industryterm:criminal law

  • Murder at #Grenfell ?

    Prosecutors have indicated a range of possible charges in response to the #Grenfell_Tower fire, but why have they failed to suggest a charge of murder? Alan Norrie makes the case for a re-think, arguing that criminal law could hold those responsible to account.


    https://lacuna.org.uk/justice/murder-at-grenfell
    #homicide #justice #UK #Angleterre #incendie

  • The guy who made a tool to track women in porn videos is sorry - MIT Technology Review
    https://www.technologyreview.com/s/613607/facial-recognition-porn-database-privacy-gdpr-data-collection-poli

    An anonymous programmer based in Germany caused outrage this week for supposedly using face-recognition technology to “catch” women who had appeared in porn. He says he’s since deleted the project and all its data, but that’s not an act of altruism. Such a project would have violated European privacy law anyway, though it would have been okay elsewhere.

    There is still no proof that the global system—which allegedly matched women’s social-media photos with images from sites like Pornhub—actually worked, or even existed. Still, the technology is possible and would have had awful consequences. “It’s going to kill people,” says Carrie A. Goldberg, an attorney who specializes in sexual privacy violations and author of the forthcoming book Nobody’s Victim: Fighting Psychos, Stalkers, Pervs, and Trolls. “Some of my most viciously harassed clients have been people who did porn, oftentimes one time in their life and sometimes nonconsensually [because] they were duped into it. Their lives have been ruined because there’s this whole culture of incels that for a hobby expose women who’ve done porn and post about them online and dox them.” (Incels, or “involuntary celibates,” are a misogynistic online subculture of men who claim they are denied sex by women.)

    The European Union’s GDPR privacy law prevents this kind of situation. Though the programmer—who posted about the project on the Chinese social network Weibo—originally insisted everything was fine because he didn’t make the information public, just collecting the data is illegal if the women didn’t consent, according to Börge Seeger, a data protection expert and partner at German law firm Neuwerk. These laws apply to any information from EU residents, so they would have held even if the programmer weren’t living in the EU.

    Under GDPR, personal data (and especially sensitive biometric data) needs to be collected for specific and legitimate purposes. Scraping data to figure out if someone once appeared in porn is not that. And if the programmer had charged money to access this information, he could have faced up to three years in prison under German criminal law, adds Seeger.

    Et toujours cette logique de l’excuse qui semble Zurkerbériser un grand nombre de programmeurs.

    Reached last night via Weibo, the programmer (who did not give his real name) insisted that the technology was real, but acknowledged that it raised legal issues. He’s sorry to have caused trouble. But he’s not the only one able to build this technology, or the only one interested in using it for dangerous purposes. Policymakers concerned with global privacy law need to start thinking ahead.

    #Reconnaissance_faciale #Données_provées #Porno

  • UN envoy fears ’new crisis’ for Rohingya Muslims if moved to remote Bangladesh island

    A United Nations human rights investigator on #Myanmar has voiced deep concern at Bangladesh’s plan to relocate 23,000 Rohingya refugees to a remote island, saying it may not be habitable and could create a “new crisis”.

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-12/un-envoy-fears-new-crisis-for-rohingya-muslims/10890932
    #réfugiés #îles #île #Bangladesh #rohingya #réfugiés_rohingya #asile #migrations #Birmanie

    • Polly Pallister-Wilkins signale sur twitter (https://twitter.com/PollyWilkins/status/1105366496291753984) le lien à faire avec le concept de #penal_humanitarianism (#humanitarisme_pénal)

      Introducing the New Themed Series on Penal Humanitarianism

      Humanitarianism is many things to many people. It is an ethos, an array of sentiments and moral principles, an imperative to intervene, and a way of ‘doing good’ by bettering the human condition through targeting suffering. It is also a form of governance. In Border Criminologies’ new themed series, we look closer at the intersections of humanitarian reason with penal governance, and particularly the transfer of penal power beyond the nation state.

      The study of humanitarian sentiments in criminology has mainly focused on how these sensibilities have ‘humanized’ or ‘civilized’ punishment. As such, the notion of humanism in the study of crime, punishment, and justice is associated with human rights implementation in penal practices and with normative bulwark against penal populism; indeed, with a ‘softening’ of penal power.

      This themed series takes a slightly different approach. While non-punitive forces have a major place in the humanitarian sensibility, we explore how humanitarianism is put to work on and for penal power. In doing so, we look at how muscular forms of power – expulsion, punishment, war – are justified and extended through the invocation of humanitarian reason.

      In the following post, Mary Bosworth revisits themes from her 2017 article and addresses current developments on UK programmes delivered overseas to ‘manage migration’. She shows that through an expansion of these programmes, migration management and crime governance has not only elided, but ‘criminal justice investment appears to have become a humanitarian goal in its own right’. Similarly concerned with what happens at the border, Katja Franko and Helene O.I. Gundhus observed the paradox and contradictions between humanitarian ideals in the performative work of governmental discourses, and the lack of concern for migrants’ vulnerability in their article on Frontex operations.

      However, in their blog post they caution against a one-dimensional understanding of humanitarianism as legitimizing policy and the status quo. It may cloud from view agency and resistance in practice, and, they argue, ‘the dialectics of change arising from the moral discomfort of doing border work’. The critical, difficult question lurking beneath their post asks what language is left if not that of the sanctity of the human, and of humanity.

      Moving outside the European territorial border, Eva Magdalena Stambøl however corroborates the observation that penal power takes on a humanitarian rationale when it travels. Sharing with us some fascinating findings from her current PhD work on EU’s crime control in West Africa, and, more specifically, observations from her fieldwork in Niger, she addresses how the rationale behind the EU’s fight against ‘migrant smugglers’ in Niger is framed as a humanitarian obligation. In the process, however, the EU projects penal power beyond Europe and consolidates power in the ‘host’ state, in this case, Niger.

      Moving beyond nation-state borders and into the ‘international’, ‘global’, and ‘cosmopolitan’, my own research demonstrates how the power to punish is particularly driven by humanitarian reason when punishment is delinked from its association with the national altogether. I delve into the field of international criminal justice and show how it is animated by a humanitarian impetus to ‘do something’ about the suffering of distant others, and how, in particular, the human rights movement have been central to the fight against impunity for international crimes. Through the articulation of moral outrage, humanitarian sensibilities have found their expression in a call for criminal punishment to end impunity for violence against distant others. However, building on an ethnographic study of international criminal justice, which is forthcoming in the Clarendon Studies in Criminology published by Oxford University Press, I demonstrate how penal power remains deeply embedded in structural relations of (global) power, and that it functions to expand and consolidate these global inequalities further. Removed from the checks and balances of democratic institutions, I suggest that penal policies may be more reliant on categorical representations of good and evil, civilization and barbarity, humanity and inhumanity, as such representational dichotomies seem particularly apt to delineate the boundaries of cosmopolitan society.

      In the next post I co-wrote with Anette Bringedal Houge, we address the fight against sexual violence in conflict as penal humanitarianism par excellence, building on our study published in Law & Society Review. While attention towards conflict-related sexual violence is critically important, we take issue with the overwhelming dominance of criminal law solutions on academic, policy, and activist agendas, as the fight against conflict-related sexual violence has become the fight against impunity. We observe that the combination of a victim-oriented justification for international justice and graphic reproductions of the violence victims suffer, are central in the advocacy and policy fields responding to this particular type of violence. Indeed, we hold that it epitomizes how humanitarianism facilitates the expansion of penal power but take issue with what it means for how we address this type of violence.

      In the final post of this series, Teresa Degenhardt offers a discomforting view on the dark side of virtue as she reflects on how penal power is reassembled outside the state and within the international, under the aegis of human rights, humanitarianism, and the Responsibility to Protect-doctrine. Through the case of Libya, she claims that the global north, through various international interventions, ‘established its jurisdiction over local events’. Through what she calls a ‘pedagogy of liberal institutions’, Degenhardt argues that ‘the global north shaped governance through sovereign structures at the local level while re-articulating sovereign power at the global level’, in an argument that, albeit on a different scale, parallels that of Stambøl.

      The posts in this themed series raise difficult questions about the nature of penal power, humanitarianism, and the state. Through these diverse examples, each post demonstrates that while the nation state continues to operate as an essential territorial site of punishment, the power to punish has become increasingly complex. This challenges the epistemological privilege of the nation state framework in the study of punishment.

      However, while this thematic series focuses on how penal power travels through humanitarianism, we should, as Franko and Gundhus indicate, be careful of dismissing humanitarian sensibilities and logics as fraudulent rhetoric for a will to power. Indeed, we might – or perhaps should – proceed differently, given that in these times of pushback against international liberalism and human rights, and resurgent religion and nationalism, humanitarian reason is losing traction. Following an unmasking of humanitarianism as a logic of governance by both critical (leftist) scholars and rightwing populism alike, perhaps there is a need to revisit the potency of humanitarianism as normative bulwark against muscular power, and to carve out the boundaries of a humanitarian space of resistance, solidarity and dignity within a criminology of humanitarianism. Such a task can only be done through empirical and meticulous analysis of the uses and abuses of humanitarianism as an ethics of care.

      https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/research-subject-groups/centre-criminology/centreborder-criminologies/blog/2019/03/introducing-new

    • Most Rohingya refugees refuse to go to #Bhasan_Char island – Xchange survey

      Nearly all Rohingya refugees asked about relocating to a silt island in the Bay of Bengal refused to go, a new survey reveals.

      According to a new report published by the migration research and data analysis outfit Xchange Foundation, the vast majority of their respondents (98.4%) ‘categorically refused’ to go to Bhasan Char, while 98.7% of respondents were aware of the plan.

      From the over 1,000 respondents who expressed their opinion, concerns were raised about their safety, security and placement in a location further from Myanmar.

      Decades long limbo

      The findings obtained by the recent Xchange Foundation Report entitled ‘WE DO NOT BELIEVE MYANMAR!,’ chart the protracted living conditions and uncertain future of almost three quarters of a million recent Rohingya refugees living in Cox’s Bazar region of Bangladesh. Accumulated together with previous generations of Rohingya, there are approximately 1.2m living across over a dozen camps in the region.

      This is the sixth survey carried out by the Xchange Foundation on the experiences and conditions facing Rohingya refugees.

      The region has been host to Rohingya refugees for just over the last three decades with the recent crackdown and massacre by the Myanmar military in August 2017 forcing whole families and communities to flee westward to Bangladesh.

      While discussions between the Bangladeshi and Myanmar government over the repatriation of recent Rohingya refugees have been plagued by inertia and lukewarm commitment, the Bangladeshi government has been planning on relocating over 100,000 Rohingya refugees to the silt island of Bhasan Char in the Bay of Bengal. This process was expected to take place in the middle of April, according to a Bangladeshi government minister.

      State Minister for Disaster and Relief Management Md Enamur Rahman, told the Dhaka Tribune ‘Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has instructed last week to complete the relocation 23,000 Rohingya families to Bhashan Char by Apr 15.’

      Is it safe?

      Numerous humanitarian organisations including Human Rights Watch, have expressed their concerns over the government’s proposals, saying there are few assurances that Rohingya refugees will be safe or their access to free movement, health, education and employment will be secured.

      HRW reported in March that the Bangladeshi authorities had issued assurances that there wouldn’t be forcible relocation but that the move was designed to relieve pressure on the refugee camps and settlements across Cox’s Bazar.

      The move would see the relocation of 23,000 Rohingya families to a specially constructed complex of 1,440 housing blocks, equipped with flood and cyclone shelter and flood walls. The project is estimated to have cost the Bangladeshi government over €250 million.

      To prepare the island, joint efforts of British engineering and environmental hydraulics company HR Wallingford and the Chinese construction company Sinohydro, have been responsible for the construction of a 13km flood embankment which encircles the island.

      When asked by the Xchange survey team one Male Rohingya of 28 years old said, ‘We saw videos of Bhasan Char; it’s not a safe place and also during the raining season it floods.’ An older female of 42 said, ‘I’m afraid to go to Bhasan Char, because I think there is a risk to my life and my children.’

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM8wlvLddnw

      Threat of flooding

      Bhasan Char or ‘Thengar Char,’ didn’t exist 20 years ago.

      The island is understood to have formed through gradual silt deposits forming a island around 30km from the Bangladeshi mainland. Until now, human activity on the island has been very minimal with it being largely used for cattle and only reachable by a 3.5 hour boat trip.

      But, the island is subject to the tides. It is reported that the island loses around 5,000 square acres of its territory from low to high tide (15,000 – 10,000 acres (54 square kilometres) respectively).

      This is worsened by the threat of the monsoon and cyclone season which according to HRW’s testimony can result in parts of the island eroding. This is recorded as being around one kilometre a year, ABC News reports.

      Golam Mahabub Sarwar of the Bangladeshi Ministry of Land, says that a high tide during a strong cyclone could completely flood the island. This is exemplifed by the 6 metre tidal range which is seen on fellow islands.

      New crisis

      The UN Envoy Yanghee Lee has warned that the Bangladesh government goes through with the relocation, it could risk creating a ‘new crisis’.

      Lee warned that she was uncertain of the island was ‘truly habitable’ for the over 23,000 families expected to live there.

      The Special Rapporteur to Myanmar made the comments to the Human Rights Council in March, saying that if the relocations were made without consent from the people it would affect, it had, ‘potential to create a new crisis.’

      She stressed that before refugees are relocated, the United Nations, ‘must be allowed to conduct a full technical and humanitarian assessment’ as well as allowing the beneficiary communities to visit and decide if it is right for them.

      https://www.newsbook.com.mt/artikli/2019/05/07/most-rohingya-refugees-refuse-to-go-to-bhasan-char-island-xchange-survey/?lang=en

    • Rohingya Refugees to Move to Flood-Prone Bangladesh Island

      Thousands of Rohingya living in Bangladesh refugee camps have agreed to move to an island in the #Bay_of_Bengal, officials said Sunday, despite fears the site is prone to flooding.

      Dhaka has long wanted to move 100,000 refugees to the muddy silt islet, saying it would take pressure off the overcrowded border camps where almost a million Rohingya live.

      Some 740,000 Rohingya fled Myanmar in August 2017 in the face of a military crackdown, joining 200,000 refugees already in makeshift tent settlements at Cox’s Bazar.

      Relocations begin soon

      Bangladesh’s refugee commissioner, Mahbub Alam, said officials overseeing the relocation would be posted to #Bhashan_Char_island in the next few days.

      Approximately 6,000-7,000 refugees have expressed their willingness to be relocated to Bhashan Char, Alam told AFP from Cox’s Bazar, adding that “the number is rising.”

      He did not say when the refugees would be moved, but a senior Navy officer involved in building facilities on the island said it could start by December, with some 500 refugees sent daily.

      Bangladesh had been planning since last year to relocate Rohingya to the desolate flood-prone site, which is an hour by boat from the mainland.

      Rights groups have warned the island, which emerged from the sea only about two decades ago, might not be able to withstand violent storms during the annual monsoon season.

      In the past half-century, powerful cyclones have killed hundreds of thousands of people in the Meghna river estuary where the island is located.

      Rohingya leaders would be taken to Bhashan Char to view the facilities and living conditions, Alam said.

      Safety facilities built on the island include a 9-feet (3 meter) high embankment along its perimeter to keep out tidal surges during cyclones, and a warehouse to store months’ worth of rations, he added.

      Overcrowding in camp

      Rohingya father-of-four Nur Hossain, 50, said he and his family agreed to relocate to #Bhashan_Char after they were shown video footage of the shelters.

      “I have agreed to go. The camp here (at Leda) is very overcrowded. There are food and housing problems,” the 50-year-old told AFP.

      There was no immediate comment from the U.N., although Bangladeshi officials said they expect a delegation would visit the island in the next few weeks.

      https://www.voanews.com/south-central-asia/rohingya-refugees-move-flood-prone-bangladesh-island

    • Bangladesh : des réfugiés rohingyas acceptent de partir sur une île

      Des milliers de Rohingyas vivant dans des camps de réfugiés au Bangladesh ont accepté de partir pour une île isolée du golfe du Bengale, ont annoncé dimanche les autorités, en dépit des risques d’inondations.

      Dacca a depuis longtemps fait part de son intention de transférer 100.000 réfugiés musulmans rohingyas des camps de réfugiés surpeuplés, près de la frontière birmane, vers un îlot de vase boueux et isolé du golfe du Bengale.

      Le gouvernement du Bangladesh y voit une solution pour résoudre le problème des camps de réfugiés surpeuplés où vivent près d’un million de Rohingyas.

      Environ 740.000 Rohingyas ont fui la Birmanie pour le Bangladesh en 2017 pour échapper à une répression militaire massive. Ils ont rejoint les quelque 200.000 réfugiés vivant déjà dans le district bangladais frontalier de Cox’s Bazar (sud-est).

      Le commissaire bangladais aux réfugiés, Mahbub Alam, a indiqué que des fonctionnaires seront détachés, dans les prochains jours, afin de superviser cette installation.

      « Environ 6.000 à 7.000 réfugiés ont déjà exprimé leur volonté d’être réinstallés à Bhashan Char », a déclaré Alam à l’AFP depuis Cox’s Bazar, affirmant que « leur nombre est en augmentation ».

      Il n’a cependant pas donné de chiffres sur le nombre de réfugiés qui seront ainsi déplacés.

      Selon un officier supérieur de la marine qui participe à la construction d’installations sur l’île, cette opération pourrait débuter en décembre et environ 500 réfugiés seraient envoyés quotidiennement sur cette île située à une heure de bateau de la terre ferme la plus proche.

      Des groupes de défense des droits affirment que Bhashan Char est susceptible d’être submergée lors des moussons.

      Au cours des cinquante dernières années, de puissants cyclones ont fait des centaines de milliers de morts dans l’estuaire de la rivière Meghna, où l’île se situe.

      Des responsables rohingyas seront conduits à Bhashan Char afin d’y découvrir les installations et leurs conditions de vie, a affirmé M. Alam.

      Des responsables locaux ont assuré qu’une digue de trois mètres a été construite autour de l’île pour la protéger de la montée des eaux en cas de cyclone.

      Nur Hossain, un réfugié rohingya, père de quatre enfants, a déclaré que sa famille et lui ont accepté de partir pour Bhashan Char après avoir vu des images vidéo des abris.

      « Le camp ici (à Leda) est très surpeuplé. Il y a des problèmes de nourriture et de logement », a déclaré à l’AFP cet homme de 50 ans.

      L’ONU n’a jusqu’à présent pas fait de déclaration à ce sujet. Des responsables bangladais ont cependant déclaré qu’une délégation des Nations unies se rendra sur l’île au cours des prochaines semaines.

      https://www.courrierinternational.com/depeche/bangladesh-des-refugies-rohingyas-acceptent-de-partir-sur-une

    • Rohingya: il Bangladesh vuole trasferirli su un’isola sperduta e pericolosa

      Le violenze dell’esercito del Myanmar avevano costretto centinaia di migliaia di Rohingya a rifugiarsi in Bangladesh nel 2017. E quando ancora un rientro nelle loro terre d’origine sembra lontano, Dacca cerca di mandarne 100 mila su un’isola remota e pericolosa nel Golfo del Bengala

      Non sono bastate le violenze dell’esercito del Myanmar e degli estremisti buddisti, che nell’agosto 2017 hanno costretto centinaia di migliaia di Rohingya a rifugiarsi in Bangladesh. E non bastano neanche le condizioni precarie in cui vivono nei fatiscenti campi profughi gestiti da Dacca. Il dramma di questa popolazione, che secondo le Nazioni Unite è una delle minoranze più perseguitate al mondo, non sembra avere fine.

      La scorsa settimana il governo del Bangladesh ha annunciato che alla fine di novembre inizierà il trasferimento di 100 mila rifugiati Rohingya a Bhasan Char, una remota isola nel Golfo del Bengala. Per le autorità questa mossa sarebbe necessaria a causa del «disperato sovraffollamento» nei campi di Cox’s Bazar, una città al confine con la ex-Birmania, che ora ospita oltre 700 mila sfollati. Ma la scelta della nuova collocazione ha sollevato una serie di preoccupazioni per la salute e la sicurezza dei Rohingya che verranno trasferiti.

      Rohinghya in Bangladesh: l’isola in mezzo al nulla

      Yanghee Lee, relatore speciale delle Nazioni Unite sulla situazione dei diritti umani in Myanmar, che ha visitato l’isola nel gennaio 2019, ha espresso seri dubbi e preoccupazioni sul fatto che «l’isola sia davvero abitabile». Bhasan Char, infatti, è soggetta frequentemente ad inondazioni e cicloni. Lee ha anche avvertito che «un trasferimento mal pianificato e senza il consenso degli stessi rifugiati, creerebbe una nuova crisi per i Rohingya».

      Il governo di Dacca ha spiegato che tutte le ricollocazioni a Bhasan Char saranno rigorosamente volontarie e che oltre 7 mila rifugiati hanno già accettato di trasferirsi. Non sappiamo, però, se questi Rohingya siano effettivamente consapevoli dell’isolamento e della pericolosità del contesto in cui andranno a vivere. L’isola, infatti, è a ore di navigazione dalla terraferma e le condizioni del mare non sono delle migliori. Durante il periodo dei monsoni i pochi residenti sono bloccati in mezzo alle acque per lunghi periodi.

      Rohingya a rischio sussistenza

      Sebbene le autorità abbiano migliorato le infrastrutture a Bhasan Char, per cercare di contrastare i rischi di inondazioni e costruito più di 1.400 edifici per ospitare gli sfollati, l’isola non ha un adeguato sistema di agricoltura e le attività commerciali sono quasi inesistenti. Inoltre vanno aggiunte le difficoltà per quanto riguarda l’istruzione e la sanità. Problematiche già presenti nei campi di Cox’s Bazar, che nei mesi scorsi avevano anche lanciato l’allarme del radicalismo islamico.

      Nell’ultimo periodo, infatti, nelle strutture dove hanno trovato rifugio i Rohingya scappati dal Myanmar sono proliferate centinaia di scuole coraniche gestite da Hefazat-e-Islam, un gruppo estremista locale fondato nel 2010, che in passato ha organizzato numerose proteste di piazza. Questa organizzazione, finanziata da alcuni Paesi del Golfo, ha di fatto riempito il vuoto educativo imposto da Dacca, che ha vietato alla minoranza musulmana di frequentare gli istituti locali.

      Chi sono i Rohingya e perché sono perseguitati

      I Rohingya sono un popolo invisibile. Di fede musulmana, dall’ottavo secolo vivono nel Nord-Ovest del Myanmar, ma non vengono considerati ufficialmente un’etnia dal governo. Proprio per questo non hanno alcun diritto e la maggior parte di loro non ha cittadinanza nel paese guidato dal premio Nobel per la pace Aung San Suu Kyi. Senza il diritto di avere cure mediche e istruzione, non possono possedere nulla e non possono avere più di due figli.

      Si è tornato a parlare della loro drammatica situazione nell’agosto di due anni fa, a causa delle persecuzioni dei militari birmani, che li hanno costretti ad un esodo nel vicino Bangladesh. Le poche testimonianze di prima mano arrivate in quei giorni del 2017 parlavano di brutalità inaudite e quotidiane: centinaia di morti, stupri, mine, sparizioni, villaggi dati alle fiamme e torture.

      Rohingya: il difficile ritorno in Myanmar

      Negli ultimi due anni, il governo del Myanmar ha negato la sua colpevolezza per le atrocità commesse e ha vietato alle organizzazioni e agli osservatori internazionali, incluso il relatore speciale delle Nazioni Unite Lee, di accedere nello stato Rakhine, dove la maggior parte dei Rohingya viveva prima dello spargimento di sangue del 2017.

      Proprio per queste ragioni, un ritorno in sicurezza in patria per la popolazione musulmana sembra, per ora, molto difficile. Lo stesso Lee, a settembre, ha dichiarato che il Paese della Suu Kyi «non ha fatto nulla per smantellare il sistema di violenza e persecuzione contro i Rohingya».

      https://www.osservatoriodiritti.it/2019/10/31/rohingya-myanmar-bangladesh-perseguitati

    • Rohingya relocation to #Bhashan_Char to begin next week

      The first batch of Rohingyas would be shifted to Bhashan Char next week from overcrowded camps in Cox’s Bazar as part of the Bangladesh government’s plan to relocate 100,000 Rohingyas temporarily to the island until permanent repatriation to their homeland in Myanmar.

      “The exact date for shifting the first batch of Rohingyas to Bhashan Char has not been fixed yet but preparations have been taken to send the first group next week. First, a small group of Rohingyas will be relocated to the island and the process will continue,” said #Commissioner_of_Rohingya_Refugee_Repatriation_Commission (#RRRC) and Additional Secretary Shah Rezwan Hayat.

      These displaced Rohingya people are believed to have become a security threat to regional peace and the host communities as many of them have got involved in criminal activities, and drug and arms trading, reports UNB.

      Seeking support from big countries to find a durable solution to the Rohingya crisis, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen on October 7 last said, “We’ve long been saying that uncertainty might be created in the region if the Rohingya crisis is not resolved."

      The government has information that trafficking of girls and children was taking place and traffickers share images of girls and children through smartphones using high-speed internet as part of trafficking, he said.

      Nur Mohammad Shikdar, general secretary of Ukhiya Rohingya Repatriation Movement Committee, said: “The relocation process could have been started long ago had a vested quarter of them not gone against the move at the provocation of some international organisations.”

      He stressed the need for implementation of the government plan to relocate 100,000 Rohingyas to Bhashan Char.

      Visiting the camps and talking to some Rohingyas, the UNB correspondent found a greater number of Rohingya people willing to be shifted to Bhashan Char due to uncertainty over their repatriation to their homeland.

      A resident and also leader of a shade in Kutupalong Rohingya Camp said, wishing anonymity, “They’re going through unimaginable suffering as some Rohingya criminals torture them. They want to return to their own country and are also ready to be shifted to Bhashan Char and stay there until the repatriation begins.”

      As part of the government move to relocate Rohingyas to Bhashan Char, a delegation of Rohingya leaders along with the representatives of 22 local and international NGOs have visited Bhashan Char recently.

      Saiful Islam Kalim, executive director of local a NGO, said, “The propaganda against Bhashan Char is totally false and fabricated. I myself visited Bhashan Char. Had I not visited the island I might have been confused with the propaganda. The government has created a wonderful environment there for Rohingyas where many NGOs have expressed their keenness to work with Rohingyas.”

      There is a lack of a conducive environment in Myanmar and two repatriation attempts have failed as Rohingyas are not feeling comfortable with the environment in Rakhine.

      Bangladesh urged the global community to convince Myanmar to bring changes in Rakhine and implement the repatriation arrangements.

      Bangladesh is now hosting over 1.1 million Rohingyas and most of them have entered the country since August 25, 2017.

      Bangladesh and Myanmar signed a repatriation deal on November 23, 2017.

      On January 16, 2018, Bangladesh and Myanmar inked a document on “Physical Arrangement”, which was supposed to facilitate the return of Rohingyas to their homeland. But no Rohingya has been repatriated so far.

      https://www.thefinancialexpress.com.bd/national/rohingya-relocation-to-bhashan-char-to-begin-next-week-16067

    • Rohingya relocation to #Bhashan_Char to begin next week

      The first batch of Rohingyas would be shifted to Bhashan Char next week from overcrowded camps in Cox’s Bazar as part of the Bangladesh government’s plan to relocate 100,000 Rohingyas temporarily to the island until permanent repatriation to their homeland in Myanmar.

      “The exact date for shifting the first batch of Rohingyas to Bhashan Char has not been fixed yet but preparations have been taken to send the first group next week. First, a small group of Rohingyas will be relocated to the island and the process will continue,” said #Commissioner_of_Rohingya_Refugee_Repatriation_Commission (#RRRC) and Additional Secretary Shah Rezwan Hayat.

      These displaced Rohingya people are believed to have become a security threat to regional peace and the host communities as many of them have got involved in criminal activities, and drug and arms trading, reports UNB.

      Seeking support from big countries to find a durable solution to the Rohingya crisis, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen on October 7 last said, “We’ve long been saying that uncertainty might be created in the region if the Rohingya crisis is not resolved."

      The government has information that trafficking of girls and children was taking place and traffickers share images of girls and children through smartphones using high-speed internet as part of trafficking, he said.

      Nur Mohammad Shikdar, general secretary of Ukhiya Rohingya Repatriation Movement Committee, said: “The relocation process could have been started long ago had a vested quarter of them not gone against the move at the provocation of some international organisations.”

      He stressed the need for implementation of the government plan to relocate 100,000 Rohingyas to Bhashan Char.

      Visiting the camps and talking to some Rohingyas, the UNB correspondent found a greater number of Rohingya people willing to be shifted to Bhashan Char due to uncertainty over their repatriation to their homeland.

      A resident and also leader of a shade in Kutupalong Rohingya Camp said, wishing anonymity, “They’re going through unimaginable suffering as some Rohingya criminals torture them. They want to return to their own country and are also ready to be shifted to Bhashan Char and stay there until the repatriation begins.”

      As part of the government move to relocate Rohingyas to Bhashan Char, a delegation of Rohingya leaders along with the representatives of 22 local and international NGOs have visited Bhashan Char recently.

      Saiful Islam Kalim, executive director of local a NGO, said, “The propaganda against Bhashan Char is totally false and fabricated. I myself visited Bhashan Char. Had I not visited the island I might have been confused with the propaganda. The government has created a wonderful environment there for Rohingyas where many NGOs have expressed their keenness to work with Rohingyas.”

      There is a lack of a conducive environment in Myanmar and two repatriation attempts have failed as Rohingyas are not feeling comfortable with the environment in Rakhine.

      Bangladesh urged the global community to convince Myanmar to bring changes in Rakhine and implement the repatriation arrangements.

      Bangladesh is now hosting over 1.1 million Rohingyas and most of them have entered the country since August 25, 2017.

      Bangladesh and Myanmar signed a repatriation deal on November 23, 2017.

      On January 16, 2018, Bangladesh and Myanmar inked a document on “Physical Arrangement”, which was supposed to facilitate the return of Rohingyas to their homeland. But no Rohingya has been repatriated so far.

      https://www.thefinancialexpress.com.bd/national/rohingya-relocation-to-bhashan-char-to-begin-next-week-16067

  • Israel releases PFLP leading member Khalida Jarrar
    Feb. 28, 2019 12:25 P.M. (Updated : Feb. 28, 2019 12:25 P.M.)
    http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?ID=782702

    JENIN (Ma’an) — The Israeli authorities released leading member of the PFLP and former Palestinian lawmaker, Khalida Jarrar, early Thursday, after being held under administrative detention for 20 months.

    Jarrar was released at the Salem Israeli military checkpoint, in the northern occupied West Bank district of Jenin, in the early morning hours to prevent family and activists from organizing a welcome ceremony for her.

    Israeli forces had detained Jarrar on July 2nd, 2017, a year after her release, and confiscated her personal belongings including a computer and a mobile phone; her detention was renewed four times.

    Jarrar, a leading member of the PFLP, deputy at the PLC (Palestinian Legislative Council), heads the PLC’s prisoners’ committee and acts as the Palestinian representative in the Council of Europe, an international organization promoting human rights and democracy around the world, was previously detained in 2015 and had spent 14 months in Israeli jails.

    #Khalida_Jarrar

    • Israël libère une députée palestinienne après vingt mois de détention
      Khalida Jarrar avait été arrêtée en 2017 pour des activités au sein du Front populaire de libération de la Palestine, mouvement considéré comme « terroriste » par Israël.
      Le Monde, le 28 février 2019
      https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2019/02/28/israel-libere-une-deputee-palestinienne-apres-vingt-mois-de-detention_542952

      #guillemets #Palestine #FPLP #détention_administrative #prison

    • Ashrawi: ’Israel’s administrative detention an assault on human rights’
      March 1, 2019 10:53 A.M. (Updated: March 1, 2019 10:53 A.M.)
      http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=782711

      RAMALLAH (Ma’an) — Commenting on Israel’s release today of Palestinian lawmaker and prominent human rights defender Khalida Jarrar after spending 20 months in administrative detention, Hanan Ashrawi, Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee Member, said Israel’s administrative detention policy is “an assault on universal human rights.”

      Ashrawi said in a statement, on Thursday, “After twenty months in Israeli captivity, Khalida Jarrar is finally free. This imprisonment was yet another chapter in a lifetime of persecution and oppression from the Israeli occupation to this prominent human rights defender and elected representative, including several arrests, house arrest, and a ban on travel due to her activism against occupation and her work in defending the national and human rights of her people.”

      She added, “As we celebrate the release of Khalida, we must not lose sight that nearly 500 Palestinian citizens, including children and other elected officials, are languishing in Israeli prisons, without charge or trial, under so-called administrative detention.”

      “This form of open-ended detention is a tool of cruel punishment and oppression that the Israeli occupation regime has employed against thousands of Palestinian activists throughout the past fifty-two years of occupation. It is an abhorrent practice that violates international law, including international humanitarian law and international criminal law, as well as the basic rights and dignity of Palestinians.” (...)

    • Israël libère une députée palestinienne après 20 mois de détention
      Par RFI Publié le 28-02-2019 - Avec notre correspondante à Ramallah, Marine Vlahovic
      http://www.rfi.fr/moyen-orient/20190228-israel-libere-une-deputee-palestinienne-apres-20-mois-detention

      Khalida Jarrar avait été arrêtée en juillet 2017 à son domicile de Ramallah en Cisjordanie occupée par l’armée israélienne. Membre du Front populaire de libération de la Palestine (FPLP), un parti placé sur la liste des organisations terroristes par Israël, les Etats-Unis et l’Union européenne, cette députée palestinienne a passé près de deux ans en détention administrative, sans véritable procès, avant d’être finalement libérée ce jeudi 28 février. (...)

  • Equality for Women - Research for Women in Prison
    http://www.r4womeninprison.net/2018/06/12/equality-for-women

    Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)

    The United Nations adopted this human rights convention in 1979. It recognizes the need to establish equal rights. CEDAW acknowledges that there is economic, social, cultural, civil and political discrimination towards women. Importantly this states that discrimination violates the principles of gender equality and a fundamental respect for human dignity. It states that in order for women to have their full potential maximized that they must be included in all forms of economic, social, cultural and political development (Van Gundy and Baumann-Grau, 2013).

    The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) is the body of independent experts that monitors implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. CEDAW Committee consists of 23 experts on women’s rights from around the world.
    Regional Mechanisms

    The European Parliament has addressed the issue of equality, women in prison and its impacts (European Resolution, 2008). This recognizes that women have specific needs that must be taken into account in judicial rulings, criminal law and penal institutions. Moreover, practitioners should have an awareness of equal opportunities, including the specific needs and circumstances of women.
    England and Wales

    The Equality Act (2010) requires public authorities and services to protect women form discriminatory practices. This equality duty applies to all business that provide goods, facilities or services to members of the public. There is a pro-active equality duty and this means having regard for protected characteristics which are: age; disability; gender-reassignment; marriage and civil partnerships; pregnancy and maternity; race; religion or belief; sex and sexual orientation.

    The equality duty has been used to justify imprisonment for women. This argument does not recognize women’s role in their communities, their life-histories or alternative to imprisonment. It is important that policy makers continue to promote the reduction of imprisonment as well as improving resources and funds for women in their communities.

  • Statewatch News Online: Council of Europe: Prison statistics for 2016: increases in prison population rate and average length of imprisonment
    http://www.statewatch.org/news/2018/apr/coe-prison-statistics-2016.htm

    The Council of Europe’s recently-published annual prison statistics reports cover the year 2016 and show an increase from 2015 in the prison population rate (the number of prisoners per 100,000 of a country’s population), the average length of imprisonment, the number of entries into penal institutions and the proportion of prisoners serving sentences for theft.

    There were decreases between 2015 and 2016 in overcrowding, in the amount spent per day per prisoner, in the number of releases from penal institutions and in the proportion of prisoners serving sentences for drug offences.

    Council of Europe: European prisons are almost full, according to latest Council of Europe survey (press release, pdf):

    “European prisons are on average close to full capacity, with inmates occupying over 9 out of ten available places, according to the Council of Europe Annual Penal Statistics (SPACE) for 2016, published today.

    The survey shows that the incarceration rate grew from 115.7 to 117.1 inmates per 100,000 inhabitants from 2015 to 2016. This rate had previously fallen every year since 2012, when it reached 125.6 prisoners per 100,000 inhabitants.

    The incarceration rate is mainly influenced by the length of the sanctions and measures imposed. In that perspective, the average length of detention, which can be seen as an indicator of the way criminal law is applied, increasing slightly to 8.5 months.

    The countries where the incarceration rate grew the most were Bulgaria (+10.8%), Turkey (+9.5%), the Czech Republic (+7.6%), Serbia (+6.6%) and Denmark (+5.5%). The prison administrations where it fell the most were Iceland (-15.9%), Northern Ireland (-11.8), Lithuania (-11.1%), Belgium (-10.1%) and Georgia (-6.7%).

    On the other hand, overcrowding remained a serious problem in many countries. Thirteen out of 47 prison administrations reported having more inmates than places to host them.”

  • UN Releases Guidelines for Team Investigating ISIS Crimes in Iraq
    Death Penalty Debate Dodged
    https://www.justsecurity.org/52628/iraqi-investigative-team-terms-reference-released-death-penalty-debate


    https://www.justsecurity.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/2018-02-09-TORs-UN-iraq-investigative-mechanism.pdf

    The Security Council complied on the basis of a resolution drafted by the United Kingdom and asked the Secretary-General to establish an Investigative Team, headed by a Special Adviser, to:

    support domestic efforts to hold ISIL (Da’esh) accountable by collecting, preserving, and storing evidence in Iraq of acts that may amount to war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide committed by the terrorist group ISIL (Da’esh) in Iraq, to the highest possible standards … to ensure the broadest possible use before national courts, and complementing investigations being carried out by the Iraqi authorities, or investigations carried out by authorities in third countries at their request…

    In this regard, the resolution has a singular focus on crimes committed by ISIL, with no mandate to look into crimes attributable to governmental forces, at the federal or regional level (e.g., Kurdistan Regional forces); militia such as the Popular Mobilization Forces; or international forces for that matter. In fact, the resolution suggests that Iraq will be in a position to dictate “any other uses” of the evidence generated “on a case by case basis.” Although having Baghdad’s consent will be crucial to the Investigative Team’s ability to operate in the country, it comes at the expense of an impartial investigation that follows the evidence rather than focuses on a single armed group, no matter how heinous.

    The newly released ToR instruct the Investigative Team to:

    Collect evidence to the highest possible standards to ensure the broadest possible use before national courts in Iraq.
    Establish standard operating procedures for collection, analysis, and archiving of potential evidence.
    Organize, preserve, and catalogue all evidence in accordance with international criminal law standards and Iraqi domestic law and establish an uninterrupted chain of custody and a system of data protection.
    Adopt procedures to obtain the informed consent of, and for the protection of, victims and witnesses.
    Enter into agreements with member states and organizations to support its work.
    Provide capacity building and legal assistance to the Government of Iraq.
    Liaise with an Iraqi Steering Committee, which will provide the necessary assistance and security to fulfill the team’s mandate free of interference.

  • What’s in A Name? Exploring the Role of Law and Bureaucracy in The Everyday Construction of Holot, an ’Open Detention Facility’ for ’Infiltrators’ in Israel | Oxford Law Faculty
    https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/research-subject-groups/centre-criminology/centreborder-criminologies/blog/2017/11/whats-name

    Approximately 38,000 asylum seekers from Sudan and Eritrea currently reside in Israel. All entered Israel since 2005 through non-authorized border points, and most claim to have fled persecution in Sudan or human rights abuses in Eritrea. In 2013, Israel established Holot ‘open detention facility’ in the middle of the Negev desert, approved by the Knesset (Israel’s Parliament). To date, approximately 10,000 people have been detained in Holot. Detainees must report to Holot for a year-long detention, under the 5th amendment to the Prevention of Infiltration Law. Detainees must be present for head counts in the mornings, evenings and sleep in the facility, while during the day, they are allowed outside the center’s confines. Israel’s Prison Authority runs the facility. Breach of disciplinary guidelines is punishable by sanctions, including removal to a closed facility, Saharonim, located across the road.

    During interviews, three legal terms were frequently used by state employees or legal professionals to describe Holot as a non-punitive arrangement. I expand briefly on each term to trace how a punitive effect takes place, despite the claimed neutrality and administrative nature of these legal terms.

    Administrative detention, which includes the arrest and detention of persons without an indictment, trial or access to judicial review, has existed since the state’s founding in 1948. The early days of Israeli statehood were characterised by the mass movement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who had been displaced during the 1947-8 war. Those who crossed the border without the new State’s authorisation were titled ‘infiltrators.’ Increased organized smuggling by militant groups called Fedayeen in the early years of the state, led to the legislation of the Prevention of Infiltration Law in 1954. Since 2012 this law was expanded, contested in court, and amended to regulate asylum seekers who entered the country through non-authorised border points, and enable their detention.

    State employees and legislators insist that administrative detention is not punitive, and therefore does not need to comply with individual criminal law procedures and protections. However, similarities between administrative detention and penal incarceration came under scrutiny in Israel’s Supreme Court and in legislative committees. As explained in the final verdict on detention in Holot by Justice Vogelman: “Long periods of detention cross the border between a ‘disciplinary’ sanction which is largely carried out for the sake of deterrence and a ‘penal’ sanction which is punitive in its essence” (author’s translation). This observation was picked up by scholars, activists and lawyers questioning the legislative aim of detention, its covert and overt goals.

    The blurred or intersecting border between criminal law and immigration law has been vastly explored under the term crimmigration. Juliet Stumpf has written about the ways in which ‘the process is the punishment in crimmigration law’, drawing on Malcolm Feeley’s 1979 work. Stumpf identifies two criteria to ascertain when processes of crimmigration law may become punitive: when those subjected to the process experience it as punitive, and when the process is enacted as a sanction by the state.

  • Interior Ministry shuts down, raids left-wing #German #Indymedia site
    https://diasp.eu/p/5953473

    Interior Ministry shuts down, raids left-wing #German #Indymedia site

    #Germany has banned and raided an independent #news website popular with #left-wing readers. Officials found linksunten.indymedia.org’s “intent and activity contrary to criminal law.”

    The site was closed for “sowing hate against different opinions and representatives of the country,” Interior Minister Thomas de Maziere told a press conference on Friday. He said authorities were treating linksunten.indymedia.org as an “association” rather than a news outlet, which would help officials get around constitutional protections on freedom of expression. De Maziere said at least two people constituted an association - the site has up to seven administrators - and the ban would not affect the international award-winning (...)

  • AIDA 2016 Update : Greece

    The updated country report on Greece provides a thorough analysis of the transformation of the Greek asylum system in the light of the closure of the Western Balkan route and the EU-Turkey statement. The report offers detailed statistics and practical insights into the workings of the asylum procedure, reception and detention of asylum seekers, as well as content of international protection.

    Substantial asylum reforms, many of which driven by the implementation of the EU-Turkey statement, took place in 2016. Law (L) 4375/2016, adopted in April 2016 and transposing the recast Asylum Procedures Directive into Greek law, was subsequently amended in June 2016 and March 2017, while a draft law transposing the recast Reception Conditions Directive has not been adopted yet.

    The impact of the EU-Turkey statement has been a de facto divide in the asylum procedures applied in Greece. Asylum seekers arriving after 20 March 2016 are subject to a fast-track border procedure and excluded from relocation in practice.

    Fast-track border procedure: One of the main modifications brought about by L 4375/2016 has been the establishment of an extremely truncated fast-track border procedure, applicable in exceptional cases. As underlined the fast-track procedure under derogation provisions in Law 4375/2016 does not provide adequate safeguards. In practice, fast-track border procedure applies to arrivals after 20 March 2016 and takes place in the Reception and Identification Centres (RIC) of Lesvos, Chios, Samos, Leros and Kos. Under the fast-track border procedure, which does not apply to Dublin family cases and vulnerable cases, interviews are also conducted by EASO staff, while the entire procedure at first and second instance has to be completed within 14 days. The procedure has predominantly taken the form of an admissibility procedure to examine whether applications may be dismissed on the ground that Turkey is a “safe third country” or a “first country of asylum”; although these concepts already existed in Greek law, they have only been applied following the EU-Turkey statement. The admissibility procedure started being applied to Syrian nationals in April 2016 and was only applied to other nationalities with a rate over 25% (e.g. Afghans, Iraqis) since the beginning of 2017. In the meantime, for nationalities with a rate below 25%, the procedure entails an examination of the application on the merits without prior admissibility assessment as of July 2016. A Joint Action Plan of the EU Coordinator on the implementation of certain provisions of the EU-Turkey statement recommends that Dublin family reunification cases be included in the fast-track border procedure and vulnerable cases be examined under an admissibility procedure.

    Appeals Committees reform: The composition of the Appeals Committees competent for examining appeals was modified by a June 2016 amendment to the April 2016 law, following reported EU pressure on Greece to respond to an overwhelming majority of decisions rebutting the presumption that Turkey is a “safe third country” or “first country of asylum” for asylum seekers. The June 2016 reform also deleted a previous possibility for the appellant to obtain an oral hearing before the Appeals Committees upon request. Applications for annulment have been submitted before the Council of State, invoking inter alia issues with regard to the constitutionality of the amendment. A recent reform in March 2017 enabled EASO staff to assist the Appeals Committees in the examination of appeals, despite criticism from civil society organisations. Since the operation of the (new) Appeals Committees on 21 July and until 31 December 2016, the recognition rate of international protection is no more than 0.4%. This may be an alarming finding as to the operation of an efficient and fair asylum procedure in Greece. Respectively, by 19 February 2017, 21 decisions on admissibility had been issued by the new Appeals Committees. As far as GCR is aware, all 21 decisions of the new Appeals Committees have confirmed the first-instance inadmissibility decision.

    Reception capacity: Despite the commitment of the Greek authorities to meet a target of 2,500 reception places dedicated to asylum seekers under the coordination of the National Centre for Social Solidarity (EKKA) by the end of 2014, this number has not been reached to date. As of January 2017, a total 1,896 places were available in 64 reception facilities mainly run by NGOs, out of which 1,312 are dedicated to unaccompanied children. As of 13 January 2017, 1,312 unaccompanied children were accommodated in long-term and transit shelters, while 1,301 unaccompanied children were waiting for a place. Out of the unaccompanied children on the waitlist, 277 were in closed reception facilities (RIC) and 18 detained in police stations under “protective custody”. A number of 20,000 accommodation places were gradually made available under a UNHCR accommodation scheme dedicated initially to relocation candidates and since July 2016 extended also to Dublin family reunification candidates and applicants belonging to vulnerable groups.

    Temporary accommodation sites: A number of temporary accommodation places were created on the mainland in order to address the pressing needs created after the imposition of border restrictions. However, the majority of these places consists of encampments and the conditions in temporary facilities on the mainland have been sharply criticised, as of the widely varying and often inadequate standards prevailing, both in terms of material conditions and security.

    Automatic detention policy: Following a change of policy announced at the beginning of 2015, the numbers of detained people have been reduced significantly during 2015. The launch of the implementation of the EU-Turkey Statement has had an important impact on detention, resulting in a significant toughening of detention policy and the establishment of blanket detention of all newly arrived third-country nationals after 20 March 2016, followed by the imposition of an obligation to remain on the island, known as “geographical restriction”.

    Detention on “law-breaking conduct” grounds: A Police Circular issued on 18 June 2016 provided that third-country nationals residing on the islands with “law-breaking conduct” (παραβατική συμπεριφορά), will be transferred, on the basis of a decision of the local Director of the Police, approved by the Directorate of the Police, to pre-removal detention centers in the mainland where they will remain detained. Serious objections as raised as to whether in this case the administrative measure of immigration detention is used with a view to circumventing procedural safeguards established by criminal law. Moreover, GCR findings on-site do not confirm allegations of “law-breaking conduct” in the vast majority of the cases. A total 1,626 people had been transferred to mainland detention centres by the end of 2016.

    Humanitarian status for old procedure backlog: Article 22 L 4375/2016 provides that appellants who have lodged their asylum applications up to five years before the entry into force of L 4375/2016 (3 April 2016), and their examination is pending before the Backlog Committees, shall be granted a two-years residence status on humanitarian grounds, which can be renewed. Appellants granted with residence status on humanitarian grounds have the right to ask within two months from the notification of the decision for their asylum application to be examined in view of fulfilling the requirements international protection. Under Article 22 L 4375/2016, a total 4,935 decisions granting humanitarian residence permits have been issued by the end of 2016.


    http://www.asylumineurope.org/news/28-03-2017/aida-2016-update-greece
    #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Grèce #fast-track #procédures_accélérées #logement #hébergement #procédure_d'asile #détention_administrative #rétention #accord_UE-Turquie #statistiques #chiffres

  • The ‘#humanitarian_smuggling’ of refugees: criminal offence or moral obligation?

    At a time when it is nearly impossible for refugees to reach the European Union through safe and legal channels, and human smugglers are providing one of the only means for refugees to flee persecution, should human smugglers be brought to justice, or are they bringing about justice? This research is an inquiry into the range of morally permissible actions that might be considered ’humanitarian smuggling’ - those acts of the facilitation of irregular entry that are morally blameless, if not praiseworthy or even obligatory, and should not be criminalised. Turning first to legal doctrine, I argue that smuggling prohibitions at both the international and European levels are vague and overbroad, failing to enable subjects of the law to orientate their behaviour accordingly and risking the suppression of humanitarian acts. Second, drawing upon practical ethics as well as historical and contemporary examples, I begin to map the complex moral terrain of the range of ethically defensible acts of smuggling that risk criminalisation under current smuggling prohibitions. Finally, I analyse several recommendations to shrink the distance between what is legal and what is moral, arguing that at a minimum, smuggling prohibitions must be more narrowly drafted to decriminalise ’humanitarian smugglers’. I ultimately propose that the true wrongs the human smugglers worthy of criminalisation commit may indeed be more aptly punished under other offences in criminal law.

    https://www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/publications/the-2018humanitarian-smuggling2019-of-refugees-criminal-offence-or-moral-o
    #réfugiés #asile #migrations #terminologie #mots #vocabulaire #smugglers #smuggling #passeurs

  • Genève, 26 avril 2016 | Conférence: « The European Refugee Crisis 2016 and the challenges to Schengen Borders »
    http://asile.ch/2016/04/20/geneve-26-avril-2016-conference-the-european-refugee-crisis-2016-and-the-chall

    Elspeth Guild is Jean Monnet Professor ad personam at Queen Mary, University of London as well as at the Radboud University Nijmegen, Netherlands. Her interests and expertise lies primarily in the area of EU law, in particular EU Justice and Home Affairs (including immigration, asylum, border controls, criminal law and police and judicial cooperation in […]

  • AP changes style on ‘illegal immigrant’ – Poynter

    http://www.poynter.org/2013/ap-changes-style-on-illegal-immigrant/209045

    Via @fil qui a vraiment l’oeil partout

    The Associated Press is changing its Stylebook entry on the term “illegal immigrant,” the news cooperative announced Tuesday. The new entry reads in part:

    illegal immigration Entering or residing in a country in violation of civil or criminal law. Except in direct quotes essential to the story, use illegal only to refer to an action, not a person: illegal immigration, but not illegal immigrant. Acceptable variations include living in or entering a country illegally or without legal permission.

    In a statement, AP Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll says the change came, in part, because of ongoing work at AP dedicated to “ridding the Stylebook of labels.”

    Immigration is just one area where AP is doing such work, Carroll says in the statement. Now it recommends “Saying someone was ’diagnosed with schizophrenia’ instead of schizophrenic, for example.”

    #migrations #réfugiés #vocabulaire #terminologie #mots #sémiologie
    #migrants_illégal

  • Myanmar’s Peace Prize Winner and Crimes Against Humanity

    A recent Yale study suggested that the abuse of the more than one million #Rohingya may amount to genocide; at the least, a confidential United Nations report to the Security Council says it may constitute “crimes against humanity under international criminal law.”


    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/opinion/sunday/myanmars-peace-prize-winner-and-crimes-against-humanity.html?WT.mc_id=2016-
    #Myanmar #Birmanie

  • Le TSL acquitte al-Jadeed, Karma Khayat reconnue coupable
    http://www.lorientlejour.com/article/944981/le-tsl-acquitte-al-jadeed-karma-khayat-reconnue-coupable.html

    La chaîne de télévision libanaise al-Jadeed, accusée d’avoir diffusé des informations sur des témoins protégés dans l’enquête sur l’assassinat de l’ancien Premier ministre Rafic Hariri, a été acquittée d’outrage et entrave à la justice par le juge compétent en matière d’outrage du Tribunal spécial pour le Liban (TSL), Nicola Lettieri.

    Le tribunal a certes estimé que trois témoins présumés, sur un total de onze concernés par cette affaire, pouvaient être identifiés grâce aux informations publiées par Al-Jadeed-TV. Mais, a soutenu le juge Lettieri, rien ne montre que « les individus concernés ait souffert de quoi que ce soit à cause de ces divulgations ».

    L’accusation n’a « pas prouvé au-delà de tout doute raisonnable que la divulgation (...) pouvait objectivement miner la confiance du public dans la capacité du tribunal à protéger la confidentialité de certaines informations », a-t-il ajouté lors d’une audience publique dans la banlieue de La Haye, où siège le TSL.

    La rédactrice en chef adjointe et la vice-présidente du conseil d’administration de la chaîne al-Jadeed, Karma Mohammad Tahsine Khayat, a elle aussi été acquittée pour la diffusion des reportages, mais a été reconnue coupable de ne pas les avoir retirés du site Internet de la chaîne lorsque le tribunal le lui avait demandé.

    • Lebanon Tribunal Gives Mixed Verdict in Confidential Witnesses Case
      http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/19/world/middleeast/lebanon-hariri-tribunal-karma-khayat-al-jadeed-tv-trial.html

      An international court on Friday found Karma Al-Khayat, an executive with Al Jadeed TV in Lebanon, guilty of contempt of court for ignoring its order to remove broadcasts about confidential witnesses from the station’s website. She was acquitted, however, of the more serious charge of obstruction of justice.

      The station’s parent company, New TV, based in Beirut, was tried on similar charges before the same Italian judge, Nicola Lettieri, but on Friday he cleared the company on all counts.

      The case against Ms. Khayat and Al Jadeed drew criticism from news organizations in Lebanon and abroad, raising questions about whether the trials amounted to an attack on the freedom of the press. Diplomats and lawyers also followed it because the charges against the company, rather than an individual, appeared to develop a novel notion of corporate liability in international criminal law.

      “I’m delighted the judge unequivocally rejected the charges against the company, because they lacked a legal base in international law,” said Karim Khan, the British lawyer representing Ms. Khayat and New TV. He said he was satisfied that Ms. Khayat had been acquitted of the most serious charge she faced, obstruction of justice. He also said that Ms. Khayat would almost certainly appeal the contempt of court conviction.

      Ms. Khayat, 32, whose family is the main owner of Al Jadeed TV, could face a prison term or fine. The prosecutor asked for a 12-month sentence or a fine of 100,000 euros, about $130,000. Ms. Khayat was scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 28.

    • Chez la BBC, on titre carrément sur le fait que Karma Khayat a été innocentée par « la Hague »… la condamnation pour outrage n’est mentionnée qu’après trois paragraphes : Hague court clears Lebanese journalist
      http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-34288461

      A Lebanese TV journalist and her station have been cleared of obstructing justice by a UN-backed tribunal investigating the 2005 killing of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

      Karma Khayat and Al Jadeed had been accused of having revealed details about key protected witnesses.

      But Ms Khayat was convicted of contempt of court for failing to remove broadcasts about the case online.

    • Why the judgement against Karma Khayyat is disappointing: Another case of STL “selective #justice
      https://mideastwire.wordpress.com/2015/09/18/why-the-judgement-against-karma-khayyat-is-disappointing-anot

      As for the Khayyat judgement, it is disappointing not because of her case in itself – I cant evaluate that…. but rather because of all the many many many destructive leaks etc by many new orgs and journos over the last 10 years – NONE of which have been brought before the court.

      Strange, right, that the only two cases involve vociferous critics of the STL!

      Strange and another sad mark on a process that could have been and should have been far better.

      #mascarade

  • Palestinian Center for Human Rights
    http://www.pchrgaza.org/portal/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11117:seek-out-and-prosecute-
    Monday, 22 June 2015

    PCHR today called on the Director of Public Prosecutions, Alison Saunders, and the Attorney General, Jeremy Wright QC, to urgently liaise to ensure that immediate decisions are made regarding the arrest and (if the evidence permits) prosecution before the a Court in England and Wales of Shaul Mofaz with a war crimes offence contrary to the Geneva Conventions Act 1957 (GCA). It is essential the decisions are made today, 22 June 2015, before Mr Mofaz is able to leave the UK.

    PCHR calls on the public and members of civil society to immediately contact the Attorney General’s office via email - correspondence@attorneygeneral.gsi.gov.uk - to ensure that he understands the strength of public feeling about the fair application of the rule of law to all those suspected of committing serious offences under international criminal law.

    It is understood that Mr Mofaz, who left Israeli political life earlier this year, is in London on Monday, 22 June 2015, on a private visit and that the Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, has not accorded Mr Mofaz any form of immunity from the fair application of English criminal law. After learning of his visit to London, on 21 June, and acting on behalf of Gazan victims of alleged war crimes, PCHR sent the police and Crown Prosecution Service evidence relating to Mr Mofaz to enable the police to arrest him on suspicion of committing an offence contrary to the GCA.

  • HIV Justice - map of countries
    http://www.hivjustice.net/site/countries

    Click on the map, or select a country/jurisdiction from the drop-down list, for news and features produced by the HIV Justice Network, as well as news from other sources and relevant links by country and/or jurisdiction.

    For individual cases visit the Cases section and filter via country and/or case type.

    The HIV Justice Network is a global information and advocacy hub for individuals and organisations working to end the inappropriate use of the criminal law to regulate and punish people living with HIV.

    Mission

    The HIV Justice Network’s mission is to collate, create and disseminate information and resources enabling individuals and communities to effectively advocate against inappropriate criminal prosecutions for HIV non-disclosure, potential or perceived exposure and transmission.

    Oslo Declaration on HIV Criminalisation 2012
    http://www.hivjustice.net/oslo/oslo-declaration

    ...
    3. Although there may be a limited role for criminal law in rare cases in which people transmit HIV with malicious intent, we prefer to see people living with HIV supported and empowered from the moment of diagnosis, so that even these rare cases may be prevented. This requires a non-punitive, non-criminal HIV prevention approach centred within communities, where expertise about, and understanding of, HIV issues is best found.
    ...

    #cartographie #SIDA

  • Mississippi Personhood Bill Could Criminalize Doctors Who Perform An Abortion To Save A Woman’s Life | ThinkProgress
    http://thinkprogress.org/health/2011/11/04/361871/mississippi-personhood-bill-could-criminalize-doctors-who-perform-an-

    Physicians and medical associations are now speaking out against Mississippi’s personhood amendment, warning that it is “a dangerous intrusion of criminal law into the provision of medical care.”

    Specifically, by criminalizing abortion, the measure could “criminalize routine medical practice that intentionally or not terminates a pregnancy” because, according to the measure, any fertilized egg — regardless of if and where it implants — could be considered a “person.” And because the measure has no exceptions for health of the mother (let alone rape or incest), Mississippi physicians are worried that termination of such a life-threatening pregnancy could still be considered a form of homicide