Category Archives: human rights

BBC World Service – World Update, The man who discovered Ebola gives his verdict on Zika

The man who discovered Ebola gives his verdict on ZikaPeter Piot co-discovered the Ebola virus in 1976 and has led research on the HIV virus. He says the most important thing with Zika is to confirm a link with birth deformations. Carnival season is approaching in Brazil and Dr Piot warns that because it falls during the high transmission period for mosquitoes, the chances of infection are increased.

Source: BBC World Service – World Update, The man who discovered Ebola gives his verdict on Zika

“Both my parents were in prison while I was growing up. I’ve…

“Both my parents were in prison while I was growing up. I’ve been in prison for 90% of my life, mainly for drugs. When I got out in 2014, there was this old lawyer in the Bronx who took an interest in me. His name was Ramon Jimenez. He’s kind of like a community activist. I don’t know why he cared so much, but he sat down with me and tried to map out my life. When I tried to start selling drugs again, Ramon came out and stood on the corner with me for three days straight. Here’s this 72 year old dude, shadowing me wherever I go, screaming at anyone who tried to walk up to me: ‘I’m calling the cops!’ I was so mad. But after three days I gave it up.”

Source: “Both my parents were in prison while I was growing up. I’ve…

Getting the Balance Right: Strengthening Asylum Reception Capacity at National and EU Levels | migrationpolicy.org  The bureaucracies answers.

This report, written by the Operational Director for the Belgian reception agency, seeks to understand the reception capacity challenges faced by EU Member States and to stimulate reflection on possible answers. It first presents the three tenets of a successful reception system—flexibility, efficiency, and quality—and the difficulty balancing their often-conflicting demands. It then reflects on divergent national approaches to reception management, and seeks to understand why certain strategies are adopted, and with what consequences for Member States and the Common European Asylum System (CEAS) at large. The report concludes with reflections on the central importance of reception as a building block of the CEAS, and potential ways forward to strengthen its quality, flexibility, and cost efficiency through improved coordination and delivery of support.

Source: Getting the Balance Right: Strengthening Asylum Reception Capacity at National and EU Levels | migrationpolicy.org

www.german-foreign-policy.com refugees

Within the EU, the mounting pressure to ward off refugees, is intensifying the debate about a possible dismantling of the Schengen system. It is yet unclear, whether Berlin can reach its objective of stopping refugees at the external borders of Greece to be immediately deported to Turkey. Alternately, attempts are being made to turn Macedonia into a buffer state against refugees, while threatening Greece’s exclusion from the Schengen system. The establishment of a “Mini-Schengen” is being considered as an emergency solution. Even while officially continuing to reject such a “Mini-Schengen,” the German government is already involved in its planning, which the Netherlands is officially directing. Any option beyond effectively sealing off Greece’s external borders, i.e. abandoning part of the Schengen-system, would be a first retreat – with unforeseeable consequences. According to observers, this could seriously weaken the EU.

Source: www.german-foreign-policy.com

Yanis Varoufakis, Edmund Burke and Mario Draghi stroll into a bar

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good people do nothing.” Edmund Burke’s brilliant line applies to today’s Europe perfectly.Here, on this site and across Europe, ‘something’ is brewing, ‘something’ is under construction…

Source: Yanis Varoufakis, Edmund Burke and Mario Draghi stroll into a bar

Masked gang threatens attacks against asylum seekers in Stockholm – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Dozens of masked, black-clad men believed to belong to neo-Nazi gangs rampaged through the streets of Stockholm on Friday night handing out leaflets threatening to attack migrant street youths “to make a statement”, with police saying two arrests have been made.The incident highlights the growing tensions over immigration in Sweden, a country of 10 million which received 163,000 asylum seekers last year, and comes days after a 22-year-old female worker was stabbed to death in a centre for unaccompanied asylum-seeking minors in south-western Sweden.As many as 100 people with their faces covered descended on the Sergels Torg pedestrian square, a popular meeting point for young people, including migrant youths.Police had beefed up their presence in the city centre, deploying anti-riot and helicopter units after learning that extremists were planning “aggression on unaccompanied migrant minors”.By midday police had not received any complaints of assault but one 46-year-old man was arrested after striking a plainclothes officer, police spokesman Towe Hagg said.The leaflets handed out on Friday night, which were confirmed by police as being the same as those posted on Swedish social media, said:”When Swedish streets are no longer safe for ordinary Swedes it is our DUTY to fix the problem … Today, therefore, 200 Swedish men gathered to make a statement against the North African ‘street children’ who are ranging around the capital’s central station.”The police have amply shown that it lacks the means to rein them in and we now see no alternative than for us to mete out the punishment they deserve.”Swedish Interior Minister Anders Ygeman condemned the “racist groups which threaten and spread hate in the public space”, adding: “One must respond strongly.”

Source: Masked gang threatens attacks against asylum seekers in Stockholm – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

‘We Will Not Apologize’: Chronicling the Defiant Women of India – The New York Times

At this point I delved into a world of shocking statistics. Despite India’s prolonged economic expansion, the percentage of women in the work force remains dismally low — lower than in any country in the G-20 other than Saudi Arabia — and it is dropping. More than 70 percent of women say they have to ask permission from a parent, husband or in-law if they want to leave home to visit a health center or to see a friend in the neighborhood.Peepli Khera seemed like a good place to learn why this state of affairs had persisted. Life there was being rearranged in tangible ways by economic growth — specifically, a booming buffalo meat export industry. Last summer, the increase in female employment in the village had erupted into a raw power struggle, with the conservative male caste leaders demanding that the women resign from their jobs. I thought we — the photographer, Andrea Bruce; the interpreter, Ravi Mishra; and I — would merely plant ourselves there and watch them duke it out.This was easier said than done.

Last summer, the increase in female employment in the village had erupted into a raw power struggle, with the conservative male caste leaders demanding that the women resign from their jobs. I thought we — the photographer, Andrea Bruce; the interpreter, Ravi Mishra; and I — would merely plant ourselves there and watch them duke it out.This was easier said than done. In the end we made nine reporting trips to the village, staying until late at night — when the whiskey kicked in — and arriving before dawn. We collected firewood with the women, accompanied them as they went looking for work, and tagged along on court dates. We spent so much time in the village that the people there began to regard us with sincere pity.Then they began to ignore us. This is when the work began to bear fruit. We became professional eavesdroppers. Four months into our reporting, we were in the village for a series of tense, clamorous late-night meetings, in which the elders grudgingly decreed that the women could return to work.That night, the headman, Roshan, pushed us out of the village with his hands pressed against our backs; later he admitted that he had done so because he did not want us to witness violence. We returned to New Delhi and almost immediately learned that a large group of villagers had assaulted Geeta and her friends, also leaving her husband badly injured. We returned to find our subjects utterly changed — unhurt for the most part, but humiliated and shrunken. One teenage girl never forgave us for failing to protect her.

In real life, stories do not have crisp endings, and the battle of Peepli Khera was no different: When we returned this month, it looked as though Geeta and her friends had gotten much of what they had wanted. They had held on to their jobs and avoided begging for forgiveness or paying a fine.

Roshan was very sick, with what seemed to be tuberculosis, and carried out long, expletive-laced conversations with the goddess Kali over his magic necklace. “How are you coming? Are you coming on a horse cart? Are you coming on the wind?” he said to the goddess, then paused to wait for her response. After a moment had passed, he remarked, “They can go to hell.”Geeta, meanwhile, is rebuilding her house a full story above street level so that she can look out of her windows and over her neighbors’ roofs. I started to explain that the article was going to appear in the newspaper, but she was busy collecting a debt for the local women’s lending collective and had no time talk.

“I’ll say to her face, bring her in front of me and I’ll say it to her face — two months have passed and she will have to give the money up,” she was snapping into her cellphone. She waved goodbye as we made our way down the dark lane — every inch the cheerful, ruthless village power broker. That is the last image I had of her.

Source: ‘We Will Not Apologize’: Chronicling the Defiant Women of India – The New York Times

It’s Time to Reverse Rape Culture. | Rebelle Society

It’s easy to say to a victim that their experience was not that bad, that it could have been worse, and they should be grateful they still have their lives. I’ve been told that a countless number of times, and I can honestly say it has never made me feel better.What helped was knowing I am not alone.Reclaiming a survivor’s body after abuse is one of the hardest things they will ever endure in their lifetime. Just because the abuse may be invisible does not mean the scars are not there. We cannot let rape culture win.It’s now or never.

***Elizabeth Tsung-Ribar is a Taiwanese American living in NYC. She is currently getting her Masters in Teaching from Fordham University.

Source: It’s Time to Reverse Rape Culture. | Rebelle Society