My friend Dr Mudawi Ibrahim Adam is currently chained by hands and feet to a wall in Kober Prison in Khartoum. He has been badly beaten. He started a hunger strike on Sunday in protest at his detention without access to a lawyer since the 7th of December 2016. He was allowed a brief visit from his brothers 10 days ago, but has otherwise been denied access also to his family.
Brutal repression received a lot of encouragement.
Killers and torturers enjoyed impunity.
The commitment to human rights of supposedly democratic political leaders remained weak, an optional extra, a nice thing to do if it did not interfere with other interests.
Putin and Xi Jinping led an idealogical assault on the very idea of human rights.
There is growing concern over how democracy and the rule of law have deteriorated in Nicaragua, bearing important consequences for human rights defenders and society at large. As the presidential family has solidified its grip on Parliament, the Army, the Police and the media, civil society space has steadily narrowed.
صديقي الدكتور مضوي إبراهيم آدم رهن الاعتقال ثانيةً في الخرطوم. فقد اعتقله جهاز المخابرات والأمن الوطني من جامعة الخرطوم في 7 ديسمبر/كانون الأول وتم احتجازه دون السماح له بالوصول إلى محاميه أو عائلته. وقد سبق أن اعتقل عدة مرات لأكثر من شهر خلال عام 2010، وقبل ذلك لما مجموعه 18 شهرا لمرات عديدة خلال الفترة ما بين 2003-2005.
The Standing Rock Sioux tribe's battle for their land has become an international phenomenon. Native Americans and environmental defenders from all over the world have converged on the Dakotas to peacefully protest a massive pipeline project that threatens the lives of indigenous peoples.
“I keep asking: why would they do this?” human rights defender Ladonna Bravebull Allard told Front Line Defenders. She quickly added that the answer is clear:
After leading Front Line Defenders for 15 years, on 6 October 2016 Mary Lawlor announced she was stepping down as Executive Director. In this letter, Mary pays tribute to human rights defenders around the world.
The Irish Times this week ran an opinion piece defending the Northern Ireland Policing Board's training and financial support for Bahraini security forces.
While the current nature of EU foreign policy means it has to be built on a delicate compromise between 28 member states, most observers have felt that it has been excessively – perhaps needlessly? - timid in communicating on issues related to human rights. Human rights, after all, are both a founding value of the EU, so important that they appear in Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union, and one of the most important objectives of its foreign policy (again, enshrined in the Treaty as the second objective after the eradication of poverty).
