Brazil has 2,100 confirmed cases of the coronavirus, the highest in any Latin American country to date. President Jair Bolsanaro has been widely criticised and accused of risking the lives of millions of Brazillians by shirking advice from experts and downplaying the severity of the coronavirus referring to it recently as “a little cold”. In … Read more →
The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) have been forced to temporarily suspend resettlement travel for refugees as a result of the travel disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Resettlement is the transfer of refugees from a country that has granted them asylum, to another State that has agreed to … Read more →
Hungary’s parliament will consider an emergency bill next week that would give prime minister Viktor Orbán sweeping powers to rule by decree, without a clear cut-off date. The bill seeks to extend indefinitely Hungary’s state of emergency, which was declared two weeks ago. Parliament would only be able to lift the state of emergency by … Read more →
An estimated 50,000 stateless people in Uzbekistan are set to acquire citizenship following the passing of a new law in the country. There are currently 97,346 documented stateless people in Uzbekistan, many are ethnic Uzbeks who fled Tajikistan’s civil war in the early 1990s. Statelessness in the country and across the wider region is largely … Read more →
The long awaited Windrush Lessons Learned Review was laid before the UK Parliament on Thursday 19 March, 2020. The damning independent report was produced by Wendy Williams, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary. The report identified that the Windrush scandal was “foreseeable and preventable”. It accused the Home Office of “ignorance and thoughtlessness” over race and … Read more →
Governments, journalists and medical officials are scrambling to provide the public with accurate and timely information about the novel coronavirus but those efforts are being undermined by the spread of medical misinformation and fake news. Amidst this, on 18th March, China decided to effectively expel journalists from three American newspapers in retaliation for restrictions on … Read more →
After more than 420 Russian academics, lawyers and writers published an open letter urging their countrymen to resist President Putin’s plans to remain in power for a further 16 years, over 18,000 people have signed it. The letter was published on 15th March, shortly before the country’s highest court endorsed a move by the Kremlin … Read more →
As countries around the world struggle to contain the Coronavirus pandemic, measures must consider human rights before they are taken. For instance, by taking drastic and what some have called draconian measures, China appears to have slowed down the coronavirus, but it has come at a high cost. “The case of Li Wenliang is a … Read more →
The 15th March marked the beginning of the 10th year of the Syrian war. The conflict has caused so many deaths on all sides but none more remembered than that of Alan Kurdi- the boy on the beach – who’s death came to symbolise the plight of all the Syrian refugees and the cost of … Read more →
On 12 March 2020, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) released a list of the 20 worst “digital predators” in 2020. The RSF list is made up of companies and governments that use digital technology to spy and harass journalists and which pose “a clear danger for freedom of opinion and expression, which is guaranteed by article … Read more →
