Your local voice for Amnesty International
An investigation for openDemocracy has found that gypsy, Roma and traveller communities are being forced to live on contaminated land, by motorways and near sewage works or risk arrest. Two-thirds of the 60 short-term ‘transit’ sites in England – and just over half of the country’s 242 permanent sites – are within 100m of one…
Continue reading Criminalisation of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller Communities
This report, written in collaboration with the Fawcett Society, found that three-quarters of women of colour experience racism at work. It is the norm that they are forced to endure harmful, pervasive and entrenched racism at every stage of their career journey. As a result, many ‘change themselves’ to fit in: they change their language, their…
Continue reading Runnymede Trust Report on Racism against Women at Work: Broken Ladders
This report from Greenpeace and the Runnymede Trust argues that black, indigenous, and people of colour bear the brunt of an environmental emergency that, for the most part, they did not create, yet their struggles have repeatedly been ignored by those in positions of power. Furthermore, systemic racism operates worldwide to produce inequalities in housing,…
Continue reading Confronting Injustice: Racism and the Environmental Emergency
Good News World President Biden took executive action in July to protect access to abortion. It directs agencies to work with medical providers and insurers to protect the privacy of women who seek or utilise abortion services, asks the Federal Trade Commission to protect the privacy of those seeking online information about abortion, and establishes…
Continue reading Good and Bad News around the World – August 2022 Update
In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty violated the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment because it was used in a discriminatory manner against the poor and minorities. However, in 1976, it ruled that the death penalty per se was not unconstitutional because it could serve the social purposes of…
Continue reading The US Supreme Court and the Death Penalty
Between November 2021 and May 2022, AI conducted dozens of interviews with refugees and migrants in Lithuania who had attempted to enter from Belarus. In March 2022, a delegation from AI also travelled to Lithuania. They visited two detention centres, conducted interviews with detainees, spoke with relevant authorities and representatives of humanitarian and civil society…
Continue reading Lithuania: Forced Out or Locked Up – Refugees and Migrants Abused and Abandoned
This report, an Inspection of the Initial Processing of Migrants Arriving via Small Boats between December 2021 and January 2022, published recently after a three-month delay, focused on protecting the border through security checks and the identification and safeguarding of vulnerable people. It said that ‘these migrants crossed the Channel in dire circumstances. Many were…
Continue reading Report by the Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration
This report makes for upsetting, if entirely predictable, reading as the executive summary states: In less than a year, the Taliban have decimated the rights of women and girls in Afghanistan. Soon after they took control of the country’s government, the Taliban said they were committed to upholding the rights of women and girls. Yet…
Continue reading Amnesty’s report Afghanistan: Death in Slow Motion: Women and Girls under Taliban Rule
A small group of British women and children, some 20 families, are detained in desert camps in North-East Syria, held in inhumane conditions with inadequate access to water, food, and healthcare. Investigations by Reprieve show that almost two-thirds of the women are victims of trafficking, often after online grooming by ISIS. A six-month inquiry by…
Continue reading British Nationals Deprived of Nationality
A report by the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Democracy and the Constitution called An Independent Judiciary – Challenges since 2016 suggests improper attacks on judges threaten the constitution. The APPG argued that government politicians are misrepresenting legal rulings to their own advantage, attacking judges over their decisions and making threats about legal reform.…
Continue reading Judges under Attack by Executive