Human rights defenders have advocated long and hard for law and policies which protect sexual and reproductive rights, including safe and legal abortion services. This work is often slow, challenging, and full of setbacks, which is why every victory is so thoroughly celebrated!
The BC government has launched an Environmental Assessment Revitalization process as part of its commitment to reshape the way BC makes decisions about natural resource projects, industrial activities and more.
YOU have an opportunity to help shape the future of environmental assessments in BC by providing your input.
BC’s current environmental assessment law is failing British Columbians and the lands and waters we rely on. Amnesty International has joined 23 other environmental, social justice and community groups in putting forward a shared vision of what future environmental assessments should look like.
This article was originally published in Foreign Policy.
On July 10, the Chinese authorities finally ended their de facto house arrest of Liu Xia, a painter, a poet, and the widow of the late Nobel peace laureate Liu Xiaobo, and allowed her to leave for Berlin.
It’s worth considering what distinguishes Liu’s case from those of the many dissidents and activists who continue to be held in Chinese prisons or prevented from leaving the country. The two-pronged approach of private and public diplomacy paid off in Liu’s case, and may yet yield results for others, however dark the situation looks.
It’s been a big year for human rights wins so far and we’re only in July! Here are just some of the epic achievements you’ve made happen this year…
You played a part in securing the release of so many people
Esther says Amnesty activists have given her the strength to carry on fighting for justice
A year ago today, Esther Kiobel stood on the steps of the Palace of Justice in The Hague. It had taken over twenty years to get there, but she had just filed a landmark case against the oil giant Shell over its role* in the 1995 execution of her husband Dr. Barinem Kiobel. Dr Kiobel, a former government official, was hanged by the Nigerian military government in connection with widespread protests against oil pollution in the Niger Delta.
“We love him to death,” Esther says of her late husband more than two decades after she last saw him in prison. “His spirit is still crying, looking for justice.”
In the 1990s, Ogoniland, the oil-rich region of the Niger Delta where the Kiobels are from, was of huge economic importance to both Shell and the Nigerian government. Both parties panicked when protests, under the leadership of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), broke out against environmental destruction caused bv Shell’s operations.
It's impossible to be in beautiful, dangerous Honduras without being deeply moved by the courage and big-hearted tenacity of people who risk their lives and freedom to defend human rights.
Their just cause has never left my thoughts since I took part in an Amnesty mission to Honduras last November.
Scarce weeks later, back in Canada, I watched in horror as disturbing images on my social media feed made it clear that the situation for defenders of rights and justice in Honduras had just got much, much worse.
Nuri Mohammed is just like other boys his age: he likes spending time with friends and family and dreams of what life will be like when he grows up. He hopes to one day buy a store and run his own business. But Nuri’s life changed completely when he came home one day to find the military in his village, killing his neighbors. The military killed his parents and eight of his siblings. His last memory of his mother was of her pleas for him to flee. Nuri ran to a nearby lake, where a bullet struck him and injured his leg. He continued on, walking for three days until he escaped from Myanmar to Cox’s Bazaar, Bangladesh, where he reunited with his remaining two sisters.
By Monica Benício
This op-ed was written by Monica Benício, the widow of Marielle Franco, a courageous women human rights defender who was murdered in Brazil in March 2018. It was originally published in Portuguese in O Globo on June 12th, to mark Brazilian Valentine's Day.
Taner Kiliç, Amnesty International Turkey's Honourary Chair, has spent more than a year in prison. Taner’s trial, and that of 10 other human rights defenders, resumes in Istanbul on June 21st.
In June 2017, Taner Kiliç was charged and jailed as part of a crackdown on human rights defenders. Taner has done nothing wrong and never should have been arrested.
Taner is our friend and colleague. We will not give up until he is free.
Join our call to #FreeTaner and demand his immediate and unconditional release. Here's how:
1. TAKE ACTION NOWSign and share our action demanding that Taner be released immediately and unconditionally.
>>SIGN NOW
2. SHOW YOUR SUPPORT FOR TANERMake a sign with a message calling for Turkey to #FreeTaner. Include a message about where you are from.
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