Tag Archives: free speech

New Generation of Online Activists Targeted in China

March 23, 2011 at 1:19 PM

Hua Chunhui was detained after tweeting about the ‘Jasmine Revolution’ © Amnesty International

Jasmine Revolution.  Those two words simply uttered online elicit enough fear in Chinese leaders’ hearts to throw the writer in jail.

Online activists have long been at risk in China but the recent spate of arrests — following online calls for a ‘Jasmine Revolution’ in China — has gotten out of hand.  Chinese authorities are not only detaining seasoned dissidents; they are trying to silence a whole new generation of online activists.

More than 100 activists, many of them active on Twitter and blogging networks, have been detained, subjected to monitoring and intimidation by the security forces, or have gone missing since late February. The sweep is the worst since 2009 when thousands were detained following deadly riots in Urumqi.

The call for a ‘Jasmine Revolution’ in February consisted of online instructions to ‘stroll’ through designated public places on Sunday afternoons. Faced with a large state security presence, no significant gatherings took place.

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Q&A: Wikileaks and Freedom of Expression

December 9, 2010 at 10:48 AM

The right to freedom of expression includes the right to receive and impart all kinds of information © Alex Milan Tracy/Demotix

International controversy over the Wikileaks release of US diplomatic cables continues to rage. In recent days, Paypal, Visa and Mastercard have barred their users from donating to Wikileaks, alleging that the site may be engaged in illegal conduct.  Amnesty International examines some of the human rights issues at stake.

Would prosecution of Julian Assange for releasing US government documents be a violation of the right to freedom of expression?

The US government has indicated since July 2010 that it is conducting a legal investigation into the actions of Wikileaks and its founder Julian Assange for distributing secret documents.  A range of US political figures have called for a criminal prosecution of Assange.

According to Amnesty International, criminal proceedings aimed at punishing a private person for communicating evidence about human rights violations can never be justified. The same is true with respect to information on a wide range of other matters of public interest.

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Musaad Abu Fagr Freed! Egyptian Bloggers Strike Back

July 15, 2010 at 9:43 PM

Musaad Abu Fagr

The Egyptian government came late to discovering the power of the Internet and social networking, but for the last four years, they’ve made it the center of its efforts to muzzle Egyptian civil society.

This week, the activists pushed back and earned an important victory.

Egyptian Bedouin blogger and activist Musaad Suliman Hassan Hussein, was released July 14 after being held in prison without trial for almost three years, accused of inciting protests against the demolition of thousands of homes in the Sinai Peninsula.

The charges were ludicrous, a ruse to attack someone whose views were outside of government control.  A prisoner of conscience who often wrote under the pen name of Musaad Abu Fagr, Hussein had been adopted recently by two US Amnesty International groups in Omaha, Neb., and Westbury, N.Y.

Upon his release Abu Fagr thanked Amnesty for its efforts. “Amnesty International’s support is one of the reasons that I was released,” he said. “Your messages gave me a sense of solidarity.”

Amnesty’s joy at his release was tempered by the continuing detention of a growing number of bloggers, social network leaders, writers and other activists, including prisoner of conscience Karim Amer, who is scheduled to be released this year after a convicted based on his writings.  Egypt has been known to hold prisoners beyond their release date, and in the case of Abu Fagr, in opposition to legal orders for their release.

However, the release also comes on the heels of other promising news — a rare legal action against Egyptian policemen charged in the beating death of a blogger.  That case also brought a public comment from Gamal Mubarak, son and presumed heir to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Many Egyptian activists who have felt the taste of Egyptian jails remember how when Hosni Mubarak came to power, his reign started with the opening of prisons and the release of many political prisoners.  The possibility seemed then that a new era of human rights and freedom was ahead.

That possibility has been crushed by the reality of the regime’s desire to bring its own kind of order to every area of civil society.  Now if this recent period of sunshine is a sign of a new Mubarak rising to the presidency, activists won’t follow the assumptions of 1981.  Musaad Abu Fagr is out of prison, but he and all other activists won’t be free until all prisoners of conscience are released and human rights are protected by the rule of law.

The power of World Press Freedom Day

May 3, 2010 at 11:04 AM

Signing petition for diamond tradeToday, World Press Freedom Day provides an opportunity for people around the world to celebrate the fundamental human right to freedom of expression.  Every day, journalists around the world face the threat of intimidation, censorship, imprisonment and violence, including torture, for their efforts to report on human rights violations.

We are shining a light on 8 specific cases in places including China, Zimbabwe, Russia and Egypt where rights to free speech and expression have been harshly denied.

It was during this same time last year when we witnessed the release of American journalist Roxana Saberi. She was arrested in Iran and initially sentenced to eight years in prison on trumped-up charges of espionage. But because we sounded the alarm and refused to let free speech be ignored, justice was served.

Commemorate World Press Freedom Day by sending an email on behalf of a journalist or free speech advocate who needs your support!

Defending Our Right to Protest: Amnesty International and the ACLU Settle Lawsuit with City of Miami

July 8, 2009 at 3:49 PM

Amnesty International and the ACLU recently settled a lawsuit that defended our members’ right to peacefully protest.  Miami officials admitted that during the 2003 Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) protests in Miami, they used overwhelming police force prohibiting a group of Amnesty International members from peacefully protesting.

Even though members of the Amnesty International Miami Chapter had a permit to assemble, police officers restrained people from gathering, preventing them from exercising their constitutional right to assemble and protest.  Although Amnesty International took no position on the FTAA treaty itself, the protests were planned to bring attention to human rights abuses in the Americas.

In 2006 the ACLU of Florida filed the Amnesty International USA v. Louis Battle and Thomas Cannon lawsuit that was finally settled last week. Miami-Dade and City of Miami officials acknowledged their use of vast and unnecessary police force, also disclosing regret that their actions had prevented Amnesty International’s attempt to communicate an important message to the public.

The outcome of this lawsuit stands as an example of our rights as citizens to free speech and freedom of people to peacefully assemble, in the hopes that in future demonstrations, the actions of the November 2003 FTAA protests will not take place.

Journalists Risking their Lives

May 1, 2009 at 2:55 PM

This Sunday, May 3rd, is World Press Freedom Day and you can help push back against governments worldwide who violate fundamental rights to free speech and expression.  Some of the journalists currently languishing in detention include:

  • Iranian-American journalist, Roxana Saberi, who was sentenced last week to eight years in prison on charges of espionage after a flawed trial.
  • Gambian journalist Ebrima Manneh who continues to be detained despite a court’s ruling in June 2008 that his rights had been violated by the Gambian government and should be released.
  • Sri Lankan writer J.S. Tissainayagam who was imprisoned in 2008 for writing two articles that criticized the government’s military offensive against the opposition group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

Here in the U.S. we often take for granted our ability to speak out against the policies of our government.  The type of content on this blog alone would surely be censored in some countries and could even land writers in prison.  We hope you’ll join us this weekend in taking action to protect journalists worldwide!

Free Roxana Saberi

April 20, 2009 at 3:46 PM

In a press statement released today, Amnesty International condemned the eight-year eight-year prison sentence imposed by an Iranian Revolutionary Court on Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi who was convicted of “espionage” following a brief closed door trial in Tehran.

Saberi had been arrested on January 31 and held in Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison since then. Legal proceedings in Iran’s Revolutionary Courts are severely flawed and fail to meet international standards for fair trials. The evidence against Saberi has not been made public.

The American born, 31-year-old Saberi is the daughter of an Iranian father and Japanese mother and worked for NPR and other news outlets. An interview on NPR with her father can be found here

Amnesty International issued an urgent action on March 16 when Saberi was first detained, mobilizing activists worldwide to send letters to Iranian officials calling on the authorities to release her unless she is to be charged with a recognizable criminal offense. AIUSA recently issued a second urgent action on Friday, April 17, after news that she had been tried in a closed courtroom.

Several dual-national Iranians have been detained in Iran in recent years since the U.S. Congress announced an extra U.S. $75 million funding for “supporting democracy” in Iran, including Dr Haleh Esfandiari, Kian Tajbakhsh, Parnaz Azima and Ali Shakeri. Most have been accused of acting against national security, particularly with relation to participation in an alleged “soft revolution” in Iran. The United States also holds five Iranian diplomats arrested in Iraq in 2007. In a meeting with the Swiss President on April 19, President Ahmadinejad called for their release. Some commentators have also suggested that Roxana Saberi’s arrest and trial may also be in part due to internal rivalries in the Iranian system in regard to the election of President Obama in the United States and his recent overtures towards Iran.

Why Microsoft, Google and Yahoo! need to be reined in

March 12, 2009 at 2:09 PM

(Originally posted on Daily Kos)

Reporters without Borders (RWB) today issued its “Enemies of the Internet” report, exposing state censorship of free speech and expression around the world. Topping the group’s list were Burma, China, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Vietnam.

While the United States is not on the list, RWB and Amnesty International earlier in the week highlighted the role of U.S. companies in internet censorship by calling on Microsoft, Yahoo! and Google to uncensor their search engines and blogging portals, even if just for a day, on the World Day Against Cyber Censorship (today March 12th).

The call on the companies is a reminder that censorship does not just happen by states acting alone. The very companies that provide access to information on-line are actively participating in the restriction of such access.

So, what happens when U.S. companies adopt the censorship practices of other countries rather than export the ideals of free speech that are largely granted to users in their homeland?

There is a clear need for regulation. While the industry has begun attempts at self-regulation, they have made far too little progress in far too much time. Rep. Chris Smith has been vigilant in trying to pass the Global Online Freedom Act, which would bring about transparency in state requests of U.S. firms to censor protected speech, and help the companies to refuse such requests, with the backing of the U.S. government.

To date, the companies have opposed the bill’s chances of becoming law.

If RWB and Amnesty’s call for one day of freedom from online censorship goes unheeded by the companies, it in itself will speak volumes — how can we expect them to make meaningful strides in their ongoing operations if they can’t even commit to a one-day, mostly a symbolic gesture?

If the U.S. doesn’t want to find itself on the “enemies” list one day, it needs to step in and regulate companies based in its soil that are essentially partners in the crackdown on free expression occurring across the world.