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Category: Human Rights (Page 1 of 12)

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

June 6, 2024 » the 80th Anniversary of D-Day » We Shall Remember Them

2024-06-06 /

80 years ago today, 160,000 troops from Britain, Canada, USA, —along with a dozen other nations— stormed five sandy beaches along the Normandy Coast, intending to liberate France and mainland Europe from Adolf Hitler’s tyranny.

The Canadian Encyclopedia says »

Juno Beach was the Allied code name for a 10 km stretch of French coastline assaulted by Canadian soldiers on D-Day, 6 June 1944, during the Second World War. The Canadian Army’s 3rd Infantry Division and 2nd Armoured Brigade seized the beach and its seaside villages while under intense fire from German defenders — an extraordinary example of military skill, reinforced by countless acts of personal courage. The 3rd Infantry Division took heavy casualties in its first wave of attack but took control of the beach by the end of the day. More than 14,000 Canadian soldiers landed or parachuted into France on D-Day. The Royal Canadian Navy contributed 110 warships and 10,000 sailors and the RCAF contributed 15 fighter and fighter-bomber squadrons to the assault. There were 1,074 Canadian casualties, including 359 killed.

Footage of Canadians landing on Juno Beach.

More »

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Jewish anti-Zionism in the U.S. and around the world

2024-06-02 /

Anti-Zionist Jews have formed a large part of the protests across the United States, and indeed the world, against Israel’s war on Gaza.

In this Al Jazeera’s interview and Simone Zimmerman, co-founder, IfNotNow, a Jewish advocacy group which opposes the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, we hear of her own transition away from Zionism forms the core of the 2023 award-winning documentary, Israelism.

More » Al Jazeera

Israel National Security Adviser said the war in Gaza will continue for at least another seven months, the rest of the year

2024-05-29 /

BBC »

“The fighting in Gaza will continue for at least another seven months,” the prime minister’s national security adviser, Tzachi Hanegbi, told Israel’s Kan public radio.

He also said Israel’s military had taken control of 75% of the buffer zone along the Gaza-Egypt border, as it pressed ahead with an assault on the southern city of Rafah.

Residents of Rafah meanwhile reported that there had been more Israeli air strikes and that tanks had mounted raids in central and western areas before retreating. »

Already, some 36,000 Palestinians, mostly children, women and non-combatants, have been killed in Gaza by the Israeli army since October 7, 2024. To date, the government of Israel has shown no intention of ceasing the genocidal actions against the innocent Palestinians, choosing instead to ignore the International Court of Justice order to stop its military operation in the Gaza city of Rafah.

Climate change is a human rights issue

2024-05-29 /

Kuan-Wei Chen, McGill University and Hoda Asgarian, Bond University, writing in The Conversation »

In April, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in favour of a group of seniors who alleged that the Swiss government’s failure to meet climate change mitigation targets is having an adverse impact on their health, well-being and quality of life.

This landmark decision by the highest human rights court in Europe confirms not only that climate change is intimately linked to human rights, but effectively holds all European governments accountable to adopt more rigorous measures to combat climate change. »

More killing » Israeli kill at least another 37 Palestinians, most in tents, near Gaza’s Rafah as offensive expands

2024-05-28 /

The Israeli shelling and airstrikes continues despite an order from the top U.N. court on Friday for Israel to halt its offensive in southern Gaza.

More than 36,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s offensive. The majority are children, women, and other non-combatants. Israel launched its air and ground war after Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israeli communities on Oct. 7, 2023 killing around 1,200 people and seizing some 250 hostages, according to Israel.

Samy Magdy and Wafaa Shurafa, writing for the Associated Press »

Israeli shelling and airstrikes killed at least 37 people, most of them sheltering in tents, outside the southern Gaza city of Rafah overnight and on Tuesday — pummeling the same area where strikes triggered a deadly fire days earlier in a camp for displaced Palestinians — according to witnesses, emergency workers and hospital officials.

The tent camp inferno has drawn widespread international outrage, including from some of Israel’s closest allies, over the military’s expanding offensive into Rafah. And in a sign of Israel’s growing isolation on the world stage, Spain, Norway and Ireland formally recognized a Palestinian state on Tuesday.

ArabNews »

Saudi Arabia condemned on Tuesday the Israeli forces’ continued “genocidal massacres against the Palestinian people without deterrence” by targeting the tents of defenseless Palestinian refugees in Rafah. The Kingdom holds the Israeli authorities fully responsible for what is happening in Rafah and all the occupied Palestinian territories, a foreign ministry statement read.

More » Reuters / Vox

Daytime temperatures in Pakistan above 52° Celsius — 125.6 degrees Fahrenheit

2024-05-28 /

Akhtar Soomro and Ariba Shahid, writing for Reuters »

Temperatures rose above 52 degrees Celsius (125.6 degrees Fahrenheit) in Pakistan’s southern province of Sindh, the highest reading of the summer and close to the country’s record high amid an ongoing heatwave, the met office said on Monday.

Also » A weather station in New Delhi, India recorded (NDTV) record temperature at 52.3℃ (126℉). India also reported an all-time high in power demand.

Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu called the airstrike in the Gaza city of Rafah that killed 45 Palestinians sheltering in a refugee camp a “tragic mistake”

2024-05-27 /

Health officials said at least 45 Palestinians were killed in the southern Gaza city of Rafah on Sunday night, including displaced people living in tents who were burnt alive.

Netanyahu called it a “tragic mistake.”

Footage and images released from the scene of the strike show large scale destruction.

More » BBC / France 24 / France 24 / Euronews /  The Journal / CTV News / Axios / AP / VOA / Time / NYT / Arab News / Globe and Mail

World Leaders Outraged » Officials in France, Germany, EU call for ceasefire » (Salon)

French President Emmanuel Macron called for an immediate cease-fire (UPI)

UN Security Council Expected to hold emergency meeting today  (AP)

Meanwhile » Israel continues striking Rafah (Le Monde / BBC)

Israeli tanks advance into Rafah’s centre despite global outcry (Reuters)

International Court of Justice orders that Israel immediately halt its offensive on city of Rafahh

2024-05-24 /

Updates below »

Israel is unlikely to comply with the order.

The Journal »

The International Court of Justice has ordered Israel to halt its offensive on the Gaza city of Rafah, a landmark ruling likely to increase mounting international pressure on Israel more than seven months into the Gaza war.

Israel must “immediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in the Rafah Governorate, which may inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part,” the International Court of Justice said.

More » The Guardian / The Guardian / Globe and Mail / CBC / NBC / NY Times / Washington Post / Al Jazeera

» Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says military operations in Rafah need to stop now that the ICJ has ordered Israel to halt its offensive in the southern Gaza city. (CBC)

» The US now has an opening available to stop the bloodshed

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“Everyone is absolutely terrified” » Inside India’s secret war against its critics abroad

2024-05-24 /

Zack Beauchamp, a senior correspondent at Vox, writes »

Interviews with political figures, experts, and activists revealed a sustained campaign where Narendra Modi’s government threatens American citizens and permanent residents who dare speak out on the declining state of the country’s democracy. This campaign has not been described publicly until now because many people in the community — even prominent ones — are too afraid to talk about it.

…

Prior to last year, the idea of India killing American citizens on American soil might have sounded absurd. But in the fall of 2023, both the Canadian government and a US Justice Department indictment alleged that Indian government agents had attempted to assassinate Sikhs living in North America. While federal agents disrupted the American plot, a Canadian citizen was killed by (alleged) Indian agents. The Modi government has denied involvement in both cases, but evidence — including reporting from the Washington Post and the Intercept —suggests they were deeply involved.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres expresses concern over ‘clear violations of international law’ in Gaza [Updated]

2023-10-25 /

via The Guardian »

UN chief expresses concern over 'clear violations of international law' in Gaza

Note: Clicking the above image will load and play the video from YouTube.

Speaking at the UN on 24 October, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres alleges “clear violations of international law” in Gaza and urges an immediate ceasefire as Israel pounds the Palestinian territory in response to Hamas attacks.

Appeals for a cease-fire dominated a UN Security Council meeting yesterday.

Israel has legal obligations under international law to abide by during its campaign against Hamas. Israel must not use starvation of Palestinian civilians as a weapon of war or for any reason.

Yet, Israeli officials called on the UN chief to resign after he said that Israel is responsible for “clear violations of international law” and that the Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7 “did not happen in a vacuum. The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation.”

More » Financial Times

The UN chief Antonio Guterres’ unedited and full addresses to the Security Council on situation in the Middle East is also available.

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said Palestinian civilians ‘must be protected’ during a speech to the UN security council on Tuesday.

Palestinian civilians must be protected, says Antony Blinken

Note: Clicking the above image will load and play the video from YouTube.

Updated 2023.10.25

UN secretary general António Guterres said he was shocked by ‘misrepresentations’ of the speech he made on Tuesday at the UN security council in which he said Hamas’s attack on Israel ‘did not happen in a vacuum’. Israel called for his resignation after he made the speech and its ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan, accused him of ‘justifying terrorism’.

UN's António Guterres says he is shocked by 'misrepresentations' of his comments on Israel

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Women Peace Security Index for 2023

2023-10-25 /

Georgetown University’s Institute for Women, Peace and Security (GIWPS) seeks to promote a more stable, peaceful, and just world by focusing on the important role women play in preventing conflict and building peace, growing economies, and addressing global threats like climate change and violent extremism.

This fourth edition of the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Index ranks and scores 177 countries on women’s status. The results show that countries where women are doing well are also more peaceful, democratic, prosperous, and better
prepared to adapt to the impacts of climate change.

This year, nine of the top ten best countries to be women are European, with Scandinavian countries leading the rankings. Denmark leads the 2023 rankings, scoring more than three times higher than Afghanistan.

1 Denmark
2 Switzerland
3 Sweden
4 Finland
4 Iceland
4 Luxembourg
7 Norway
8 Austria
9 Netherlands
10 New Zealand

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The intelligence chiefs of the ‘Five Eyes’ security alliance join Dr. Condoleezza Rice on stage to discuss current threats facing democratic nations

2023-10-17 /

The Five Eyes is a coalition of five countries » Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. It grew from the 1946 BRUSA agreement, shortly after the end of World War II, to share intelligence and coordinate security efforts. The five member countries have a long history of trust and cooperation, and they share a commitment to common values.

More » FBI | Toronto Star | The Guardian | Globe & Mail | CBC | ABC (Australia) | AFR

Mastercard should stop selling our personal data

2023-10-16 /

EFF »

Knowing where you shop, just by itself, can reveal a lot about who you are. Mastercard takes this a step further, as U.S. PIRG reported, by analyzing the amount and frequency of transactions, plus the location, date, and time to create categories of cardholders and make inferences about what type of shopper you may be. In some cases, this means predicting who’s a “big spender” or which cardholders Mastercard thinks will be “high-value”—predictions used to target certain people and encourage them to spend more money …

Cars are fast becoming all-seeing data-harvesting machines – a so-called “privacy nightmare on wheels”

2023-10-13 /

The Conversation »

The researchers looked at the privacy terms of 25 car brands, which were found to collect a range of customer data, from facial expressions, to sexual activity, to when, where and how people drive.

They also found terms that allowed this information to be passed on to third parties. Cars were “the official worst category of products for privacy” they had ever reviewed, they concluded.

The mayor of Pontevedra, Spain is placing pedestrians first

2023-09-27 /

For decades, throngs of cars clogged the cobblestone streets of Pontevedra’s downtown, making this seaside city on Spain’s northwestern tip a hard place to live. Smog, loud noise and narrow walkways drove young families away from a region struggling with a shrinking and aging population.

Family physician turned mayor Miguel Fernandez Lores managed to halt the bleeding by closing many streets to car traffic. Now Pontevedra is a model of success in a growing global movement that’s trying to reclaim streets for pedestrians.

Bloomberg »

This Spanish Mayor Is Putting Pedestrians First

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