Russia’s Most Prominent Political Prisoner Freed After Ten Years Behind Bars

December 22, 2013 at 3:02 PM

Mikhail Khodorkovsky was charged with embezzlement and tax evasion. He spent 10 years in prison until his unexpected pardon by Russian President Vladimir Putin (Photo Credit by Sean Gallup/Getty Images).

By Ludmila Gordon, Amnesty USA Russia Country Specialist, Eurasia Cogroup Co-Chair

Amnesty International is happy to share the great news of the release of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Russia’s most prominent political prisoner who spent over 10 years behind bars.

On December 19, 2013, Russian President Vladimir Putin unexpectedly announced at the annual news conference that he decided to pardon Mikhail Khodorkovsky after he received a petition from Khodorkovsky asking to be pardoned due to family reasons. Shortly after, Khodorkovsky was released from a prison colony in the Karelia region of northwestern Russia and immediately flown to Germany.

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When Will Big Companies Really Take Responsibility for Industrial Disasters?

By Guest Writer

December 7, 2013 at 2:00 PM

On December 2nd, 1984, a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India, began leaking 27 tons of the deadly gas methyl isocyanate. Half a million people were exposed to the gas and 25,000 have died to date as a result of their exposure (Photo Credit: Giles Clarke/Getty Images).

By Joe Westby, Corporate Campaigner at Amnesty International Online

This week marked the 29th anniversary of one of the world’s worst-ever industrial disasters: the infamous gas leak from a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India that, on the night of December 2-3, 1984, killed thousands. Many more have been left to suffer since then, given the abject failure by both the Indian government and the companies involved to provide survivors and their families with an adequate remedy and justice.

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When A Fight For Environmental Reform Becomes A Fight For Human Rights

By Guest Writer

December 3, 2013 at 10:00 AM

Children play in a polluted landscape containing years of toxic waste and various chemical byproducts from the Union Carbide leak on December 2, 1987. The site has never been properly cleaned up and it continues to poison the residents of Bhopal (Photo by Giles Clarke/Getty Images).

By James Mutti, India Country Specialist, Amnesty International USA

This week marks the 29^th anniversary of the world’s deadliest industrial disaster – the 1984 gas leak at the Union Carbide factory in Bhopal, India. If you’re not familiar with the disaster and Amnesty’s recent campaigning concerning Bhopal, read Amnesty USA’s recent blog posts here, here and here.

The gas leak, and the continuing contamination of local soil and water that killed 25,000 people and injured or sickened over 100,000, is indeed horrifying. Much remains to be done to ensure that those responsible for so much human suffering are held accountable and that those whose lives have been so unfairly devastated by the disaster receive justice. At the same time, the strength and determination of Bhopal’s survivors is truly inspiring and has led to a number of important victories.

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The Illegal Practice That Generates $44 Billion a Year For Perpetrators

By Leila Chacko

December 2, 2013 at 8:45 PM

There are more than 300,000 migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong, with about half from Indonesia (Photo Credit: Amnesty International).

I had no time to myself – I worked long hours from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. with no rest day. My employers didn’t allow me to leave the house without someone accompanying me. When it was bed time, I had to wait for everyone to sleep because I slept in the family bathroom.

This 30-year-old woman from Tulungagung told Amnesty International her story in 2012.

In an extensive new report, filled with heartbreaking testimony about exploitative recruitment, physical and sexual violence, lack of food, excessive hours and restrictions on religious practices, Amnesty International examines the experiences of Indonesian domestic migrant workers trafficked to Hong Kong.

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The Company That Forced Its Employees to Work For 9 Months Without Pay

By Guest Writer

November 18, 2013 at 12:00 PM

Migrant construction workers in Doha © Amnesty International.

By Conor Fortune, News Writer

“Everything Was Hopeless.”

This is how Rahul summed up his first stint as a migrant worker in Qatar when he recently spoke to Amnesty International.

Stuck thousands of miles from his native India in a land where he couldn’t speak the language, he faced the worst predicament of his working life.

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The Dirty Secret Behind Cairo’s Development Dreams

By The Editors

November 14, 2013 at 1:29 PM

12 million Egyptians live in informal settlements. Thousands inhabit the tombs of bygone nobels in Cairo’s City of the Dead pictured here (Photo Credit: Marco Longari/AFP/Getty Images).

Egyptian lawyer Abdel Nasser Ahmed Mohamed Alsayed still struggles to live with the memories of the day he was forced out of his house in Old Cairo.

It was March 2009. Riot police showed up, beat him and threw his belongings out the window. Lorries then took his furniture, books and everything he worked hard for to ‘October 6 City’ and dumped them on the street.

The Egyptian authorities gave Abdel Nasser a small flat, 45 kilometres outside Old Cairo, but he never got a contract, so he now faces being evicted again.

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The Lies Shell is Telling About Oil Spills in the Niger Delta

By Simon Billenness

November 7, 2013 at 11:17 AM

In the powerful new report “Bad Information,” Amnesty International and the Center for Environment, Human Rights and Development (CEHRD) reveal that Shell has manipulated investigations into its oil spills in Nigeria.

“Shell is being disingenuous about the devastation caused by its Niger Delta operations. This new evidence shows that Shell’s claims about the oil spills cannot be trusted,” said Audrey Gaughran, Director of Global Issues at Amnesty International.

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Will You Take Action to Help End Employment Discrimination?

By Cristina Finch

November 1, 2013 at 3:30 PM

Participants attends the 2009 Athens Gay Pride on June 13, 2009 (Photo Credit: Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images).

The United States Senate is poised to vote on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (“ENDA”), critical legislation that will help end employment discrimination against the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.

Imagine being fired from your job not because of your qualification but simply because of who you are or who you love. For millions of people in the United States, this is the scary reality.

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Ten Years After Khodorkovsky’s Arrest, Repression in Russia Continues

By Samir Goswami

October 25, 2013 at 8:00 AM

Since Putin was re-elected, Russians have witnessed a further erosion of their rights (Photo Credit: Vasily Maximov/AFP/Getty Images).

When a government cracks down on human rights, the rule of law is degraded.

On Oct. 7, Amnesty International USA and the law firm of Kirkland & Ellis hosted a discussion with Daniel Feldman and Pavel Ivlev about the erosion of rights in Russia and the impact it has on the legal fabric of Russian society.

Both men worked with Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an Amnesty prisoner of conscience, who was once one of Russia’s most successful businessmen and CEO of Yukos Oil Company.

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In Honduras, Posting a Blog Can Come with Jail Time

By Larry Ladutke

October 10, 2013 at 11:30 AM

Members of the COPINH during a demonstration. Three members of the COPINH, Bertha Cáceres, Tomás Gómez and Aureliano Molina, are currently jailed or on probation for a series of blog posts and speeches accusing the Honduran government and a hydro-electric company of violating their indigenous community’s land rights (Photo Credit: Orlando Sierra/AFP/Getty Images).

In mid-September, Amnesty International issued an Urgent Action calling on the Honduran government to drop its unfounded charges against Bertha Cáceres, Tomás Gómez and Aureliano Molina of the Civic Council of the Indigenous and Popular Organizations of Honduras (COPINH). The organization warned, “If they are imprisoned, Amnesty International will consider them prisoners of conscience.”

First, thank you to everyone who took action! Unfortunately, however, the judge did not listen to us. On September 20, 2013, she ordered Cáceres to be held in prison. She also ordered Gómez and Molina placed on probation.

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Russia’s Most Prominent Political Prisoner Freed After Ten Years Behind Bars

When Will Big Companies Really Take Responsibility for Industrial Disasters?