew what was happening inside that fence.
What they didn’t know was that there were spies within it, and one of them was Ted Hall. He certainly heard the scuttlebutt that the Russians were the real target, and that was very disturbing to him, and to many of the scientists, who felt that the Soviets were doing most of the dying and most of the fighting against the Germans at that time, and that they were our ally.
JJ: You touched on it, but let me just ask you directly: Why wasn’t Ted Hall prosecuted? Why wasn’t he treated the way that Oppenheimer was?
DL: It’s an amazing story. It turns out that Ted’s older brother, 11 years older than him, had taken charge of his early education and encouraged him to go to Harvard when he was 18. And this brother, Ed Hall, actually became the top rocket scientist for the Air Force, and he developed the engine for the Atlas, the engine for the Titan, the engine for the Thor missile. And he invented the whole concept of ICBM with solid fuel, the Minuteman; that was his creation, and his idea of having hundreds of them in silos as a prevention of nuclear attack on the US was sold by him to the Defense secretary at the time, in the ’50s, and then to Eisenhower.
So he was so important to the Air Force—I got his FBI file, after they first told me there wasn’t one; I got over a hundred pages—that Hoover was hoping that he was going to catch him as a spy, Ed Hall, as a spy, as well as Ted Hall. And the Air Force shut him down. They basically refused to let him question Ed about his own history, just whether he knew anything about his brother, and he denied it. And then, by late 1951, Ted was taken off of the security index, and they stopped monitoring his mail and his funds.
Nobody ever knew that, why he didn’t get investigated. And it’s just astonishing, because, Janine, the most important thing about this story, and it’s another thing that Americans don’t know: As soon as the war ended, the US started, in the Manhattan Project and then later the Atomic Energy Commission, working feverishly to figure out a way to mass produce atomic bombs. And by ’48, they were producing them at a hundred a month. And why were they doing that, when they thought that there’d been no spies in the project, and that the Soviet Union would not get an atomic bomb for at least eight or ten years after this one—you know, the two bombs invented by the US, and tested on the Japanese?
So the reason was, they were preparing to attack the Soviet Union. There was even a day, they estimated in 1954, that they were calling “A-Day,” when it would be impossible to attack the Soviet Union preemptively, because they’d have the bomb by then and be able to slip one into a harbor in the US as retaliation. And that all fell apart when the Soviets detonated a carbon copy of the bomb that Ted was working on, in 1949.
JJ: In media, Dave, we know that US/Russia relations are super simplistically presented. It’s like Rock’em Sock’em Robots, you know, or King Kong vs. Godzilla. And the fact that there are human beings making choices, with the information that they have at the time and their thoughts about how what they’re doing might be used, it’s both difficult to think about and it’s easy to obscure. And so some folks now are rattling the nuclear saber, if only rhetorically, again. What do you think is the value of lifting up Ted Hall’s story right now?
Dave Lindorff: “He did what Oppenheimer wouldn’t do…. And the result was that we have not seen an atomic bomb used since Nagasaki.”
DL: First of all, he proved to be right. He did what Oppenheimer wouldn’t do, by actually sharing the secrets, and making it possible for there to be two countries with the bomb. And the result was that we have not seen an atomic bomb used since Nagasaki. We’re on 79 years and counting since those two bombs were dropped, and none has been used, because of multiple nations having the bomb. You just can’t do it.
Now, whether that’ll hold, it’s always been pretty precarious, but it’s the best that they’ve come up with, is just having mutual assured destruction. It’s not a good system, but it’s here.
I personally think that it’s bluster still, because all the game-planning, when they look at what happens if we use an atomic bomb, or we reply with an atomic bomb when one is used, it always escalates within hours or days into a full-scale global strategic nuclear bombing and destruction of the Earth.
JJ: Right. Well, let me ask you, finally, from a journalism or media perspective: some reviewers, of the film in particular, have said, essentially, humanizing Ted Hall at all— and the film talks a lot with his wife, Joan—humanizing him is bias, because he was a traitor, the end.
And then other people say, well, we don’t really need Wikipedia-style history. We don’t need news from nowhere, that it’s a disservice to just present sort of Big Good vs. Big Evil, and that starting from a human perspective helps us locate ourselves within this broad sweep of events that, once they’re done, can seem inevitable. And I don’t imagine that you would’ve been attracted to a story that was kind of cut, paste, print. The complexity, was that part of the draw for you?
DL: Yes, absolutely. I mean, think about what he did. At the one hand, he thought that the bomb was a horrible, horrible thing. At the other, he was working feverishly trying to help them get it, because when he was hired, he thought it was important to get it before the Germans did. And then when he found that wasn’t the case, he was still working on it, because he knew that it was going to be built, with him or without him. And yet, that meant he was contributing to when it was finally used, because he wanted to be able to give all the information to the Russians. He knew that there were going to be bombs used if that didn’t happen.
And I think that’s correct, that it must have been torture for him to know that he had helped create what happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, yet he felt it was the right thing that he had done. So it was very complicated.
JJ: All right, then, well, we’ll leave it there for now. We’ve been speaking with Dave Lindorff. The new book, Spy for No Country, is out from Prometheus Books. Thank you so much, Dave Lindorff, for joining us this week on CounterSpin.
This week on CounterSpin: The long-fought effort to get legal acknowledgement of the abuse of Iraqi detainees during the Iraq War is coming to a federal court in Virginia, with Al-Shimari v. CACI. Since the case was first filed in 2008, military contractor CACI has pushed some 20 times to have it dismissed.
Time magazine unwittingly told the tale with the recent headline: “Abu Ghraib Military Contractor Trial Set to Start 20 Years after Shocking Images of Abuse.” That’s the thing, people had been reporting the horrific treatment of Iraqi detainees at the Baghdad-area prison and elsewhere, but it was only when those photos were released—photos the Defense Department tried hard to suppress—that it was so undeniable it had to be acknowledged.
But still: When Australian TV later broadcast new unseen images, the Washington Postofficially sighed that they weren’t worth running because they did not depict “previously unknown” abuse. Post executive editor Len Downie had a different answer, saying in an online chat that the images were “so shocking and in such bad taste, especially the extensive nudity, that they are not publishable in our newspaper.” Because that what officially sanctioned torture is, above all, right? Distasteful.
We got a reading on the case last year from Baher Azmy, legal director at the Center for Constitutional Rights.
Also on the show: Historians tell us that the Cold War is over, but the framing persists in news media that love a simple good guy vs. bad guy story, even as who the good and the bad guys are shifts over time. Telling history through actual human beings makes it harder to come up with slam-dunk answers, but can raise questions that are ultimately more useful for those seeking a peaceful planet. A new book provides a sort of case study; it’s about Ted Hall, who, as a young man, shared nuclear secrets from Los Alamos with the then–Soviet Union. Veteran investigative journalist Dave Lindorff has reported for numerous outlets and is author of Marketplace Medicine and This Can’t Be Happening, among other titles. We talked with him about his latest, Spy for No Country: The Story of Ted Hall, the Teenage Atomic Spy Who May Have Saved the World, which is out now from Prometheus Books.
On 2 April, 2024 Human Rights Watch made part of its Rwanda Archives public in digital form.
Human Rights Watch has been documenting and exposing human rights violations in Rwanda since the early 1990s. Its senior adviser in the Africa division, Alison Des Forges, one of the world’s foremost experts on Rwanda, dedicated her career to the struggle for human rights in the Great Lakes region of Africa, and to Rwanda in particular. In the period leading up to the 1994 genocide, she worked tirelessly to alert world powers to the impending crisis in Rwanda. Few would listen. By the time the genocidal forces had unleashed their sinister program and the world had awakened to the full horror that was unfolding in Rwanda, it was too late. The killings in Rwanda increased as a civil war in Burundi waged on. The violence in Burundi, also based on ethnic divisions between Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups, lasted from 1993 until 2005.
Des Forges’s efforts did not stop when the genocide ended. She continued to painstakingly gather information on the killings, rapes, and other horrific crimes, which she compiled into what has become one of the main reference books on the Rwandan genocide: “Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda”, a 500-page account of the genocide published jointly by Human Rights Watch and the International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH) in 1999.
Des Forges testified as an expert witness in 11 trials at the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania, as well as in domestic court proceedings involving Rwandan genocide suspects in several countries.
Des Forges campaigned vigorously for justice for the genocide until her tragic death in a plane crash in the US on February 12, 2009. She also documented human rights abuses by the new government of Rwanda after the genocide and advocated for accountability for all abuses, past and present.
Thirty years after the genocide, Human Rights Watch has begun the process of digitizing and making available some of Des Forges’s archives. The documents summarized below are some of those that remained in Human Rights Watch possession after Des Forges’s death and help shed light on efforts by Des Forges and others to warn about, and then attempt to stop, the genocide. These are just a selection of the many documents in the archives; others will not be published at this time for a variety of reasons. The private exchanges, letters, statements, and reports below do not purport to be a comprehensive account of the work of Human Rights Watch and others at the time, as it is likely documents are missing from the archive.
A prominent Uyghur who published books about Uyghur cultural identity and China’s persecution of the Uyghurs has been sentenced to prison, according to a Norway-based foundation and officials in Xinjiang.
Erkin Emet, 65, on a list of detained intellectuals in Xinjiang compiled by Uyghur Hjelp Foundation based in Norway, was taken into custody in July 2018, according to the organization’s founder, Abduweli Ayup.
Emet’s family said authorities accused him of inciting ethnic separatism and that he is serving a prison term, according to a source in Kashgar, asking not to be identified for security reasons.
However, his whereabouts and the length of his sentence are unknown, the source said.
Through confidential channels, Ayup discovered that Emet was most likely arrested for his involvement in the publication or dissemination of two books in particular.
The first was the novel “Altun Kesh,” or “Golden Shoes,” by Halide Israel, about the persecution of Uyghurs during China’s 1966-76 Cultural Revolution and the importance of holding onto Uyghur identity.
Emet also sold copies of Zordun Sabir’s “Ana Yurt,” or “Motherland,” which chronicles the Uyghur victory over Chinese nationalist forces in the early 1940s and the establishment of the second East Turkestan Republic, in existence from 1944 to 1949.
Crackdown on intellectuals
Emet was arrested during a crackdown known as “Hui Tou Kan,” or “Looking Back,” a police officer who works near the Xinjiang’s Health Publishing House in Urumqi, where Emet used to work, told Radio Free Asia.
At that time, Chinese authorities were detaining Uyghur intellectuals, including writers and publishers, in internment camps or prisons for producing works viewed as harboring separatist tendencies.
Material written or published by prominent Uyghurs was scrutinized, even though it had previously received government approval.
“During Hui Tou Kan, they investigated all previously published books,” said an official at Xinjiang’s Political Law Office in Urumqi, the region’s capital.
The most problematic book related to his arrest was “Altun Kesh,” he said.
Another source said that his involvement in the sale of “Ana Yurt” was also behind his arrest.
Bookstore manager
Emet, who has two children and several grandchildren, first served as deputy director of the Kashgar branch of Xinhua Bookstore in the 1990s, according to Ayup, whose group is also known as Uyghuryar.
Emet was the first bookstore manager to order 5,000 copies of “Ana Yurt,” which sold out quickly, he said.
“He opened multiple large bookstores in different counties of Kashgar, expanded the Kashgar Xinhua Bookstore, and diversified its offers with different categories, which proved to be successful,” Ayup told RFA.
Emet was appointed director of the Kashgar Uyghur Publishing House at the end of 2010.
There he published notable works, including Hojamuhemmed Muhammad’s eight volumes of poetry collections and was instrumental in getting Halide Israel’s “Kechmish,” or “Tales of the Past,” and “Altun Kesh” published, Ayup said.
In May 2018, Emet moved to Urumqi to become director of Xinjiang’s Health Publishing House, where he worked with Qurban Mamut, a renowned retired Uyghur editor at the Uyghur Civilization Journal, according to Ayup.
Two months later, Emet was arrested.
Mamut, father of RFA journalist Bahram Sintash, was arrested later and sentenced to 15 years in prison, Ayup said.
Translated by RFA Uyghur. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Shohret Hoshur for RFA Uyghur.
Michelle Langrand for Geneva Solutions of 20 March 2024 has an exclusive report on the liquidity crunch and its effect on the UN human rights branch. Here her report in full:
UN secretary general António Guterres and UN human rights high commissioner Volker Türk at the opening of the Human Rights Council 55th session in Geneva, 26 February 2024. (UN Photo/Elma Okic)
As the United Nations faces its worst liquidity crisis in recent history, experts, staff and observers worry about the ramifications on human rights work. Correspondence seen by Geneva Solutions reveals concerns at the highest levels of the UN human rights branch in Geneva as they are forced to scale back their operations.
A patchwork of cost-saving measures taken over the winter holidays at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, from keeping the heat down and closing the premises for two weeks, revealed how serious the UN’s cash troubles were after states failed to fully pay their bills in 2023. The new year didn’t brighten prospects either. In January, UN secretary general Antonio Guterres in New York announced that “aggressive cash conservation measures” would be taken across the organisation to avoid running out of cash by August as year-end arrears reached a record $859 million.
It couldn’t have come at a worse time for a cash-strapped UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) as worsening human rights crises worldwide add to its workload. The Geneva-based office acts as a secretariat for dozens of independent experts, investigative bodies and human rights committees that rely for the most part on the UN’s regular budget and few voluntary contributions from states. Between vacancies and travel restrictions, both insiders and outsiders worry that planned cuts could severely impair the UN’s crucial human rights work.
Understaffed and overwhelmed
On 12 February, just as the UN’s Geneva headquarters prepared for one of its busiest months hosting the Human Rights Council’s first session of the year, bad news came from New York. Countries had only paid one-third of the UN’s $3.59bn regular budget for 2024, and instructions from the higher-ups were that the hiring freeze imposed in July 2023 would be extended throughout 2024 across UN operations. The organisation said that $350 million would need to be shaved off through spending restrictions on travel, conference services and others.
Human rights bodies, where vacancies had been piling up in the last months, would have to continue to run with reduced staff. In a letter from 23 December, UN high commissioner for human rights Volker Türk had already warned Council president Omar Zniber that 63 posts in over 10 investigative mandates were waiting to be filled while recruitments had been placed on hold. Currently, there are active investigations on serious human rights abuses in Ukraine, Iran, Syria, South Sudan and Nicaragua among others.
“While no compromise has been made in terms of methodology, some of the investigative bodies have had to narrow the scope of both their investigations and their upcoming reports,” the letter reads.
The fact-finding mission on Sudan was one of the bodies immediately affected. Created in October to collect evidence on atrocities committed during the last year of bloody conflict in which thousands of civilians have been killed and millions displaced, the probe body has struggled to begin work. The independent experts composing it, who aren’t paid, have been appointed since December, but as of late February, the Human Rights Office hadn’t been able to hire a support team due to insufficient cash flow, according to a Human Rights Council spokesperson. The experts, who have been mandated for one year, are due to present their findings in September, with observers wondering whether the western-led proposal will garner the political backing it needs to be renewed.
That isn’t the only initiative struggling to get off the ground. “We have met with some new mandates, and we realised that they barely have a team, if any, to support them,” said one NGO member who collaborates with the human rights mechanisms and asked to remain anonymous. Observers say most investigative bodies, even older ones, are impacted at some level.
Kaoru Okoizumi, deputy head of the Independent Investigative Mechanism on Myanmar (IIMM) – the largest human rights probe team – said six out of 57 staff positions funded through the UN’s regular budget were vacant, significantly affecting their work. The IIMM, which also relies on a trust fund made up of voluntary donations and doesn’t depend on the OHCHR’s budget, is coping better than most.
Expert committees that oversee states’ compliance with international human rights law, such as on children’s rights and on torture, are also stretched thin. One staffer said they were required to take on more work than normally expected, for example, having to conduct research and compile information about several countries at the same time for one session. “It’s just too much!” they said, adding that their team was short of more than 10 people.
Another worker from the OHCHR’s special procedures branch, who said was covering for several vacant spots, conceded that the quality of work is affected in such conditions. “Of course, you won’t work as well after pulling all-nighters,” they said. Türk’s letter to Zniber acknowledges that the secretariat was having trouble supporting some 60 special procedures, which are UN-backed independent experts or groups of experts assigned to report to the council on a specific theme or country.
While the problem of understaffing isn’t new, and many also point to cumbersome months-long recruitment processes that are often incompatible with brief mandates, the situation has worsened. To compensate for the hiring freeze, the UN has also increasingly resorted to temporary contracts that last for a few months and can be exceptionally renewed for up to two years. The two workers, who have living on contract to contract for more than a year, said that there is fear that temporary staff may be among the first to go, along with consultants. “In the food chain of contracts, we’re at the bottom,” one of them said.
A slim year for the Human Rights Council
The UN’s human rights branch, which receives as little as four per cent of the UN’s total budget – around $142 million – just enough to cover one third of its activities, has been scrambling to cut back on spending. On Friday, in another letter seen by Geneva Solutions, Türk informed Zniber that his office would be forced to axe certain activities this year.
OHCHR spokesperson Marta Hurtado confirmed the information to Geneva Solutions by writing: “The office has developed an internal contingency plan, which provides for adjustment pending the complete availability of regular budget resources become available.”
Among the measures it proposes is postponing some activities to 2025 altogether while as many consultations and meetings as possible would be moved online without interpretation, according to Hurtado, since the UN in New York hasn’t authorised it for virtual meetings. For those that will be held in person, resources to fly in experts and civil society will also be reduced.
The UN’s recent decision that it would no longer provide online services for meetings has drawn outcry from rights campaigners who argue it curtails the possibility of civil society groups and states with little resources to participate. While the move has been attributed to matters of rules, observers can’t help but wonder if it isn’t, in the end, about the money. Echoing the concerns in the letter, Türks described the impact of these measures on participation from experts and other stakeholders as “deeply regrettable”.
Another issue raised by the UN rights chief is the difficulty that his office has been facing in providing technical assistance to national authorities. He gave the example of the Marshall Islands, which requested help in 2022 to assess the human rights impact of US nuclear testing in its territory in the 1940s and 50s. A source said that although a first visit finally took place this year, work has been delayed.
Marc Limon, director of the human rights think tank Universal Rights Group, remarked that work by the Council to help states improve their rights record through capacity-building support was unfortunately “almost inexistent” and regretted that resources couldn’t be spared for what he calls the “hard end of human rights diplomacy”. “While UN investigations must be protected, there is little threat to key commissions of inquiry due to the huge budgets allocated to them in the first place,” he said. Most probe bodies have between 17 to 27 staff while special procedures usually have one or two assistants.
The Moroccan ambassador forwarded Türk’s letter to fellow states on Monday and said a draft decision regarding the measures would be tabled for the council to consider at the end of the session at the beginning of April.
Human rights credibility at stake
One that has raised eyebrows but isn’t explicitly mentioned by the UN rights chief is limiting country visits by UN experts to one visit instead of two. Hurtado acknowledged that special procedures and other expert mechanisms, including probe bodies, would see their country visits “reduced” while not commenting on the number of authorised visits.
One UN expert, speaking under the condition of anonymity, voiced concern over the restriction. “Country visits are extremely important because they give us a real intimate understanding of a place and the state gets direct feedback on what they’re doing well and what they can do to improve, while also energising civil society,” they said, point out that experts were already barely able to conduct visits during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Limon commented that while it was a wise choice to cut back on some of the “superfluous” debates and activities, reducing special rapporteur trips to countries to one per year, an idea that he said has been floated around before, showed the office “had its priorities wrong”.
Travel restrictions could also have significant implications for criminal cases. Okoizumi said her Myanmar team only had 65 per cent of its usual travel budget, which is key for the Geneva-based group to reach victims and witnesses. “We do our witness interviews in person because we think it’s important in a criminal investigation to make sure that interviews are being conducted in a way that preserves the integrity of the testimony,” she said.
The body, set up in 2018 by the Human Rights Council, is currently working to support a case brought by The Gambia against Myanmar for violating the Genocide Convention at the International Court of Justice, as well as investigations on crimes against the Rohingya at the International Criminal Court and Argentina.
“These are very concrete proceedings and our ability to support them will be impacted by the number of interviews that we’re able to conduct or the analysis that we’re able to produce and share with these jurisdictions,” Okoizumi said, noting that the ICJ case is particularly time-sensitive as both parties were expected to make submissions this year.
The international lawyer said this has meant shifting resources to meet shorter-term deadlines at the risk of putting aside other objectives. “The whole point of having an investigative mechanism is to make sure that we can collect the evidence very soon after a crime happens, even if there isn’t an investigation or prosecution until many years or even decades later. So, shifting our resources in that way, overall will have a negative impact,” she explained.
Top experts within the human rights branch have also rang alarm bells about the wider repercussions of the funding crisis. In a letter seen by Geneva Solutions addressed to the president of the General Assembly, Dennis Francis, dated 23 February, 10 chairs of human rights committees warned that the liquidity crisis “severely threatens the credibility and efficiency of the United Nations human rights system”.
The experts said the treaty bodies were “being denied even the minimum staff and operational resources required to deliver their critical mandates to advance human rights” at a time of “such a severe existential crisis of multilateralism and of non compliance with international law”.
Referring to some of the measures being considered, the signatories also argue that suspending sessions “for the first time in their over six decades of history for financial reasons, together with visits to prevent torture and other human rights violations” would lead to “concrete and irreversible” harm.
“When the collective security system has failed to honour the ‘never again’ pledge of 1945, the least to do is to strengthen human rights monitoring mechanisms, so that human rights violations are documented, even when justice seems extremely challenging to serve. We note with deep regret that the opposite is being done,” the custodians of human rights law wrote.
