Why should we care about the human rights of people who themselves don’t appear to respect them?  Statements made this week by a former member of an armed Islamic group suggest that it is the best way to change hearts and minds.

In an interview in the British newspaper the Independent, Maajid Nawaz, discusses his life in a radical Islamic group.  He was imprisoned and tortured in Egypt.  But it was in prison, he told British journalist Johann Hari, where he had his deepest beliefs challenged.

“When his family were finally allowed to see him, they told him he had a new defender. Although they abhorred his political views, Amnesty International said he had a right to free speech and to peacefully express his views, and publicised his case. “I was just amazed,” Maajid told Hari. “We’d always seen Amnesty as the soft power tools of colonialism. So, when Amnesty, despite knowing that we hated them, adopted us, I felt — maybe these democratic values aren’t always hypocritical. Maybe some people take them seriously … it was the beginning of my serious doubts.”

This isn’t a new revelation.  Eight years ago, Egyptian democracy activist Saad Ibrahim, a former Amnesty POC, told of how during his detention in Egypt he met with members of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and convinced several to give up militancy for support of democracy.  It may be, Ibrahim told me, perhaps his most important initiative.

It does make a difference as to whether we treat the enemies of human rights with justice.  At a time when America is divided on how to treat the people behind the 9/11 attacks and armed Islamic groups in general, it’s important to show that human rights and democracy is for everyone. It might also just be the best policy we have against armed Islamist groups.

This posting is part of our Write-a-Thon Cases Series. For more information visit www.amnestyusa.org/writeathon/

Mansour Ossanlu

Trade Unionist Mansour Ossanlu, age 49, is the leader of the Union of Workers of the Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company (Syndica Sherkat-e Vahed). He has been peacefully working to obtain better conditions for workers in Iran and to end discriminatory laws and practices that curtail workers’ rights in Iran. He is currently serving a five-year prison sentence for “acts against national security” and “propaganda against the system.” He had been previously arrested and detained several times for his peaceful labor activism and severely beaten in custody, causing damage to his retinas. He is currently serving his term in a prison for violent criminals and has been mistreated by staff and other inmates. He suffers from several severe health problems, but has not received necessary medical treatment.

Mansour Ossanlu is one of Amnesty International’s 10 priority cases who you can help free by participating in our Global Write-a-thon running from December 5-13. Amnesty International considers him a prisoner of conscience who is being detained on vaguely worded charges in order to halt his efforts to build strong trades unions capable of defending the human rights of workers.

Placing pressure on the Iranian authorities to release Mansour Ossanlu and allow Iran’s vibrant civil society activists to exercise their human rights, could be especially effective now.  Iran is a State Party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, of which Article 22 (1) states: “Everyone shall have the right to freedom of association with others, including the right to form and join trade unions for the protection of his interests.” Article 26 of Iran’s Constitution states: “The formation of parties, societies, political or professional associations…is permitted provided they do not violate the principles of independence, freedom, national unity, the criteria of Islam, or the basis of the Islamic republic. No one may be prevented from participating in the aforementioned groups, or be compelled to participate in them.”

Mansour Ossanlu is in prison in defiance of both international as well as Iranian laws. With your help, Amnesty International will campaign for his immediate release in our Global Write-a-thon.

By Elise Auerbach, Iran and Jordan country specialist for AIUSA

Emadeddin Baghi, leading human rights activist in Iran

On Monday November 9, the award ceremony for this year’s winner of the Martin Ennals Award for human rights defenders will take place in Geneva. The recipient of the award will probably not be there though. Emadeddin Baghi, one of Iran’s leading intellectuals and human rights activists, will be the first laureate in the award’s eighteen-year history to be denied the opportunity to receive his prize in person since the Iranian authorities are not allowing him to leave the country to accept it.

Iran’s citizens have won more than their fair share of prestigious international human rights awards. Fearless attorney and human rights defender Shirin Ebadi won the Nobel Peace Prize in October 2003, the first (and only) Muslim woman to receive that honor. Parvin Ardalan, a prominent journalist and women’s rights activist, was awarded the Olof Palme Prize for 2007 for her activism on behalf of women’s rights in Iran. And this year, Emadeddin Baghi won the Martin Ennals Award for his work to defend the rights of prisoners and to end the imposition of the death penalty. However, instead of expressing pride in the accomplishments of their citizens, the Iranian authorities have not only done their best to try to silence their voices, but won’t even let them collect their awards.

Parvin Ardalan had already boarded a plane at the airport in Tehran in March 2008 to fly to Stockholm to accept her Olof Palme Award when she was removed from the flight by Iranian authorities. Her passport was then confiscated. Since that time, she has been battling charges against her stemming from her activities with the One Million Signatures Campaign, calling for better rights for women. She was finally able to leave Iran to go to Sweden in October 2009.

Although Shirin Ebadi was allowed to accept her Nobel Prize in person, she has been subjected to persistent and withering threats, intimidation, and persecution. In December 2008, dozens of government agents carried out a raid on the Center for Human Rights Defenders, run by Ms Ebadi to provide legal assistance to victims of human rights violations, hours before they were planning on holding an event there to commemorate the 60^th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Center staff members and guests were harassed and intimidated and the center was forcibly closed; documents and computers containing protected attorney-client information were later removed.

The Martin Ennals Award, named for the first secretary-general of Amnesty International, is a collaboration of ten of the world’s leading human rights organizations, including AI. It is “granted annually to someone who has demonstrated an exceptional record of combating human rights violations by courageous and innovative means.”  The Chairman of the Jury of the MEA, Hans Thoolen, described Emadeddin Baghi as “an exceptionally brave man defending human rights despite imprisonment and poor health.”

Emadeddin Baghi is the founder of the Association for the Defense of Prisoners’ Rights, which had been compiling information on torture and other abuses of detainees. He has focused attention on Iran’s appalling record of executing juvenile offenders, as well as the execution, following grossly flawed legal proceedings, of a number of Iranian Arabs accused of politically motivated crimes. In the late 1990s he exposed the mysterious serial murders of Iranian intellectuals. His books Right to Life and Right to Life II argue for the abolition of the death penalty using Islamic texts and jurisprudence. They have been banned by Iranian authorities–who had previously shut down his newspaper Joumhouriat in 2003– and Mr. Baghi has served years in prison on charges of “endangering national security” and “printing lies.”  In December 2007, during his most recent imprisonment, he suffered three seizures and remained in poor health without adequate medical care until his release in October 2008.  Officials closed down the office of the Association for the Defense of Prisoners’ Rights in September 2009.

Amnesty International has deplored the Iranian authorities denying Emadeddin Baghi the opportunity to personally accept an award he so richly deserves.

Italy convicts Americans for C.I.A. renditions. BRENNAN LINSLEY/AFP/Getty Images

American courts and politicians have been reluctant to take a stand against the use of kidnapping and torture by American officials in the war on terror, but critics of those policies today received a stunning vote of support from an unexpected source – the Italian courts.

An Italian judge convicted a CIA station chief and 22 other Americans in the kidnapping of the 2003 Egyptian cleric from the streets of Milan.  The cleric, Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, known as Abu Omar, was seized and rendered to Egypt where he was allegedly tortured and held in detention without trial before his release nearly four years later. Abu Omar said he was tortured while held in secret detention in Egypt and that methods included alternating extremes of temperature and electric shocks to the genitals. There was no indication that the allegations were the subject of any investigation by the Egyptian authorities.

Supporters of American renditions insist that the policy is limited to actions against the most dangerous of the dangerous, but in fact the American kidnapping thwarted an Italian investigation into the cleric that might have resulted in criminal charges and a fair trial.  The fact that the Egyptians released the cleric after four years, despite that countries record of long-term administrative detention, simply underscores just how much of a loser the American policy is.

So now former CIA station chief Robert Seldon Lady and 22 Americans, all of whom were tried in absentia, are fugitives from Italian law.  The practical consequences of the Italian ruling are minimal, but the ruling sets a standard of truth and justice that American courts and politicians have yet to make.  For all the talk about moving forward, the extent of the illegal American practices, particularly involving rendition and torture, has still not been publicly disclosed.  If the Obama Administration doesn’t heed the call of the Italian courts and act, it may be that other nations are willing to do the job for us.

Israel is denying Palestinians their right to access to adequate water by using discriminatory and restrictive policies.

 Donatella Rovera, senior researcher on Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories said,

 “Israel allows the Palestinians access to only a fraction of the shared water resources, which lie mostly in the occupied West Bank, while the unlawful Israeli settlements there receive virtually unlimited supplies. In Gaza the Israeli blockade has made an already dire situation worse.”

The report, “Troubled Waters: Palestinians Denied Fair Access to Water,” says Israel uses more than 80 per cent of the water from the Mountain Aquifer, the main source of underground water in Israel and the OPT, while restricting Palestinian access to 20 per cent.  Israel takes all the water from the Jordan River,  the Palestinians get none.

In the Gaza Strip, 90 to 95 per cent of the water from its only water resource, the Coastal Aquifer, is contaminated and unfit for human consumption. Yet, Israel does not allow the transfer of water from the Mountain Aquifer in the West Bank to Gaza.  And because of the blockade on the Gaza Strip and the stringent restrictions imposed by Israel on the entry into Gaza of material and equipment necessary for the development and repair of infrastructure have caused further deterioration of the water and sanitation situation in Gaza, which has reached a crisis point.

A  12 page digest, “Thirsting for Justice: Palestinians access to water restricted” and the feature story of West Bank farmer,  Mahmoud al-’Alam,  about the day Israeli bulldozers came and destroyed his water supply and his livelihood can also be found on the Amnesty International website along with  the main report.

Why is the Iranian government so afraid of Kian Tajbakhsh? To all appearances, the 47-year-old Iranian-American is a mild-mannered social scientist who taught urban policy at the New School University in New York. He was living quietly in Tehran with his Iranian wife and baby daughter and working on a book when he was arrested on July 9.

So why was he just convicted by a Revolutionary Court in Tehran and sentenced to up to 15 years in prison? Judging from the list of charges piled up against him and the long prison term imposed, one would think he was one dangerous fellow, single-mindedly bent on overturning the Iranian government, working with foreign enemies to undermine Iranian society, and sowing mass chaos.

Tajbakhsh was one of the more than 100 people charged with fomenting the post-June 12 election unrest in a mass show trial before a Revolutionary Court in Tehran.  The assortment of defendants who were hauled into the multiple sessions of the trial displayed the wide net cast by the government in its zeal to staunch the protests over the elections: many were prominent opposition political figures such as Mohammad Ali Abtahi, Mohsen Aminzadeh, Mohsen Mirdamadi, Behzad Nabavi and Abdollah Ramazanzadeh who supported, or were believed to have supported, reformist candidates in the June 12 presidential elections.

Others were journalists such as Maziar Bahari, a Canadian-Iranian who worked for Newsweek. Other defendants included Hossein Rassam, an Iranian employee of the British Embassy in Tehran and Abdollah Momeni, the spokesperson for the Alumni Association of Iran (Advar-e Tahkim Vahdat).  Even the prosecutors did not accuse the defendants of standing on the hustings in front of the crowds and literally urging them to tear down the Iranian government by force. Many had not actually even participated in the mostly peaceful mass protests by ordinary Iranian citizens after the election results were announced—protests that were met by brutal and often lethal force by riot police and the paramilitary Basij. Most of the defendants were “guilty” of nothing more than quietly supporting reformist political parties or questioning the election results.

Even granting the Iranian government’s spurious argument that peacefully protesting the election results was not a legitimate exercise of the right to freedom of expression and association, but rather a criminal activity akin to high treason, it is hard to see why the government would have targeted Tajbakhsh for such harsh treatment. According to his friends, he had not participated in the post-June 12 election protests, had not expressed support for opposition candidates and had not publicly questioned the election results or even mentioned the election in his writings.

Let’s look at what he was charged with. Charges against Tajbakhsh included espionage, co-operation with an enemy government, and acting against national security. And what was the evidence used to back those charges? Well, years ago, he had been a consultant for the Open Society Institute. He was also charged with belonging to an e-mail list Gulf/2000 run by Gary Sick, a professor at Columbia University, whom the indictment identifies as a “CIA agent.” Implicit in the charges is the matter of Tajbakhsh’s dual citizenship.

This is not the first time that Kian Tajbakhsh’s scholarly activities have led to persecution by the government. He was one of four Iranian-Americans detained for several months in 2007 for attempting to—yes—foment that scary-sounding “velvet revolution” in Iran. He was then accused of “acting against national security by engaging in propaganda against the Islamic Republic by spying on behalf of foreigners.” So the new charges seemed to be warmed-over versions of the previous charges against him. Somehow the usual activities involved in a scholar’s life such as research, writing and engaging in dialogue with colleagues, have been transformed by the authorities into treachery and malice.

By attempting to portray Kian Tajbakhsh as an existential threat to the Islamic Republic and inflicting such a disproportionately harsh punishment on him, the Iranian authorities seem to be going to preposterous lengths to draw in as many elements of society as possible into a continually sucking vortex of fear and oppression.

Hamas, the de facto administration in the Gaza Strip, released a video of 23 year old Gilad Shalit.  Gilad, an Israeli soldier, was seized by armed Palestinian groups over three years ago in June 2006 in a cross ‘border’ raid.  The video is significant as armed Palestinian groups have been detaining him incommunicado except for a couple of letters and an audio tape released over two years ago. Gilad has been denied communication with not only his family, but also the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) which contravenes international law. Since his capture, Amnesty International has consistently called for his releaseand for the ICRC to have access to him.  AI has done this using both public actions and behind the scenes dialogue.

Negotiations for Gilad Shalit’s release have intensified under the current government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahuand Gilad’s family as well as the nation has been increasingly concerned about his condition and treatment.  The following video, although in Hebrew, shows a pale, but otherwise healthy looking Gilad Shalit holding a paper from September 14th.

In exchange for the video, which Israel requested as ‘proof of life’, Israel released 19 Palestinian women prisoners; another female prisoner is due to be released sometime next week.  Israel holds several thousand Palestinians, including hundreds of children, in Israeli prisons against international law.  Hundreds of detainees are also held without charge or trial under administrative detention orders which can be repeatedly renewed and often includes children.  Currently, one child is held under administrative detention, Hamdi Al-Ta’mari.  Amnesty International is working on his case.  More information available at http://www.dci-pal.org/english/display.cfm?docID=1096&categoryid=16.

Others have been convicted in unfair trials in military courts.  It is a major concern that prisoners are held in Israeli prisons instead of in the occupied Palestinian territories which is against international law.  Since detainees are held within Israel proper, it is very difficult for families to visit minors in detention or other family members.

This video produced by B’tselem explains how the imprisonment of Palestinians inside Israel proper affects families, including the children:

This exchange, although bringing temporary relief to the Shalit family and joy to the families of the 20 detained female prisoners just highlights the concern Amnesty International outlined in the document ‘Detainees used as bargaining chips by both sides in Israel/Gaza conflict’ published in March 2009.  Gilad Shalit, it is believed was taken as leverage in future negotiations with Israeli authorities and many believe Palestinians are regularly taken by Israeli forces for many reasons other than security and one of them is for leverage as well.  Hostage taking, that is threatening to harm or continue to detain a detained person in order to compel a third party to do or abstain from doing something as a condition of their release is expressly prohibited under international law.  Such practice threatens the fundamental right to life, personal integrity and liberty and is expressly prohibited by international humanitarian law.  Under no circumstances is the taking of hostages justifiable.

Negotiations continue with Israel wanting Gilad Shalit released immediately and the Palestinians asking for at least 1,000 Palestinian prisoners to be released and/or an end to the punishing blockade of the strip.

The United States is fast losing their credibility in the region and among Human Rights organizations and activists over our reluctance to support the recommendations contained in Justice Richard Goldstone’s report (pdf).

Justice Richard Goldstone, who gained respect internationally for his work in the UN International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda and his human rights work in Argentina, South Africa and Kosovo led an investigation into violations of international law committed by all parties involved in the fighting last winter in Gaza and southern Israel.  The UN mandated investigation found that both Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups committed grave violations of international law, including war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity, during the conflict.  The report supports Amnesty International’s own findings of war crimes committed by both sides.

US made Hellfire missile manufactured in Orlando, FL used in incident where two Palestinian medics and a child were killed.

See prior blog post for more details.

Remarks from the State Department and specifically Ambassador to the United Nations, Susan E. Rice do not bode well for the report’s reception in the Human Rights Council and the recommendation that the HR Council take concrete steps to move the process of accountability forward.  Ambassador Rice has said she has ’serious concerns’ about the mission’s mandate and that it is imperative to not get distracted and look forward to resolve the conflict.

Amnesty International believes that justice and accountability can never be an impediment to peace, but are the foundation to an enduring peace in the region.  And that the recommendations contained in the Goldstone report are the best hope for achieving justice for the victims and to end the atmosphere of impunity enjoyed by the perpetrators from both sides and help end the cycle of violence.

Justice Richard Goldstone is scheduled to present the findings of his team’s investigation Tuesday, September 29th to the Human Rights Council.  The HR Council will then discuss the findings and has the ability to refer the report and its recommendations for consideration by the UN Security Council.  The United States recently joined the HR Council and has the ability to sway the council one way or the other.

Send a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Ambassador Susan Rice urging them to support the recommendations contained in Justice Richard Goldstone’s report.

Amnesty International said yesterday that the recommendations of the United Nations Human Rights Council’s fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict, if implemented, offer the best hope for justice and accountability. The UN-mandated report by Judge Richard Goldstone found that both Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups committed grave violations of international law, including war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity, during the Gaza conflict this year.

 The report supports Amnesty International’s own findings of war crimes committed by both sides.

Donatella Rovera, who headed Amnesty International’s fact finding mission last winter in Israel and the Gaza Strip, said:

“The UN Security Council and other UN bodies must now take the steps necessary to ensure that the victims receive the justice and reparation that is their due and that perpetrators don’t get away with murder. The responsibility now lies with the international community, notably the UN Security Council, as the UN’s most powerful body, to take decisive action to ensure accountability for the perpetrators and justice for the victims. The Security Council must refer the Goldstone findings to the International Criminal Court Prosecutor if Israel and Hamas do not carry out credible investigations within a set, limited period.”

Note:  The United States holds the Presidency of the United Nations Security Council for the month of September.

Despite powerful evidence of war crimes and other serious violations of international law which emerged during and in the aftermath of the conflict, both Israel and Hamas have failed to carry out credible investigations and prosecute those responsible.  The UN Security Council condemned attacks against civilians during the conflict and urged both sides to respect international law, but so far it has turned a blind eye to the allegations of war crimes and other grave violations committed by both sides.

The report’s findings are consistent with those of Amnesty International’s own field investigation into the 22-day conflict during which some 1,400 Palestinians and nine Israelis were killed (four other Israeli soldiers were killed by their own side in ‘friendly fire’ incidents).

Most of the Palestinians killed by Israeli forces were unarmed civilians, including some 300 children. Amnesty’s investigations also found Israeli forces carried out wanton and wholesale destruction in Gaza, leaving entire neighborhoods in ruin, and used Palestinians as human shields.  Amnesty’s findings also agree with the Goldstone report in that the rocket fire into southern Israel by armed Palestinian groups, including Hamas, was indiscriminate which constitutes a war crime.

Key findings of the Goldstone report include:

• Israeli forces committed violations of human rights and international humanitarian law amounting to war crimes and some possibly amounting to crimes against humanity. Notably, investigations into numerous instances of lethal attacks on civilians and civilian objects revealed that the attacks were intentional, that some were launched with the intention of spreading terror among the civilian population and with no justifiable military objective and that Israeli forces used Palestinian civilians as human shields.

• Israeli forces committed grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention, notably wilful killing, torture and inhumane treatment, wilfully causing great suffering or serious injury to body or health, and extensive destruction of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly. As grave breaches these acts give rise to individual criminal responsibility.

• Israel violated its duty to respect the right of Gaza’s population to an adequate standard of living, including access to adequate food, water and housing. Notably acts which deprive Palestinians in Gaza of their means of sustenance, employment, housing and water, that deny their freedom of movement and their right to leave and enter their own country, that limit their access to an effective remedy and could amount to persecution – a crime against humanity.

• Palestinian armed groups violated the principle of distinction by launching rocket and mortars attacks which cannot be aimed with sufficient precision at military targets and that their attacks into civilian areas which had no intended military target constituted deliberate attacks against civilians. Such attacks constitute war crimes and may amount to crimes against humanity.

• Palestinian combatants did not always adequately distinguish themselves from he civilian population and they unnecessarily exposed civilians to danger when they launched attacks close to civilian or protected buildings.

• The Fact-Finding Mission found no evidence that Palestinian armed groups directed civilians to areas where attacks were launched or that they forced civilians to remain within their vicinity, nor that hospital facilities were used by the Hamas de-facto administration or by Palestinian armed groups to shield military activities, or that ambulances were used to transport combatants, or that Palestinian armed groups engaged in combat activities from within hospitals or UN facilities that were used as shelters.

In Iran, in January of this year, a man being stoned to death for adultery managed to survive his ordeal by digging his way out of the pit in which he had been buried.  According to an Amnesty International report, citing Iran’s penal code, “if the condemned person manages to escape from the pit, they will not be stoned again if they had been sentenced after confession.” The man who escaped in January was not stoned again that day, though it is believed he was taken back into custody.   

Today, Ohio faces a similar dilemma.  Romell Broom survived the Buckeye state’s attempts to execute him by lethal injection, due to the failure of his executioners to find a useful vein in which to inject the poison.    Does this mean Mr. Broom will no longer face the needle, or will Ohio subject him to a second execution?  It appears that the latter is the case (Ohio Governor Ted Strickland merely granted Mr. Broom a week-long reprieve), although there may be arguments in court that being executed twice would constitute cruel and unusual punishment. 

Ohio has had these problems before: the execution of Christopher Newton (who “volunteered” to be executed by giving up his appeals) took 90 minutes, and the lethal injection of Joseph Clark took 40.  In both cases, the delay was the result of the inability of the execution team to find suitable veins.

Given that this horrible problem keeps re-occurring, it would be wise for Ohio Governor Ted Strickland to at least declare a moratorium and halt executions in his state.