AIDS is a Human Rights Issue

Today is "World AIDS Day." Sadly, it is also the 20th anniversary of this day and its call to action. In the last 20 years, wonderful advances have been made in the treatment of AIDS. As a result, AIDS death rates have been falling in the developed world. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Africa. According to James Boyce, over 4000 people in Africa will die of AIDS today and another 2000 children will be infected with HIV.

Morally, this is an unacceptable state. According to Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,

Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services . . .

This right is being denied to millions of people in Africa. They have neither the means nor the access to appropriate treatment, and as a result they are succumbing to AIDS in larger numbers and far more quickly than is necessary. There are many ways to help (see the Boyce link above for suggestions), but we can't let this be a one-day-a-year cause. If we do, there will be about 1.5 million unnecessary deaths in Africa before World AIDS Day 2009.

The Continuing Problem of Slavery

Modern slavery does not often make the press. We have the idea that slavery was something that was abolished in the 19th century. However, as iAbolish has documented, slavery is far from over (See particularly their section "Modern Slavery 101"). One country where forced labor slavery is still common is Mauritania. VOA News recently reported that as many as 43 people have been freed from slavery in 2008, despite the fact that the government contends that slavery has been abolished.

Slavery in Mauritania has numerous cultural roots. The practice is embedded not only in the economic structure, but in the tribal and caste structures as well. As such, it will take efforts in law enforcement, education, and economic restructuring to make the problem vanish entirely. Though many of the slaves in Mauritania know that they are held in bondage illegally, many are either afraid to go to the authorities or are ignored when they do. Thus the government must continue to enforce the laws on slavery rather than hide behind them and claim that slavery is a thing of the past. The educational and economic issues are even more difficult, but these too must be addressed. As abhorrent as the concept of slavery is to us, it is still a part of Mauritanian culture; a part that must be rejected if the concept of human rights is to flourish in that country.

Death Penalty Support still Strong among Americans

Gallup released a poll today that is a disappointment to all those who have a concern for human rights. With a margin of error of about 3 percent, the poll reports that nearly two-thirds of the population support the death penalty. Even more depressing, a large majority of those who support the death penalty think it is not administered often enough. These numbers are consistent with the results of other polls taken by Gallup since 2001.

Looking more deeply into the poll, there is still little cause for hopefulness. The death penalty is favored overwhelmingly by Republicans, but a majority of both Democrats and Independents also support its use. Over half the people believe that the death penalty is administered fairly in this country, despite the abundance of evidence that race is a major factor in the use of the sentence.

If there is a silver lining for those who oppose the death penalty, is that only a third of the respondents believe that the death penalty is a deterrent. Evidence clearly shows that it is not a deterrent. Perhaps as more people come to understand this fact, we will begin to see an erosion of support for the death penalty in the U.S.

Cholera outbreak in the Congo

As if the situation weren't bad enough in the Congo (as detailed in my previous post), we can now add a cholera outbreak to the problems those beleaguered people are facing. Doctors without Borders and other relief agencies are reporting more than 50 cases of cholera in the last week. There have already been dozens of deaths from cholera, and that number is sure to rise given the number of refugees and the poor conditions in which they are trying to live.

According to the CDC, cholera is an acute gastrointestinal disease. Most cases are mild, but about 5% are severe, and left untreated a severe case can cause death quickly. The treatment for the disease is simple hydration! While antibiotics can be of some use, the far more important, easier, and least expensive option is to keep the patient hydrated. The truth is that no one should die of cholera, but given conditions, it is likely that many people will.

Situation Deteriorating in the Congo

Personally, I am still on a bit of an emotional high following Obama's victory on Tuesday night. Unfortunately war, violence against women and children, torture, rape, murder and many other human rights abuses have not stopped in response to the election. There is still much work to be done, though I hope electing Obama is a step in the right direction.

One area in serious need of help is the Congo. The recent cease-fire between the government and rebels has apparently collapsed. Children are either wandering alone, probably orphaned, but searching for parents, or they are being conscripted and forced to become soldiers. According to UNICEF, as many as 60,000 children have been displaced in the last week. It is hard to imagine the situation being more dire.

There are 17,000 UN peace-keeping forces in the Congo--more than anywhere else in the world--but they are virtually powerless to stop the war and the human rights abuses. The Democratic Republic of the Congo is a very large country--roughly the size of western Europe--with almost non-existent infrastructure. Given the global financial crisis, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's call for 3,000 more troops is not likely to be met in the near future. That leaves the few troops and the few organizations that are there to deal with the many hundreds of thousands of refugees. UNICEF is doing important work there, and other organizations are beginning to provide some aide.

We need to do more. Please consider doing something--anything--to help alleviate the suffering in the Congo. Donate money to UNICEF or some other organization providing aide; write your government and encourage them to take what steps they can to stop the violence; pray. The Congolese people need all the help they can get.

Fighting in Congo Endangers Refugees Human Rights

As fighting has increased in the Congo, human rights abuses have also increased, according to United Nations Human Right Commissioner, Navi Pillay. In particular, there has been an increase in looting by government soldiers and the murders and rapes that often accompanying these abuses. The Congo has long been one of the worst places in the world for civilians, particularly those living in the Goma area. With the increase in violence, the world faces a major humanitarian crisis if something isn't done soon. In the U.S., we need to call on our leaders--and whomever wins next week--to address this issue with both public statements and assistance as needed. The people of the Congo cannot endure much more abuse.

Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft and Others Adopt Online Code of Conduct

Led by Yahoo!, a group of large internet companies have adopted a human rights code of conduct to help protect free speech and the right to disagree with a country's policies. The policy is designed to encourage companies to resist aiding governments who want to crack down on free speech by dissidents, and to comply as narrowly as possible when they are compelled to do so.

In the past, companies have been criticized for their willingness to acceded to governments' demands. Now, however, with a code that says that individuals have a right to privacy, these companies will need to be more resistant when they are asked to limit speech or turn over surfing habits of dissidents.

Some human rights proponents are decrying the code of conduct as too limited. However, considering we had no agreement and no standards before this, I consider this to be a step in the right direction. Now we can hold companies up to a standard, and we can justifiably criticize them when they fail to meet their obligations. I hope, though, that far more often we will be praising companies for meeting their human rights obligations on the internet.

Georgia's Death-Penalty Process Criticized by Justice Stevens

I don't have much time to post today, but I wanted to point people to an interesting article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

Hu Jia receives the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought

Hu Jia has won the prestigious Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, which is awarded by the European Parliament. European Parliament President Pottering said, "By awarding the Sakharov Prize to Hu Jia, the European Parliament firmly and resolutely acknowledges the daily struggle for freedom of all Chinese human rights defenders." Human Rights Watch has a useful chronology of the Hu case. In late 2007., Hu provided telephone testimony on China's human rights abuses to the European Parliament. For this testimony, Hu and his wife were arrested, tried and convicted of subverting state power. He was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison.

Hu has been a peaceful worker on behalf of Human Rights and environmental issues for many years. The Sakharov prize will hopefully help to return focus on his plight as a prisoner of conscience. Amnesty International is still encouraging people to write on his behalf (link is to a PDF).

Policeman who Tortured Suspects Charged with Perjury and Obstruction of Justice

Twenty years ago, Jon Burge was a police officer in Chicago's South Side. He is alleged to have taken part in torturing primarily black suspects in order to elicit confessions. He and other involved officers are reported to have subjected the suspects to the following forms of torture. They were beaten "with telephone books, suffocated with plastic typewriter covers, burned with cigarettes, threatened with mock executions, and suffered electric shocks to their genitals." Burge was acquitted on brutality charges, but was still fired by the Chicago Police Department. Allegations of torture were investigated, but the statute of limitations prevented charges from being filed against Burge.

Burge is now facing a federal indictment for perjury and obstruction of justice based on a deposition he gave in a civil suit by one of his victims. Burge may finally get the justice he so richly deserves.

Burge's place in history, though, is not just limited to some cases in the South Side of Chicago. It was in part due to his actions that Governor George Ryan cleared Illinois' death row after he became concerned about how some people were convicted. His tactics were also part of the impetus behind Barack Obama's proposal that all Police interrogations should be videotaped, which he made while a state legislator in Illinois. The case was even brought before the United Nations. Guantanamo and Abu Graib may be our country's most notorious examples of the use of torture, but it is unfortunately not the only one. We have to be vigilant not only on the international front, but close to home as well.

The Death Penalty for Crimes against Children

Among some supporters of the death penalty, there has been a call to expand the death penalty to crimes against children. Perhaps the most visible advocates have been Clint Eastwood and Angelina Jolie, who both spoke out in support of expanding the death penalty to include child abductions, rape and other horrific crimes against minors. These ideas don't reside only in Hollywood, however. Recently, Detroit City Council President Monica Conyers made the news when she called for the death penalty for anyone who killed a child.

The idea that crimes against children deserve a more harsh punishment is appealing on many levels. Jolie sums up the argument made most often: If it was my kid, "I'd want to go after" the killers. The rage we feel against those who perpetrate crimes against children is understandable. However, the revenge motive is not a motive for justice, and it does nothing to protect children. Putting someone to death for a crime against a child does not provide a deterrent, and the idea that getting the perpetrator off the street is served just as well by a life sentence as by a death sentence. We need to vigorously resist all calls to expand the death penalty, even in such emotional cases as crimes against children. Instead, we need to work on abolishing the death penalty while finding ways to reduce violence in our communities. That is the real way to keep children safe.

White House Approved Harsh Interrogation Tactics

I haven't posted in a long time, but I needed to write something about this article in the Washington Post. Officials in the White House and in the CIA have confirmed that the Bush administration gave written approval of harsh interrogation techniques, including water-boarding, in not one but TWO separate memos. The first was written in 2003 at George Tenant's request. The second came in 2004, also at Tenant's request, but after his departure from the CIA. In both cases, the CIA made a case to the administration that such techniques were the only way they could get information they needed out of the apprehended Al Queda suspects. Under pressure, the administration agreed to give them "cover" so that the White House couldn't distance itself from the CIA should a backlash against the tactics arise.

As we know, such a backlash did arise, and the administration has repeatedly attempted to distance itself from the harshest tactics used to question the detainees. They continue to down play and hide behind classified information while they continue to deny habeas corpus to the detainees. The revelation of these memos doesn't really tell us anything we didn't know before. However, it does attach certain people--most notably, Condi Rice--to the tactics. Such explicit knowledge should preclude Rice from any public service position for the rest of her life, if it doesn't land her in jail! Any aspirations to become President of the U.S. are now gone. She will forever be linked with this dark chapter in U.S. history.

Rice is not the only one besmirched by our countries willingness to torture. Bush, Cheney, Ashcroft, and Gonzales will all be judged harshly by history, and rightfully so. But perhaps the biggest casualty of this whole sick affair, apart from the victims themselves, is to the reputation of the United States. We can no longer hold our standards up as those to be emulated, unless we want our own soldiers tortured, that is. We can no longer claim the moral high ground. All we can do is to try to rebuild our reputation in the coming years and decades. That is George Bush's legacy.

Chinese Torture Methods used in Guantanamo

The New York Times reports a shocking story today: American Soldiers and CIA members were trained to use methods employed by the Chinese military during the Korean War. These methods were considered to be torture at the time, and it was known that the methods elicited false confessions. The chart used in the training was taken verbatim from the original report on Chinese Torture methods, with only the title removed.

Can it be more clear that at least between 2002 and 2005, the U.S. Government was actively using torture in the name of homeland security? As Senator Levin notes in the article, “People say we need intelligence, and we do. But we don’t need false intelligence.” Torture is not a reliable source of information, and if that were the only argument against it, it would be enough to consign torture techniques to the dustbin of history. But there are many more reasons to oppose torture. From any moral standpoint, the intentional infliction of harm on another human should be opposed. Torture not only inflicts terrible physical and mental suffering on the victim, it is also psychologically damaging to the person who inflicts the torture. A torturer must learn to see the human being that they are harming as something less than human. The torturer, in the act of torture, turns into a monster. Both the torturer and the tortured become animalistic.

Using torture is simply not how we want our society to work. We don't want to be remembered by history as a society of torturers. We need to tell our leaders in no uncertain terms that all torture must end. It doesn't work. It causes irreparable harm. It must be stopped.

The President and Congress are not above the Constitution

The Supreme Court gave a stinging, if narrow, rebuke yesterday to President Bush and congress regarding detainees at Guantanamo. By declaring that detainees have the right to seek their release in our standard court system, the Supreme Court should have finally put an end to Bush's flaunting of the constitution in the name of the "war on terror." Amnesty hails the decision but calls it "a limited victory for human rights." Scotusblog looks at some of the scenarios that may play out in the White House, the Pentagon and the court system. There is, of course, a multitude of other coverage.

It seems to me, though, that the real tragedy of this is how long it has taken. Bush has essentially shown that the courts move so slowly on issues like this that a president can get away with more than 6 years of human rights and constitutional abuses. Worst of all, there are no repercussions for these actions. The President and the Congress are not above the Constitution, but for long periods of time, they can act as if they are.

Psych Hospital held man in solitary confinement for 20 years

I posted the following story over on Digg. Here is my brief description:

Unbelievable, a Hispanic man in his 50's has spent 20 years in solitary confinement without access to other patients. He speaks no English and yet almost all of his medical and psychiatric care was provided by people who didn't speak Spanish. "We think it is an egregious violation of human rights," said Alex R. Gulotta. You got that right!

Mental health is another area in which human rights abuses are common and unreported. Kudos to the committee for discovering and reporting this crime. We need more transparency and oversight in this arena as in so many others.

read more | digg story

2 Amnesty Campaigns

I've added 2 campaigns from Amnesty International to my links. The first one, which you will find on the left, is called Unsubscribe Me. It is a campaign to enlist people to show their displeasure about human rights abuses perpetrated in the name of the "war on terror." If you are appalled by things like water-boarding, Abu Ghraib, unlawful detentions in Guantanamo or any other abuses, please sign up.

The second campaign is called irrepressible, and you'll find it along the bottom of my blog. It exists because countries around the world are censoring and blocking internet access to sites that are critical of them or their leaders. To make matters worst, many companies are helping them in their censorship (including the company hosting this blog). Irrepressible dynamically publishes censored content to a site every time the page is loaded. This helps subvert the companies' and governments' attempts at censoring public web content. Take a read and consider adding irrepressible to your own site.

Water and Human Rights

I got the latest magazine from Heifer International, and they had a story about the U.N.'s Water for Life program. The magazine story and the U.N.'s online resources have reminded me how absolutely central access to clean water is to human rights.

Water, of course, is central to everything we do. We can live only days without it, but it isn't just ingesting that makes water important. Its use in agriculture, livestock rearing, hygiene and even transportation are vital parts of a person's life. The U.N. estimates that over 2 million people die each year from diseases that are due to unclean or contaminated water sources. Most of these deaths are of children who are least able to fight off these diseases.

As more people live in water-scarce areas, other human rights problems arise. People sometimes have to travel great distances to obtain clean water, and this puts them at risk of becoming the prey of bandits, warlords or other criminals in the area. Such dangers are shouldered disproportionately by women, who are often the ones who are charged with fetching water and doling it out for all of a family's needs.

Access to clean water is an imperative and is as much a human rights issue as an ecological or environmental issue. People in developed countries can think of ways to improve the problem, whether by donating to build wells (or traveling somewhere to help dig one!) or just by wasting a little bit less of the water that most of us take for granted.

Myanmar Disaster Relief

I think everyone is aware of the disaster in Myanmar and the difficulty in getting aid to the people who need it most. As I indicated in my last post, things like food and medical assistance are human rights and governments need to do what they can to assist, rather than hinder, people's abilities to obtain these basic necessities. Unfortunately, Myanmar's government has intentionally made it difficult for relief workers to reach the millions of people who need help.

Amnesty has launched a campaign to encourage ASEAN (Association of South Eastern Asian Nations) to put pressure on the Myanmar government to allow humanitarian aid into their country. Doctors without Borders has called for an "unobstructed escalation of Myanmar relief operations." I'd also like to take an opportunity to point out that you can make donations to Myanmar relief through UMCOR, the United Methodist Committee on Relief. What makes them different is that 100% of your gift goes to relief because the United Methodist Churches around the country pay for its operating costs. They coordinate with all the major relief organizations, so your money can be put to the best use and is not put toward religious efforts. Their Myanmar Emergency page has a link for donations (disclosure: I am a member of a United Methodist Church but am otherwise not affiliated with the organization).

Soaring Food Prices Threaten Human Rights

In her address to the U.N. Human Rights Council, Louise Arbor argued that the rice in various food commodities is a threat to basic human rights. She listed three main factors that have led to this threat:

The current food crisis stems from a perverse convergence of several factors, including distortions in supply and demand, unfair trade practices, as well as skewed policies involving incentives or subsidies.

The distortions in supply and demand and the other issues result from several factors, but mostly because hunger is an international problem that is treated like a national problem. There are countries with enormous food surpluses, but those surpluses don't make it to the market for a variety of reasons: reserves for their own citizens, desires to keep prices high, subsidies and other policies, etc. Whatever the reason, though, the result is that countries without adequate food don't have the means to procure it for their citizens. As Arbor says, "This crisis boils down to a lack of access to adequate food. Such access is a right protected by international law."

Arbor goes on to point out that the food crisis could lead to further human rights abuses:

A failure to act in a comprehensive manner may also trigger a domino effect by putting at risk other fundamental rights, including the right to health or to education, when people are forced to forego competing basic necessities or services in order to feed themselves and their families.

Hunger is a core issue for many human rights problems, and the U.N. needs to lead the way in finding a solution. Arbor argues for an increased focus on sustainability for families and local communities. Whether that is a long-term solution or not I leave to better-informed experts. It is clear, though, that we must solve the issue of hunger if we have any hope of tackling other human rights abuses.

LRA Expands Abductions in Central Africa

If you don't know much about the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Uganda and its leader Joseph Kony, now is the time to learn. Human Rights Watch reported yesterday that the LRA has abducted at least 100 children, and probably many more, and in the Central African Republic , the Democratic Republic of the Congo , and in the Southern part of Sudan. The boys they kidnap are either made to be porters or trained in the army. The girls are forced into sexual slavery. HRW is calling for international action to stop the abductions and to enforce the arrest warrants against Joseph Kony that have been issued by the International Criminal Court.

Kony has led a 21-year uprising against the Ugandan government. This war has taken many thousands of lives and has displaced over 2 million people. According to HRW, "The LRA has been responsible for willful killings, beatings, large-scale abductions, forced recruitment of adults and children, rape against girls whom it assigns as 'wives' or sex slaves to commanders, and large-scale looting and destruction of civilian property." It is time that western governments--led by the European Union and the United States--take action against this dangerous group and bring its leaders to justice.

Blog for Human Rights Day

Today is "Blog for Human Rights" day, as you can see from the image on the left. As such, I'd like to call your attention to a little-known illegal detention that has gone on for almost a year in India. Dr. Binayak Sen is a health activist and human rights advocate in Chhattisgarh province in India. He was detained almost a year ago, on May 24, 2007. The charges against him have been investigated and shown to be false, and yet he is still unlawfully held. We like to think of India as a country with a solid human rights record, but cases like this show that things are not quite so rosy as we'd like them to be.

4th Circuit to consider Virginia's use of lethal injection

Virginia and its death-row inmates are back in the news today. Christopher Scott Emmett and his attorneys will argue in front of the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals that Virginia's use of lethal injection poses a "substantial risk" of harm and is thus banned under the constitution. This is the first challenge to lethal injection since the Baze v. Rees decision by the U.S. Supreme Court that ruled lethal injection was not cruel and unusual punishment when administered under certain guidelines. Emmett's attorneys think Virginia's methods differ enough from what the Supreme Court allowed that they challenged this ruling.

Emmett and his attorneys are also arguing that the Virginia officials who administer the injections “have performed incompetently,” and they further argue that Virginia administers too little of the first drug and thus inmates may not be truly unconscious. They further propose that a single-drug alternative be considered for executions. They are asking that the Circuit Court send these issues back to a lower court to rule on them.

It seems unlikely that the 4th Circuit will have much sympathy with these arguments, and as long as the Supreme Court says that lethal injection is not cruel or unusual, these executions will continue.

Update

The State Attorney General's office is indicating that they would be open to considering the single-drug, single-injection method indicated above.

Supreme Court Stays Execution in Virginia

Today the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to stay the execution of Edward Nathaniel Bell while they review the claim that his lawyers did a poor job of representing him during the sentencing stage of his trial. In Virginia, there are two stages to a trial. The first determines guilt or innocence and the second determines the sentence in a guilty verdict is returned. During the second phase, prosecutors can introduce evidence that would tend toward a stiffer sentence--in this case, death--while the defense can introduce mitigating evidence.

Lawyers for Bell did not submit any evidence on his behalf, even though they had a psychologist review him. His new lawyers are claiming that this failure to offer mitigating evidence about his childhood and environment was prejudicial to the jury determining his sentence. As one jury member said, "[The jury was] looking for something mitigating, some reason not to sentence him to death, but . . . [we] were given nothing by his lawyers." The supreme court is reviewing whether or not the 4th Circuit Court was correct in rejecting this claim (Bell's petition to the Supreme Court is here).

Virginia has executed 98 people since the death penalty was re-instated in 1976. They have executed more people than every other state except Texas. We should urge Governor Tim Kaine to commute Bell's sentence to life in prison since there is every reason to believe that the jury would have done so had the evidence been presented.

Arrests not enough for China

While the Olympic torch works its way up Mount Everest, the Nepalese government arrested 500 people who were protesting China's human rights record, particularly as it pertains to Tibet. Most of the protesters were not held on charges but were released a few hours later. Apparently, this was not enough for China. The Chinese Ambassador publicly informed the government of Nepal that they should be more "severe" on protesters against China: "It is not enough to close down the Dalai Lama’s liaison office in Kathmandu but the government should adopt severe measure [sic] against those handful of Tibetans carrying out anti-China activities." In other words, detaining peaceful protesters doesn't please the Chinese government; only further and more desperate human rights violations will placate them.

This is an outrageous demand by the Chinese government, made all the more egregious by the public and unapologetic way in which it was delivered. China could hardly have been more clear: Arrest them and keep them behind bars; beat them or use anti-riot means to break up the peaceful protesters; do anything necessary to prevent anti-China protests; squelch their rights at all costs.

Amnesty International has long detailed human rights abuses in Nepal,and China (note China's abuses in Tibet in particular). Check their pages for more information.