Derechos Humanos (Continuación)

MundoAsia,

Vendredi 25 décembre, un réformiste modéré, Liu Xiaobo, a été condamné à onze ans de prison par le gouvernement chinois au simple motif qu'il avait fait circuler et signé une pétition, la Charte 08, qui réclame les réformes politiques et les droits humains fondamentaux dont une grande partie du monde bénéficie déjà.

Il s'agit d'un message clair à l'adresse de tous ceux qui demandent de la retenue à une Chine dotée d'une puissance toute neuve, et qui occupe désormais une place de premier rang dans les réunions de la gouvernance mondiale : "Puisque vous avez réclamé à grand bruit la libération de Liu après son arrestation, nous le punirons encore plus sévèrement.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente PróximoReflexionesTestimonios,

En una época en la que se atenta contra los derechos de los ciudadanos en el nombre del islam, una persona que ha fomentado el conocimiento de esta religión desde la erudición, el ayatolá Hossein Alí Montazeri, lleva hoy el nombre de Luchador por los Derechos Humanos. A pesar de que el fundamentalismo islámico conlleva la pérdida de derechos ciudadanos, un entendimiento profundo obtenido de las fuentes de la erudición y el pragmatismo defiende «el derecho y la dignidad de las personas». La última iniciativa de quien toda su vida ha participado activamente en la aplicación de los derechos humanos desde la perspectiva del islam ha sido la afirmación de que la respuesta dura y violenta contra el pueblo iraní en su protesta por el resultado de las últimas elecciones es contraria a los principios del islam.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalOrden Mundial

Barack Obama recibió ayer el Premio Nobel de la Paz. Cuando la concesión se hizo pública, hace un par de meses, Amnistía Internacional no tardó en pedir al presidente estadounidense que centrara sus esfuerzos para promover la paz en la justicia, los derechos humanos y el Estado de derecho, en consonancia con el espíritu del galardón recibido. Queríamos recordar que el camino hacia la paz no es solo una declaración de intenciones, sino que pasa necesariamente por tomar medidas concretas en defensa de los derechos humanos.

Semanas después, Obama visitó China, un país que sufre una verdadera escalada de violaciones de derechos humanos.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

Ariel Sigler Amaya y Ricardo González Alfonso son dos ciudadanos cubanos que han sido encarcelados por el régimen y que padecen ahora en prisión graves problemas de salud. Contar su historia es lo más instructivo para saber de los procedimientos del castrismo.

El primero de ellos, nacido en 1964 fue el presidente de la organización pro derechos humanos Movimiento Independiente Opción Alternativa hasta que en 2003, durante la Primavera Negra de Cuba, fue arrestado en su pueblo natal Pedro Betancourt.

Amante del deporte y de la lectura, fue campeón provincial de boxeo en su categoría en Matanzas. Se graduó de licenciado en Educación Física.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

The world must engage, not isolate Iran, in the push for Middle East peace, said Brazil's President Lula after a three-hour private meeting with his Iranian counterpart, President Ahmadinejad, on Monday.

Lula also said that Brazil supports Iran's rights to enjoy what he called "the benefits of fuel and technology". But he said Iran should negotiate with western nations for a "just and balanced" solution to concerns over its nuclear programme. The two leaders also issued a joint call for reform of the United Nations.

Ahmadinejad became the first Iranian head of state to visit Brazil in 44 years and the trip was widely viewed as controversial.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAmérica,

Your article on the Human Rights Watch (HRW) report on Cuba gives little context of the complexity of US-Cuba relations (Hopes of new dawn dashed as Fidel Castro's brother cracks down on dissent, 19 November).

You report that president Raúl Castro "has kept up repression and kept scores of political prisoners locked up", but ignore that these include individuals accused of receiving US government money who were jailed for being paid agents of a foreign power – a crime punishable in every country in the world.

And you make scant reference to the inhumane US blockade, recently voted against by 187 countries at the UN.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoÁfrica,

Dans le monde entier, des femmes vivent sous la menace des mutilations génitales féminines ou en subissent les conséquences. Rien qu’en Afrique, environ 3 millions de filles et de femmes sont soumises à cette pratique chaque année et l’on estime à quelque 92 millions les femmes à en avoir été victimes.

La justification de cette amputation varie entre les pays. Dans certaines parties du continent, les textes religieux sont invoqués de manière erronée. Dans d’autres, ce sont des traditions culturelles qui contribuent à maintenir la pratique vivante. Mais quel que soit le raisonnement avancé, les mutilations génitales féminines (MGF) constituent une violation flagrante des droits humains les plus fondamentaux et doivent être éradiquées.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoÁfricaMundoAméricaEspañaPolítica ExteriorEuropaUnión EuropeaPolítica Exterior, ,

Cuba tiene hoy en día 58 presos de conciencia. La Unión Europea no le brinda ningún tipo de cooperación y le aplicó incluso, en 2003, unas sanciones inspiradas en una posición común que la diplomacia española desea suavizar cuando, el año próximo, ejerza la presidencia europea. Esa posición estipula que la mejora de la relación con Europa está supeditada a los progresos de Cuba en materia de derechos humanos.

Túnez posee, según la ONG Human Rights Watch, cerca de 800 presos condenados, en su mayoría, por "acciones que responden a motivos políticos" consistentes en preparar viajes a Irak o descargarse vídeos yihadistas, pero no cometieron actos violentos.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

Before starting college in 2008, my sister, Ti-Anna, spent a year in Washington advocating for our father, Wang Bingzhang, a political prisoner in China. She accomplished a great deal: She met influential politicians and policymakers and even had an op-ed published on this page in January. When Barack Obama won the presidency in a historic election last year, my sister and I celebrated. After voting for him in my first American election, I toasted his victory with friends at Duke Law School, where I was a first-year student. Meanwhile, my sister attended inauguration parades and balls, absorbing the excitement of hope and change.…  Seguir leyendo »

Europa,

For those who believe that the re-emergence of realpolitik in the Brown cabinet through the personage of Lord Mandelson is a regrettable turn for British politics, Foreign Secretary David Miliband's pending visit to Moscow will be a great test.

In recent weeks, Miliband has denounced those who he believes have not properly recognised historical facts and fundamental principles relating to episodes of genocide and gross violations of human rights.

His visit to Moscow this week, the first by a British minister since the still unresolved poisoning death of Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko in London, presents an excellent opportunity to further his defence of human rights as well as to improve Russia-UK relations.…  Seguir leyendo »

ReflexionesSocial,

Corks popped this month in Copenhagen, with Rio de Janeiro voted as host city for the 2016 Summer Games and the convening of the XIII Olympic Congress, the first since 1994. Meanwhile, in a dark cell in Fuzhou, a coastal city on the East China Sea, Ji Sizun has no cause to celebrate. The 59-year-old legal activist was sentenced to three years in prison in January. His crime? He took the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the Chinese government at their word when authorities set up three official protest zones during the Beijing Games and said that any citizen could apply to protest.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente Próximo, ,

I recently met a leading representative of the foreign ministry of Israel who acknowledged to me "off the record" that Israel had made a tremendous blunder in refusing to cooperate with the UN Commission led by Judge Richard Goldstone, which investigated the charges of Israeli and Palestinian war crimes in the invasion of Gaza last December and January. Judge Goldstone, an internationally respected jurist whose Zionist credentials include being a member of the governing board of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, wanted to hear Israel's account of what happened, but Israel blocked that inquiry so Goldstone could only report what the victims of Israel's attacks sought to convey.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente Próximo, ,

Aren't the British sickened by the moral confusions of their government? First, we have the weasel words to justify the unjustifiable release of the Lockerbie bomber. Now we have the sickening spectacle of Britain failing to stand by Israel, the only democracy with an independent judiciary in the entire region.

It was to be expected that the usual suspects of the risible UN human rights council would be eager to condemn Israel for war crimes in defending itself against Hamas. If you treat people as the Chinese do the Tibetans or Uighurs ("Off with their heads!"); or as the Russians eliminate Chechen dissidents; or as the Nigerians tolerate extrajudicial killings, the evictions of 800,000, rape and cruel treatment of prisoners; or as the Egyptians get prisoners to talk (torture) and the Saudis suppress half their population … well, go through the practices of all 25 states voting to refer Israel to the security council for the Gaza war, and you have to acknowledge they know a lot about the abuse of humans.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente Próximo

As the founder of Human Rights Watch, its active chairman for 20 years and now founding chairman emeritus, I must do something that I never anticipated: I must publicly join the group’s critics. Human Rights Watch had as its original mission to pry open closed societies, advocate basic freedoms and support dissenters. But recently it has been issuing reports on the Israeli-Arab conflict that are helping those who wish to turn Israel into a pariah state.

At Human Rights Watch, we always recognized that open, democratic societies have faults and commit abuses. But we saw that they have the ability to correct them — through vigorous public debate, an adversarial press and many other mechanisms that encourage reform.…  Seguir leyendo »

Europa,

La Turquie, qui est membre du Conseil de l'Europe depuis 1949 et qui a ratifié la Convention européenne des droits de l'homme en 1954, connaît encore des difficultés à se conformer à cette dernière. 1 676 arrêts de violations ont été rendus par la Cour européenne des droits de l'homme et, à ce jour, 12 029 requêtes sont encore pendantes. Les violations sont souvent graves : elles concernent les atteintes à la vie, l'interdiction de la torture et des traitements inhumains, l'habeas corpus, mais également la liberté d'expression ; cela reflète à quel point le respect de la Convention en Turquie demeure fragile.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoÁfrica, ,

Guineans were relieved when there was a bloodless coup last December after the death of the longtime president, Lansana Conté. Not only had the feared battle for succession among army factions been averted, but the coup leader, Captain Moussa Dadis Camara, vowed to root out corruption and hold elections within 60 days. Better yet, he promised not to run. "I have never had the ambition of power," he said at the time.

When Dadis recently reversed his promise not to run in the presidential election, now set for January, people began to take to the streets. On Monday thousands of people, who had lost hope in Guinea's long-repressive government, protested in the West African capital of Conakry.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoOriente Próximo,

They came early in the morning, about seven o’clock. In Tehran on Sunday, June 21, at his 83-year-old mother’s home, agents of the Iranian government seized Maziar Bahari. As his mother looked on, Mr. Bahari — a 42-year-old Newsweek journalist and documentary filmmaker who has been accredited by the Iranian authorities for over a decade — was arrested and taken to Evin prison, where we believe he is being held in isolation. He has not been allowed to see a lawyer, nor has he been formally charged. He is awaiting the birth of his first child.

Mr. Bahari, a dual Canadian-Iranian citizen, has found himself an unwilling player in a frightened regime’s attempt to explain away the demonstrations that took place after Iran’s contested June 12 presidential elections.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoCáucasoEuropa, ,

On the day of the funeral of Natalya Estemirova (Natasha to her friends), a leading investigative researcher for Memorial human rights centre in Chechnya, her friends and colleagues gathered at the Memorial office in Grozny. "Who is next in line?" a sign said. All of us there were devastated by Estemirova's brazen murder, following her abduction by unidentified men who appeared to be law enforcement officers, on 15 July.

Many women were crying, while the men stood there grimly, as if entranced. They knew someone would eventually be next, but thought that after Estemirova's killing there would be at least a lull, a respite.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalOrden Mundial

Les conventions de Genève, pierre angulaire du droit international humanitaire, ont 60 ans aujourd’hui. Elles interdisent toute violence délibérée à l’encontre des civils, prohibent également toute violence ayant un impact disproportionné sur les civils au regard des objectifs militaires légitimes des parties à un conflit et imposent aux Etats de garantir que les populations civiles ont effectivement accès aux biens et aux services dont elles ont besoin pour survivre. Elles constituent l’instrument juridique le plus reconnu et ratifié à travers le monde.

Ces conventions sont pourtant régulièrement violées dans chaque conflit moderne. De l’Afghanistan à la République démocratique du Congo (RDC) en passant par les jungles de Colombie, Oxfam est témoin des graves exactions où des civils, piégés sur les champs de bataille, sont pris pour cible et où des millions de personnes vulnérables sont privées d’une aide humanitaire urgente du fait des obstructions délibérées à l’acheminement de cette aide, des violences à l’encontre des travailleurs humanitaires et de l’intensité accrue des conflits.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

The now-defunct six-party talks in which the United States, South Korea, Japan, Russia and China participated focused almost exclusively on North Korea's nuclear weapons program. But with a struggle for succession underway in Pyongyang and some of the country's internal controls reportedly beginning to erode, it's time to rethink the near-exclusion of human rights from the U.S.-North Korean dialogue.

The fear of raising human rights issues has been based largely on the belief that doing so would distract from efforts to disable North Korea's nuclear weapons program. But past negotiations focused narrowly on nuclear weapons have not produced sustainable outcomes, and they are unlikely to do so in the future unless they are grounded in a broader and more solid framework.…  Seguir leyendo »