threats

Lebanon: Threats against Palestinian Human Rights Foundation 'Monitor'

Front Line is deeply concerned following reports of threats received by members of the Palestinian Human Rights Foundation (Monitor), a human rights organisation based in Lebanon.

Palestine

Uzbekistan:Torture of human rights defender Yusuf Juma, his sons, and threats against human rights lawyer Ruhiddin Kamilov

Front Line is deeply concerned following reports of the continued torture and ill-treatment of imprisoned human rights defender and writer Yusuf Juma and his sons Bobur and Mashrab Juma. Yusuf Juma is a prominent writer and pro-democracy activist in Uzbekistan. Yusuf, Bobur and Mashrab Juma were arrested in the Tashkent region in mid-December 2007 and are all detained in the Otbozor Prison in the Bukhara region of Uzbekistan. Yusuf and Bobur Juma's lawyer, Ruhiddin Kamilov, has been threatened by the prison governor.

Uzbekistan

Serbia: Threats against human rights defenders and organisations in Serbia following independence of Kosovo

Front Line is deeply concerned following information received of threats against human rights defenders, including Natasa Kandic, the Executive Director of the Humanitarian Law Centre, and human rights organisations operating in Serbia, in the context of the official declaration of Kosovo's independence.

Serbia

Serbia: Biljana Kovacevic-Vuco attacked for challenging impunity

“Whore, bitch, if Kosovo becomes independent we will cut you and that man in B92 (radio) and all those faggots...”. This is just one of the threats received by Biljana Kovacevic-Vuco for challenging the culture of impunity in Serbia.

Serbia

Front Line USA :Threats Attacks Arrests and Harassment of Human Rights Defenders

USA

This report examines the situation for human rights defenders in the USA in the aftermath of 9/11 and the way the “war on terror” was being used to repress the work of human rights defenders internationally.The report details the challenges facing those working for human rights, which include discrimination, harassment, intimidation, death threats, ill treatment, arrest and detention, spurious legal actions and loss of earnings. The report highlights the fact that over the past two years, human rights defenders in the USA have become increasingly vulnerable to repressive consequences as a result of their human rights activities.

Front Line Rwanda: Disappearances Arrests Threats Intimidation and Co-option of Human Rights Defenders 2001 - 2004

Rwanda

Over the past three years, Rwanda’s increasingly authoritarian government has arrested political opponents, stifled independent journalists, targeted human rights defenders, failed to thoroughly investigate disappearances, and narrowed the space for independent civil society. It has justified those actions as necessary to prevent ‘ethnic divisionism’ and a possible resurgence of genocide. Two months after the tenth commemoration of the genocide in April 2004, a Parliamentary Commission made accusations of genocidal ideology – a highly charged allegation in a country still recovering from the 1994 genocide that killed at least 800,000 people – against several civil society NGOs involved in promoting human rights in the judicial and rural sectors. While the main targets were LIPRODHOR (Rwandan League for the Promotion and Defence of Human Rights or Ligue rwandaise pour la promotion et la défense des droits de l’Homme) and FOR (Forum of Rural Organisations or Forum des organisations rurales), the Commission also went after the only remaining independent newspaper, churches, schools, and even international development NGOs such as CARE and Trócaire.

Upsurge of violence against human rights organizations in Guatemala

On 20 May 2007 intruders broke into the office of ActionAid in Zone 13 of Guatemala City and stole computer hard-drives containing files on ActionAids work in Guatemala. No other items of value were taken. ActionAid is the fifth member of the International Forum of NGOs to be attacked in the last month.

Guatemala

Attempted assassination of prominent Mexican human rights defender

Lydia Cacho Ribeiro a leading Mexican defender of children’s and women’s human rights narrowly escaped an assassination attempt by means of sabotage of an official vehicle she was traveling in from the city of Juarez in Mexico City on 7 May 2007.

Mexico

Human rights defender and community leader murdered in Colombia

Human rights defender, Francisco Puerta was assassinated reportedly by paramilitaries in front of the main transport terminal in Apartadó, Colombia on 14 May 2007.

Colombia

Gégé Katana winner of 2007 Front Line Award for Human Rights Defenders at Risk

Gégé Katana

Gégé Katana is a leading human rights defender working in Uvira, eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Gégé Katana is the president of Solidarite des Femmmes Activistes pour la Defense des Droits Humains, SOFAD (Solidarity Movement of Women Human Rights Activists) an organisation that works through a grassroots network of 625 women to research and campaign against sexual violence, and provide counselling and help to rape survivors. SOFAD also educates local communities on women and children’s rights, and lobbies the government to deliver justice and reform discriminatory laws.

Gégé Katana has worked with several non-governmental organisations including; IDEA/Afrique - Institut pour le developpement et l’education des adultes. She is a network member of the Global Fund for Women and Coordinator for the Synergie des Femmes Defenseurs des Droits de le l'Homme du Sud-Kivu en RDC.

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