In the days surrounding Human Rights Day on December 10, I will be writing letters to people around the world – most of whom I have never met. As my messages begin to arrive in places like Chicago, Brasilia, Tel Aviv and Beijing, they will be joined by hundreds and thousands more. Together, we will speak with one voice to demand justice, cry for change and inspire hope. SEE THE REST OF THIS POST
October 24th is United Nations Day –meant to commemorate the passage of the Charter of the United Nations. One of the principles of the UN Charter, enshrined in the preamble, is:
“to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, andto establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained.” SEE THE REST OF THIS POST
Former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge is scheduled to be released from prison today after his 2010 conviction for lying about the torture of suspects in police custody. SEE THE REST OF THIS POST
El Salvador: Marlene was accused and charged with having an abortion after she had a miscarriage when she was 18 years old.
I was on a plane coming back from Mexico when I first encountered the stories of children and young women in El Salvador suffering from the country’s universal criminalization of abortion, a law that is now more than a decade old. SEE THE REST OF THIS POST
Moses Akatugba was 16 years old when he was arrested by the Nigerian police in 2005.
In the years that followed, he was beaten by the police, shot in the hand, and hung for hours at the police station. After 8 years of torture and ill treatment that led to a coerced confession of his involvement in a robbery, he was sentenced to death November 2013.
Moses’ case is sadly all too familiar in Nigeria, where a recent report by Amnesty International found the use of torture and ill-treatment to be rampant SEE THE REST OF THIS POST
Sunday, September 28, Amnesty International is taking part in the International Day to Decriminalize Abortion. The importance of access to safe, legal abortion is clearly demonstrated in Amnesty’s new report, On the Brink of Death: Violence Against Women and the Abortion Ban in El Salvador. SEE THE REST OF THIS POST
An encounter with the Nigerian security forces can be a dangerous thing.
The police and military routinely engage in beating people in their custody with whips, gun butts, machetes, batons, sticks, rods and cables. Rape and sexual assault are widespread Detainees can be shot in the leg, foot or hand during interrogation, or have their nails or teeth extracted with pliers.
