Browsed by
Category: Human rights/civil liberties

More Saudi brutality shows that MBS’s promises to Biden were a farce

More Saudi brutality shows that MBS’s promises to Biden were a farce

In an editorial, the Washington Post says: Salma al-Shehab, the mother of two young children, was studying for a PhD at the University of Leeds and took time off to go home to Saudi Arabia for a vacation. Ms. Shehab is a Shiite Muslim, a persecuted minority in the kingdom, and a women’s rights activist who spoke out on social media for the right of women to drive. Her vacation ended in prison. Saudi authorities detained Ms. Shehab in January…

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What Amnesty got wrong in Ukraine and why I had to resign

What Amnesty got wrong in Ukraine and why I had to resign

Oksana Pokalchuk writes: On Aug. 4, Amnesty International issued a report that accused the Ukrainian army of violating the laws of war by placing military bases close to civilian infrastructure. The report triggered a wave of public outrage worldwide and across Ukraine. For me, the report’s deepest flaw was how it contradicted its main objective: Far from protecting civilians, it further endangered them by giving Russia a justification to continue its indiscriminate attacks. That’s why I resigned as head of…

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The secret history of the U.S. government’s family-separation policy

The secret history of the U.S. government’s family-separation policy

Caitlin Dickerson writes: During the year and a half in which the U.S. government separated thousands of children from their parents, the Trump administration’s explanations for what was happening were deeply confusing, and on many occasions—it was clear even then—patently untrue. I’m one of the many reporters who covered this story in real time. Despite the flurry of work that we produced to fill the void of information, we knew that the full truth about how our government had reached…

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‘Absolute evil’: Inside the Russian prison camp where dozens of Ukrainians burned to death

‘Absolute evil’: Inside the Russian prison camp where dozens of Ukrainians burned to death

The Observer reports: Screams from soldiers being tortured, overflowing cells, inhuman conditions, a regime of intimidation and murder. Inedible gruel, no communication with the outside world, and days marked off with a home-made calendar written on a box of tea. This, according to a prisoner who was there, is what conditions are like inside Olenivka, the notorious detention centre outside Donetsk where dozens of Ukrainian soldiers burned to death in a horrific episode late last month while in Russian captivity….

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Why the defense of abortion in Kansas is so powerful

Why the defense of abortion in Kansas is so powerful

Sarah Smarsh writes: Lines of Kansas voters, resolute in the August sun and 100-degree heat, stretched beyond the doors of polling sites and wrapped around buildings on Tuesday to cast ballots in a primary election. A few suffered heat exhaustion. Firefighters passed out bottles of water. When polls closed at 7 p.m. Central time, many were still in line and legally entitled to get their turn. The Wichita Eagle reported that one Wichita woman cast the final vote at her…

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How abortion rights supporters won in conservative Kansas

How abortion rights supporters won in conservative Kansas

The New York Times reports: Going into Election Day, many observers believed the outcome of the referendum would be determined in increasingly Democratic areas like the Kansas City suburbs — that is, by whether enough voters turned out there to compensate for the very conservative lean of the rest of the state. But abortion opponents did surprisingly poorly even in the reddest places. Consider far western Kansas, a rural region along the Colorado border that votes overwhelmingly Republican. In Hamilton…

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States opposed to abortion are more willing to let mothers and children die

States opposed to abortion are more willing to let mothers and children die

The New York Times reports: In Mississippi, which brought the abortion case that ended Roe v. Wade before the Supreme Court, Gov. Tate Reeves vowed that the state would now “take every step necessary to support mothers and children.” Today, however, Mississippi fares poorly on just about any measure of that goal. Its infant and maternal mortality rates are among the worst in the nation. State leaders have rejected the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion, leaving an estimated 43,000 women…

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How preventing unwanted pregnancies can help on climate

How preventing unwanted pregnancies can help on climate

Robert N. Proctor and Londa Schiebinger write: Every year, some 36 billion tons of anthropogenic carbon enter the atmosphere, mainly as a result of burning fossil fuels. With 8 billion people on Earth, this means that each human adds an average of 4.5 tons of carbon into the air annually. And wealthy people have a far bigger footprint than the poor — by a couple orders of magnitude. Too often ignored in devising solutions to slow global warming is the…

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For Biden, Saudi crown prince now looks more like pal than pariah

For Biden, Saudi crown prince now looks more like pal than pariah

Karen Attiah writes: President Biden just fist-bumped a man who has my friend and colleague’s blood on his hands. It’s not a stretch to say that when Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman began his ascent to power in 2015, he made his mark through fear and repression. He launched a bloody war in Yemen, kidnapped the Lebanese prime minister, blockaded Qatar, imprisoned critics and, most notoriously, orchestrated the operation that murdered Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi, according to a…

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Ex-Khashoggi lawyer sentenced to three years in prison by UAE court, state media says

Ex-Khashoggi lawyer sentenced to three years in prison by UAE court, state media says

CNN reports: US citizen Asim Ghafoor, the former lawyer of murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi, was sentenced by a court in the United Arab Emirates to three years in prison, state news WAM reported Saturday. The Abu Dhabi Money Laundering Court convicted Ghafoor of committing “two crimes of tax evasion and money laundering related to a tax evasion operation in his country and sentenced him to three years in prison and a fine of three million dirhams [$US 816,748], with deportation…

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After Biden confronts MBS about murdering Khashoggi, Saudi prince gives whataboutist retort

After Biden confronts MBS about murdering Khashoggi, Saudi prince gives whataboutist retort

CNN reports: Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, hit back at Joe Biden after the US President confronted him about the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi during a meeting between the two leaders on Friday, according to a source familiar with the matter. In the meeting, Bin Salman, also known as MBS, denied responsibility for the killing of Khashoggi at the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate. Biden said he inidicated that he disagreed with MBS, based…

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Biden to visit a Saudi Arabia that is closer to Russia than ever

Biden to visit a Saudi Arabia that is closer to Russia than ever

The Wall Street Journal reports: As President Biden prepares to visit Saudi Arabia, the oil-rich kingdom is closer than ever to Russia and has no plans to disengage from Moscow or help Washington by pumping more crude, Saudi officials said. The burgeoning partnership between Russia and the Saudis, rooted in their vast petroleum production capacity, has upended an oil-for-security arrangement between Washington and Riyadh that has lasted nearly half a century and been a central fixture of the post-World War…

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States with abortion bans risk paying an economic price

States with abortion bans risk paying an economic price

The New York Times reports: As a group of conservative states enacted severe abortion restrictions last year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois sent letters to a handful of corporate executives with close ties to Texas. Mr. Pritzker, a Democrat, urged executives to rethink basing their companies in “a state that strips its residents of their dignity.” Most workers, he wrote, did not want to live under a rigid abortion ban. There was no immediate response to his overture. Companies thriving…

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Biden defends planned visit to Saudi Arabia as U.S. judge asks whether crown prince should get immunity

Biden defends planned visit to Saudi Arabia as U.S. judge asks whether crown prince should get immunity

Reuters reports: President Joe Biden on Saturday defended his decision to travel to Saudi Arabia saying human rights would be on his agenda as he gave a preview of a trip on which he aims to reset ties with the crown prince, who he previously denounced as a pariah. Biden will hold bilateral talks with Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz and his leadership team, including Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on his visit to the Middle East next week. The…

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Women’s rights have suffered a grim setback. But history is still on our side

Women’s rights have suffered a grim setback. But history is still on our side

Rebecca Solnit writes: As it happened, I was in Edinburgh the day Roe v Wade was overturned, and the next day I caught a train back to London and did what I usually do when I get anywhere near King’s Cross station. I took the short walk to the old St Pancras churchyard to visit the tombstone of the great feminist ancestor Mary Wollstonecraft, author of that first great feminist manifesto A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. To be…

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Pelosi receives communion in Vatican amid abortion debate

Pelosi receives communion in Vatican amid abortion debate

The Associated Press reports: U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi met with Pope Francis on Wednesday and received Communion during a papal Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica, witnesses said, despite her position in support of abortion rights. Pelosi attended the morning Mass marking the feasts of St. Peter and St. Paul, during which Francis bestowed the woolen pallium stole on newly consecrated archbishops. She was seated in a VIP diplomatic section of the basilica and received Communion along with the rest…

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