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By Kumi Naidoo, Secretary General of Amnesty International, @kuminaidoo

Real leaders keep human rights alive. They don’t try to stifle them by placing unreasonable restrictions and barriers on NGOs to prevent them from carrying out vital human rights work. Nor do real leaders use bullying techniques or tie up NGOs in red tape in a bid to silence them.

Yet as more self-proclaimed ‘tough guy’ leaders have emerged on the world stage in recent years, these are exactly the kind of bullying tactics they have resorted to in their attempts to target and attack already marginalised communities.

As Amnesty International’s new report on the global crackdown on civil society globally reveals, since 2017 almost 40 pieces of legislation designed to hamper the work of civil society organizations have been put in place, or are in the works, globally.

This week, a Dutch court in The Hague heard the first arguments in an historic case against Shell brought by Esther Kiobel, Victoria Bera, Blessing Eawo and Charity Levula. It was a long, challenging, emotional day.

The hearing started with two powerful statements by Esther Kiobel and Victoria Bera. The widows’ lawyer claimed that Shell was instrumental to the human rights violations of the Ogoni people. They argued that: Shell requested the Nigerian regime to end the peaceful protests against its operations in Ogoniland; provided logistics as well as money to crash the demonstrations; and had a crucial role in the arrest, torture and execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, Barinem Kiobel, Baribor Bera and the rest of the Ogoni 9.

Shell challenged these allegations on procedural grounds/jurisdiction, stating that the case should be time barred and should belong to a Nigerian court rather than a Dutch one because the events took place long ago, in Nigeria.

Esther Kiobel’s lawyer challenged these arguments, and asked the court to order the release of 1000 documents marked as confidential by Shell.

Dhaka, Bangladesh

As I arrive in Bangladesh, joining an Amnesty International delegation that is here for two weeks to meet with and hear from Rohingya refugees in the country, a specific question comes to mind. In this world of ours – a world marked of late by far too much conflict, hate and division – when and why is a crisis no longer seen to be a crisis?

In a world which feels to have an ever-shortening attention span and seems only able to give real attention to two or three emergencies at once, we forget and move on from today’s or this week’s crisis more quickly than ever.

Meanwhile, politicians regularly bandy the word crisis about to inflame tensions and score political points when it isn’t a crisis by any measure; be it Donald Trump’s manufactured border wall crisis or the overblown rhetoric around a supposed-influx of refugees crossing the Canada/US border. We see quick resort to the word crisis in those situations, largely to undermine support for refugee protection.

In the space of two hours last November, Amnesty acquired the passionate support of eight youths. It was through their Human Rights class at Centennial College in Scarborough last November that the students participated in Write for Rights 2018. “They ignored my suggestion of writing just three sentences to describe who they are, what their concern is, and what action they request,” noted Marilyn McKim. “They wrote long, engaged and personal letters to the authorities.” Read about their experience as described by student Loni Welch.