Irish government to sue over British attempt to stop prosecutions for Troubles-era crimes
The Irish government is to sue the UK government over its attempt to halt inquests, civil cases and criminal prosecutions for Troubles-era crimes.
Leo Varadkar said on Wednesday that Dublin would launch an inter-state case against the UK’s so-called legacy legislation under the European convention on human rights.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Plan is aimed at spreading cost of hosting asylum seekers across bloc and limiting number of arrivals
EU negotiators have reached agreement on rules aimed at spreading the cost and responsibility for hosting asylum seekers across the bloc, limiting the number of people coming in and making it easier to deport those whose claims fail.
After all-night talks, representatives from national governments, the European parliament and European Commission “reached a deal on the core political elements” of the pact on asylum and migration, the EU’s Spanish presidency said on Wednesday.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
US congressional commission has called for Li Qiaochu’s release, citing reports she needs urgent medical treatment
Li Qiaochu, a human rights activist detained for nearly three years in China, has gone on trial in Shandong province charged with “inciting subversion of state power”.
On the eve of the trial the chairs of the US congressional commission on China called for Li’s unconditional release, citing reports that the labour rights and feminist activist needed urgent medical treatment.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Report calls for immediate closure of Wethersfield as conditions causing irreparable harm to residents
Asylum seekers housed in the UK’s largest mass accommodation site have attempted to kill themselves and set themselves on fire because of conditions “no different from Libya”, according to a report.
The controversial Wethersfield site, on a remote military airbase near Braintree in Essex, is in the constituency of the home secretary, James Cleverly, who said earlier this year in a social media post that the site was not “appropriate”.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Rev Dr Noel Anthony Davies says Rishi Sunak’s government seems all too willing to breach the principles of the UN’s human rights declaration. Plus letters from Clive Stafford Smith, Jim King and Michael McLoughlin
As a retired Christian minister, I very much welcome the powerful and challenging article by Prof Philippe Sands (From Gaza to Ukraine, what would the pioneers of human rights think of our world today?, 13 December). In the service that I led in our uniting church in Swansea last Sunday – international Human Rights Day – I shared some of the key articles of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights with the congregation. A number commented afterwards on how powerful and challenging its affirmations are.
We were therefore shocked to see that the UK government is prepared to turn its back on the declaration that has been the foundation of our common humanity and our shared sense of justice and freedom for all over the last 75 years merely to serve party political ends, and to implement an immigration policy that is clearly in contravention of the declaration. It is also a denial of what we, as Christians, would regard as a universal recognition, founded in the teaching of Jesus, of the dignity, freedom and equality of all people, irrespective of race, religion, sexuality, national identity or political conviction.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
European court of human rights finds that Polish abortion legislation breached a pregnant woman’s right to privacy and family life, after her foetus was diagnosed with Down’s syndrome
Poland’s 2020 abortion legislation violated the rights of a woman who was forced to travel abroad to access an abortion, the European court of human rights ruled on Thursday.
The court found that while the legislation, which prevented the applicant from accessing an abortion after her foetus was diagnosed with trisomy 21 (Down’s syndrome), did not legally amount to “inhuman or degrading treatment”, it did violate her right to privacy and family life, protected under article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
With 40% of homes destroyed in the strip, legal experts are raising the question of ‘domicide’ – but what it is it, and is it taking place in Gaza?
Since the resumption of Israel’s bombardment, life for civilians in Gaza has become desperate, says the Guardian’s world affairs editor, Julian Borger. More than 1.9 million people there have fled their homes, and many have had to then flee again as the bombardment shifts from the north to the south of the territory.
Tented camps are springing up – improvised shelters with no sanitation or heat – and with winter approaching, medical and humanitarian groups warn that starvation and disease may follow. Now, a UN special rapporteur suggests that what is happening could be “domicide” – the deliberate targeting of homes and buildings to make an area uninhabitable.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
The prime minister faced PMQs for the final time before the Christmas recess
Rishi Sunak is about to take PMQs. It will be the last of 2023.
Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda bill passes its first Commons vote but only after rebellion by a collection of rightwing Tory MPs
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, a former lord chief justice of England and Wales, has said the government should not try to ignore the jurisdiction of the European court of human rights. In an interview for a podcast called the Judges, he said:
If you have subjected yourself to a court, and it was our voluntary decision to do so, then you have to take the rough with the smooth and if they’ve decided [the court] have this jurisdiction then you ought to follow it.
You can’t expect others to respect the law if you say you won’t respect the law of someone else.
You ought to actually be able, within a set period of time, say a fortnight, to investigate, decide, give him one right of appeal – why you should have more than one right of appeal I simply don’t understand – and remove them.” But, he concedes, it costs money.
Britain is a practical nation – always has been. People can’t afford Christmas. If they call an ambulance this winter – they don’t know if it will come. 6,000 crimes go unpunished – every day. Common sense is rolling your sleeves up and solving these problems practically, not indulging in some kind of political performance art.
This goes for stopping the boats as well. It’s not about wave machines, or armoured jet skis, or schemes like Rwanda you know will never work.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights protects the most vulnerable: we must fight to defend and extend it
During the week when we mark 75 years of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the 1948 convention on the prevention and punishment of genocide, I have been thinking about the genesis of both events and how we should commemorate them now.
Adopted within 24 hours of each other in Paris in December 1948, the universal declaration seeks to protect individuals, while the convention seeks to protect groups. That moment in Paris was revolutionary: a recognition that the rights of the state are not unlimited, that the days of being allowed as a matter of law to trample over human lives were over.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
As Tuesday’s crucial vote looms, MPs from both wings of the party say PM has tied his future to a bill that cannot succeed
• Read more: The UK’s deal with Rwanda must stay within the rule of law
Senior Tories from across the party are warning that Rishi Sunak’s emergency Rwanda plan will never become law in its current form, ahead of the most critical vote of his premiership.
Liberal Tories confirmed last night that, despite their desire to back the PM against the right, “serious concerns” remain about the plan and more reassurances will be required. Meanwhile, a self-styled “star chamber” of legal figures examining the proposals for the Tory right is understood to have found problems that are “extremely difficult to resolve”.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Scotland to become first devolved nation to incorporate UNCRC into domestic law – unless Westminster intervenes again
Campaigners, politicians and young people who led grassroots efforts to put international children’s rights standards at the heart of Scottish law are celebrating the passing of a landmark Holyrood bill.
The Scottish parliament voted unanimously on Thursday afternoon for Scotland to become the first devolved nation to incorporate the UN charter on the rights of the child (UNCRC) into domestic law.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Al-Haq and Global Legal Action Network argue sales of British weapons could breach international law
The high court has been urged to intervene and suspend UK arms sales to Israel in a legal challenge launched on Wednesday.
The Palestinian human rights organisation Al-Haq and the UK-based Global Legal Action Network (Glan) have applied for a judicial review of the government’s export licences for the sale of British weapons capable of being used in Israel’s action in Gaza, which has killed more than 16,000 people – mostly civilians – since 7 October, according to Gaza’s health authorities. Israel’s invasion of Gaza followed Hamas’s attack on southern Israel, in which it killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Emergency legislation stops short of leaving European convention on human rights and will infuriate Tory hard right
Rishi Sunak aims to block UK human rights laws in an effort to revive the government’s faltering plans to send people seeking asylum to Rwanda.
An emergency bill published on Wednesday will assert that ministers have the power to ignore judgments that come from Strasbourg while stopping short of leaving or “disapplying” the European convention on human rights.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Amnesty International report details ‘harrowing’ testimonies of survivors at hands of security forces following nationwide protests
Iranian security forces used rape and sexual violence to torture, punish and inflict lasting physical and psychological damage on protesters as young as 12 during the country’s nationwide protests last year, a report says.
The report by Amnesty International is based on the testimonies of 12 women, 26 men, one girl and six boys who survived rape or other forms of sexual violence. Six survivors of rape were subjected to gang rapes by up to 10 male state agents, according to Amnesty.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Former home secretary urges PM to block all human rights laws used to halt deportation flights
The Conservative party faces “electoral oblivion in a matter of months” unless ministers block all human rights laws used to halt deportation flights to Rwanda, Suella Braverman has told MPs.
In a personal statement to the Commons, the former home secretary urged Rishi Sunak to build at pace “nightingale” detention centres and stop all legal challenges using domestic and international laws.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
PMQs clash comes as Suella Braverman expected to heavily criticise government’s immigration plans
Rishi Sunak’s government has been accused by Keir Starmer of giving Rwanda “hundreds of millions of pounds for nothing in return” following the signing of a deportation treaty.
In a clash at prime minister’s questions, the Labour leader mocked the treaty, signed on Tuesday, saying the Rwandan government of President Paul Kagame had seen the prime minister coming “a mile off”.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Centrist Tories want PM to stick by UK’s human rights obligations while those on the right want new bill to override them
Tory MPs are at loggerheads as competing factions engage in last-minute lobbying efforts to try to change Rishi Sunak’s flagship Rwanda legislation before it is published in the coming days.
The prime minister is due to announce a new bill as soon as this week, which Downing Street says will deal with concerns raised last month by the supreme court over the government’s scheme to send asylum seekers to east Africa. It follows the signing of a new treaty with Rwanda on Tuesday by the home secretary, James Cleverly, in Kigali.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
A suite of recent cybersecurity data breaches highlight an urgent need to overhaul how companies and government agencies handle our data. But these incidents pose particular risks to victim-survivors of domestic violence.
In fact, authorities across Australia and the United Kingdom are raising concerns about how privacy breaches have endangered these customers.
The onus is on service providers – such as utilities, telcos, internet companies and government agencies – to ensure they don’t risk the safety of their most vulnerable customers by being careless with their data.
Earlier this year, the UK Information Commissioner reported it had reprimanded seven organisations since June 2022 for privacy breaches affecting victims of domestic abuse.
These included organisations revealing the safe addresses of the victims to their alleged abuser. In one case, a family had to be moved immediately to emergency accommodation.
In another case, an organisation disclosed the home address of two children to their birth father (who was in prison for raping their mother).
The UK Information Commissioner has called for better training and processes. This includes regular verification of contact information and securing data against unauthorised access.
In 2021, the Australian Information Commissioner and Privacy Commissioner took action against Services Australia for disclosing a victim-survivor’s new address to her former partner.
The commissioner ordered a written apology and a A$19,980 compensation payment. It also ordered an independent audit of how Services Australia updates contact details for separating couples with shared records.
An earlier case involved a telecommunications company and the publisher of a public directory.
The commissioner ordered them each to pay $20,000 to a victim of domestic violence whose details were made public, which jeopardised her safety.
More recently, the Energy and Water Ombudsman Victoria reported a case where an electricity provider inadvertently provided a woman’s new address to her ex-partner. The woman had to buy security cameras for protection. The company has since revised its procedures.
The Energy and Water Ombudsman Victoria has also reviewed complaints received in 2022-23 related to domestic violence. These include failing to flag accounts of victims who disclosed abuse, as well as potentially unsafe consumer automation and data governance processes.
The Victorian Essential Services Commission accepted a court-enforceable undertaking from a water company that it would improve processes after allegations its actions put customers affected by family violence at risk.
The commission found the company failed to adequately protect the personal information of two separate customers in 2021 and 2022, by sending correspondence with their personal information to the wrong addresses.
In both cases, the customer had not disclosed their experience of domestic violence. Nevertheless, the regulator noted these “erroneous information disclosures put these customers at risk of harm”.
Australia’s Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman received about 300 complaints involving domestic violence in 2022-23, with almost two-thirds relating to mobile phones.
Complaints included instances of telcos disclosing the addresses of victim-survivors to perpetrators or of frontline staff not believing victim-survivors. There were also cases of telcos insisting a consumer experiencing family violence contact the perpetrator of family violence. The report noted:
For example, one person was asked by her telco to bring her abusive ex-partner into a store to change her number to her new account. We’ve also had complaints about telcos disconnecting the services of a consumer experiencing family violence – sometimes at the request of the account holder who is the perpetrator of the violence – despite access to those services being critical to the consumer staying safe.
The Australian Financial Complaints Authority resolved more than 500 complaints from people experiencing domestic and family violence in 2021-22, including those related to privacy breaches.
In May, new national rules came into force to provide better protection and support to energy customers experiencing domestic violence.
These rules mandate retailers prioritise customer safety and protect their personal information. This includes account security measures to prevent perpetrators from accessing victim-survivors’ sensitive data.
They also prohibit the disclosure of information without consent. In issuing its rules, the Australian Energy Markets Commission noted the heightened risk of partner homicides following separations.
The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman has called for mandatory, uniform and enforceable rules. The current voluntary industry code and guidelines fall short in protecting phone and internet customers experiencing domestic violence.
New rules should include training, policies and recognition of violence as a cause of payment difficulties. They should also factor in how service suspension or disconnection affects victim-survivors.
The Australian Information and Privacy Commissioner said last year:
Sadly, we continue to receive cases of improper disclosure of personal information off line by businesses to ex partners who target women in family disputes and domestic violence. All of these issues reinforce the need for privacy by design.
In its response to a review of the Privacy Act, the government has agreed the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner should help develop guidance to reduce risk to customers.
We must work harder to ensure data and privacy breaches do not leave victim-survivors of domestic violence at greater risk from perpetrators.
The National Sexual Assault, Family and Domestic Violence Counselling Line – 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732) – is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week for any Australian who has experienced, or is at risk of, family and domestic violence and/or sexual assault.
Please note: Picture at top is a stock photo. Used under the Pixabay Content License. Credit: antonynjoro
The post Data breaches can be extraordinarily dangerous for victim-survivors appeared first on BroadAgenda.
This post was originally published on BroadAgenda.
Human rights activists say supreme court’s vague wording provides wide scope for persecution
Russia’s supreme court has outlawed what it called an “international LGBT public movement” as extremist, in a landmark ruling that representatives of gay and transgender people warn will lead to arrests and prosecutions of the already repressed LGBTQ+ community.
The ruling in effect outlaws LGBTQ+ activism in a country growing increasingly conservative since the start of the war in Ukraine. The “extremist” label could mean that gay, lesbian, transgender or queer people living in Russia could receive lengthy prison sentences if deemed by the authorities to be part of the so called “international LGBT public movement”.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Family of Paul Rusesabagina, who campaigned to have him freed from jail, say country’s justice system is a ‘tool to oppress people’
The Rwandan legal system is incapable of protecting refugees sent from the UK, according to the daughters of Paul Rusesabagina, the man who inspired the Oscar-nominated movie Hotel Rwanda.
Carine and Anaïse Kanimba campaigned for more than two years to secure the release of their father, who was freed from a Kigali jail after three years of incarceration earlier this year, and they have detailed first-hand knowledge of the true nature of the Rwandan legal system.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
London-based Christian Legal Centre behind a number of end-of-life court cases ‘prolonging suffering’, doctors say
Medics treating critically ill babies are quitting their jobs owing to “considerable moral distress” caused by a rightwing Christian group behind a series of end-of-life court cases, the Guardian has been told.
Senior doctors claimed the behaviour of some evangelical campaigners was “prolonging the suffering” of seriously ill infants. They accused them of “selling falsehoods and lies” to families and of using legal tactics condemned by judges.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Edelman, world’s largest public relations company, paid millions by Saudi Arabia, UAE and other repressive regimes
Public trust in some of the world’s most repressive governments is soaring, according to Edelman, the world’s largest public relations firm, whose flagship “trust barometer” has created its reputation as an authority on global trust. For years, Edelman has reported that citizens of authoritarian countries, including Saudi Arabia, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and China, tend to trust their governments more than people living in democracies do.
But Edelman has been less forthcoming about the fact that some of these same authoritarian governments have also been its clients. Edelman’s work for one such client – the government of the UAE – will be front and center when world leaders convene in Dubai later this month for the UN’s Cop28 climate summit.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
More than 13,000 Nigerian villagers can bring legal claims against oil firm, rules high court
Thousands of Nigerian villagers can bring human rights claims against the fossil fuel company Shell over the chronic oil pollution of their water sources and destruction of their way of life, the high court in London has ruled.
Mrs Justice May ruled this week that more than 13,000 farmers and fishers from the Ogale and Bille communities in the Niger delta were entitled to bring legal claims against Shell for alleged breaches to their right to a clean environment.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Ding Jiaxi and Xu Zhiyong are leading figures in the thwarted New Citizens’ Movement group of activists and lawyers
A Chinese court is to rule in the appeals of detained human rights lawyers Ding Jiaxi and Xu Zhiyong, as Ding’s wife called on China’s top judge to “rectify the miscarriage of justice” in their case.
Ding and Xu are leading figures in China’s thwarted New Citizens’ Movement, a loose network of activists and lawyers concerned with human rights and government corruption. In April, the men were sentenced to more than a decade in prison for subversion of state power, in a ruling that was criticised by the UN’s human rights chief. Ding received a 12-year sentence, while Xu’s was 14 years.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Media Matters for America (11/16/23): “We recently found ads for Apple, Bravo, Oracle, Xfinity and IBM next to posts that tout Hitler and his Nazi Party on X.”
He wasn’t bluffing.
After threatening to sue liberal media watchdog Media Matters for America (CNBC, 11/18/23), Twitter’s principal owner Elon Musk did just that, arguing in papers filed in a Texas court that the group “manipulated” data in an effort to “destroy” the social media platform, causing major advertisers to pull back (BBC, 11/20/23).
The world’s richest human was responding to an MMFA report (11/16/23) about Twitter—which Musk has rebranded as X since purchasing the once publicly traded company—and its promotion of far-right, antisemitic content. It said that while “Musk continues his descent into white nationalist and antisemitic conspiracy theories,” the social media network has been “placing ads for major brands like Apple, Bravo (NBCUniversal), IBM, Oracle and Xfinity (Comcast) next to content that touts Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party.”
Elon Musk (BBC, 11/20/23) promised a “thermonuclear” lawsuit against anyone “who colluded in this fraudulent attack on our company.”
The report came just as the world stood in shock of Musk’s latest outburst of antisemitism: Just before the lawsuit was filed, he “publicly endorsed an antisemitic conspiracy theory popular among white supremacists: that Jewish communities push ‘hatred against whites’” (CNN, 11/17/23). This received widespread condemnation, including from the White House (Reuters, 11/17/23).
A few weeks earlier, the South African–born billionaire had endorsed the “white genocide” conspiracy theory (Mediaite, 10/27/23), a central myth of white supremacy: “They absolutely want your extinction,” he replied to a Twitter user who claimed that the melting down of a statue of Robert E. Lee was proof that “many seek our extinction.” The reported exodus of advertisers from Twitter in such a brief time span has been enormous (AP, 11/18/23).
The AP (11/20/23) reported that Twitter’s lawsuit claims MMFA “manipulated algorithms on the platform to create images of advertisers’ paid posts next to racist, incendiary content,” and that the lawsuit states that the instances of hateful content near such advertisements were “manufactured, inorganic and extraordinarily rare.” (By “manufactured,” Musk means that MMFA got its results by following far-right accounts on Twitter as well as the accounts of Twitter‘s major advertisers.)
New York Times (12/2/22): Researchers said “they had never seen such a sharp increase in hate speech, problematic content and formerly banned accounts in such a short period on a mainstream social media platform.”
It isn’t a secret that antisemitic vitriol has increased on the site under Musk’s management (New York Times, 12/2/22; Washington Post, 3/20/23; Vice, 5/18/23). What’s different now is that the MMFA report and the anger toward his last outburst happened as he is losing the business he desperately needs, as the brand has been rapidly tanking since he spent $44 billion to acquire it (Fortune, 5/30/23).
The case was filed in Texas, although Twitter is based in California and MMFA is in Washington, DC. Musk’s choice of venue has everything to do with his right-wing politics and nothing to do with compliance with the law. Fast Company (11/21/23) wrote:
The case has been assigned to District Judge Mark Pittman, a Donald Trump appointee whose previous rulings include blocking President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan and declaring a Texas law banning people ages 18 to 20 from carrying handguns in public was unconstitutional.
Also, by filing in the state, the case can be heard by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which has backed several conservative figures who claim they’ve been censored in the past.
MMFA is nevertheless confident that it will win the case; in a statement published by CNBC (11/18/23) before Musk’s suit was filed, Media Matters president Angelo Carusone declared:
Far from the free speech advocate he claims to be, Musk is a bully who threatens meritless lawsuits in an attempt to silence reporting that he even confirmed is accurate. Musk admitted the ads at issue ran alongside the pro-Nazi content we identified. If he does sue us, we will win.
Defamation cases are difficult for the plaintiff to win, especially in the case of someone like Musk, a public figure, who must prove that even false statements against them were intentional lies or made with “reckless disregard for the truth.” Legal experts cited by CNN (11/21/23) characterized the lawsuit as “weak” and “bogus.”
That doesn’t mean that legal fees, hours of working on the case and sleepless nights won’t impact MMFA’s work. In a case like this, a Goliath like Musk doesn’t need to win in court to hamper a David like MMFA, which reports an annual revenue of about $19 million and total assets of $26 million. That’s pennies in comparison to Musk, whose net worth is valued at nearly $200 billion (CBS News, 10/31/23). Mounting legal bills for oligarchs like Musk are as significant as a McDonald’s hamburger.
In the topsy-turvy world of the New York Post (11/21/23), billionaires who sue critics of hate speech are champions of free speech.
The suit is also a rallying call for the right, as former Fox News host Megyn Kelly (New York Post, 11/20/23) and the Federalist (11/21/23) are cheerleading the legal action. Greg Gutfeld of Fox News (11/21/23) welcomed the lawsuit, calling MMFA a “hard-left smear machine.” The New York Post editorial board (11/21/23), using Freudian projection, said the suit was a reaction to the liberal determination to “bring down Elon Musk for championing free speech.” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican who fought to overturn the 2020 presidential election (Austin American-Statesman, 5/25/22), said he was opening an investigation into MMFA (The Hill, 11/21/23).
Musk—who is hostile to organized labor (NPR, 3/3/22; Forbes, 12/5/22), who has promoted anti-trans hate on Twitter (San Francisco Chronicle, 12/13/22; Business Insider, 1/2/23; The Nation, 6/23/23) and who backed Republicans in last year’s midterm elections (Politico, 11/7/22)—has become a darling of the right. A billionaire boss with socially conservative views, he has amped up the mythology that social media networks are somehow rigged against the right (Vox, 12/9/22; New York, 12/10/22; Daily Beast, 4/6/23; CNN, 6/6/23), and that his takeover of Twitter will lead to more balance.
What has resulted since his takeover is an unrelenting campaign of censorship. El País (5/24/23) reported that since his takeover, the platform “has approved 83% of censorship requests by authoritarian governments,” and has shown a particular interest in censoring critics of India’s right-wing regime (Intercept, 3/28/23). It has silenced left-wing voices at the behest of “far-right internet trolls” (Intercept, 11/29/22). And in order to silence criticism of Israel–an impulse that is not incompatible with antisemitism–Musk has threatened to suspend users who use the word “decolonization” or the phrase “from the river to the sea,” a reference to the original borders of historic Palestine before the proposed partition and Israel’s eventual founding (Mother Jones, 11/18/23). Journalists on the social media beat have been banned (CNN, 12/17/22; Daily Beast, 4/19/23).
Media Matters (11/15/23): Musk has reinstated known white nationalists and antisemites on the platform” and “amplified conspiracy theories that were used to push antisemitism.”
MMFA was founded in 2004—in the midst of the “War on Terror” fervor of the George W. Bush years—by former right-wing journalist turned liberal consultant David Brock, who launched it to keep an eye on the rising influence of conservative news and talk shows (New York Times, 5/3/04). Its ongoing criticism of both Musk and corporate media like Fox News (Rolling Stone, 7/28/19) makes it the perfect target for the right. In the paranoid fantasyland of US conservatism, MMFA sits alongside George Soros, Black Lives Matter and Antifa as sinister forces who are out to undermine traditional social hierarchies.
And one can understand why Musk has a personal interest in going after MMFA, as the group (10/5/23, 11/13/23, 11/15/23) has focused on his politics and his administration of the website since he took it over.
I have written for several years about the right’s attempt to use the courts and legislatures to destroy press freedom to suppress reporting and opinions the rich and powerful don’t like (FAIR.org, 3/26/21, 5/25/22, 11/2/22, 3/1/23). The lawsuit sends a warning to reporters and advocates that can be easily interpreted: Musk isn’t just interested in taking over one social media network, but also drowning out the voices of anyone who challenges him. The point of this lawsuit is to intimidate anyone who speaks out against antisemitism, white supremacy and other forms of bigotry.
For those of us who care deeply about free speech and a free press, let’s hope this lawsuit is swiftly tossed out.
The post Musk’s Lawsuit Is About Destroying Free Speech appeared first on FAIR.
This post was originally published on FAIR.
Fears South Korean court will impose harsh penalty on Kwon Pyong to appease Beijing
The father of a Chinese dissident detained in South Korea said his son will die if he is sent back to China, a country he escaped from on a jetski in a life-threatening journey in August.
A court in South Korea will decide on Thursday the fate of Kwon Pyong, who is charged with violating the immigration control act. Kwon, 35, pleaded guilty and appealed for leniency as prosecutors requested a sentence of two and a half years, which experts say is unusually harsh.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Yasmine Ahmed says government actions regarding asylum seekers, climate activists and pro-Palestine protesters are starting to ‘look very much like authoritarianism’
The British government’s aggressive politicisation of human rights is a dangerous assault on democracy that must be halted before irrevocable damage is done, the UK director of Human Rights Watch (HRW) has warned.
In an exclusive interview with the Guardian, Yasmine Ahmed, who has been the UK director of HRW since November 2020, said the government indicating it could “disapply” the Human Rights Act to an emergency bill that will allow it to send asylum seekers to Rwanda – despite the supreme court ruling the policy illegal – is part of an escalating attack on human rights.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
Sentences risk silencing public concerns about the environment, climate change rapporteur Ian Fry says
Long sentences handed to two Just Stop Oil protesters for scaling the M25 bridge over the Thames are a potential breach of international law and risk silencing public concerns about the environment, a UN expert has said.
In a strongly worded intervention, Ian Fry, the UN’s rapporteur for climate change and human rights, said he was “particularly concerned” about the sentences, which were “significantly more severe than previous sentences imposed for this type of offending in the past”.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
No 10 has discussed possibility of ‘disapplying’ key human rights law to emergency bill to head off legal challenges
Rishi Sunak is considering blocking a key human rights law to help force through plans to send asylum seekers to Rwanda amid growing pressure from rightwing Conservative MPs.
No 10 has discussed the possibility of “disapplying” the Human Rights Act to an emergency bill in an effort to minimise legal challenges against the prime minister’s key immigration policy. Ministers are aware such a proposal could face rebellions in the Commons and the Lords, which could vote down the proposals.
Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.