Three Cleveland Women, Missing 10 Years, Found Alive

“Help me, I’m Amanda Berry … I’ve been kidnapped and I’ve been missing for 10 years. And I’m here, I’m free now.”

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SUMMARY
On May 6, 2013, three women from Cleveland, Ohio – Amanda Berry, Georgina “Gina” DeJesus, and Michelle Knight – were rescued from their nine- to eleven-year captivity after Berry escaped and contacted police. They were freed from a house owned by Ariel Castro, the suspect in their kidnappings. A six-year-old daughter of Berry, born while she was captive, was also rescued.

Knight disappeared in Cleveland in 2002 at age 21, Berry in 2003 at 16, and DeJesus in 2004 at 14. While captive, the women had multiple pregnancies, at least one live birth (Berry’s daughter), and multiple miscarriages. The women were at times bound with chains and rope.

Ariel Castro was arrested on May 6, 2013, shortly after the women were freed. On May 8, Castro was charged with four counts of kidnapping and three counts of rape, charges that carry prison sentences of 10 years to life. On May 9, Castro’s bail was set at $8 million. Additional charges are pending, including aggravated murder (for terminating the pregnancies), attempted murder, assault, a charge for each instance of rape, and a kidnapping charge for each day each victim was held captive. The case received front-page news coverage worldwide.

THE ABDUCTIONS

Michelle Knight
Michelle Knight was last seen on August 22, 2002, when she left her cousin’s house. She disappeared near West 116th Street and Lorain Avenue, on a day she was to appear in court for a child custody case concerning her son. She was 21 years old at the time of her disappearance. Police put far fewer resources into the Knight case than the Berry or DeJesus cases, partly because they had very few leads, and due in part to the fact that she was an adult, and was believed to have run away. Knight’s removal from the National Crime Information Center database, 15 months after she disappeared, has been criticized, although police and the FBI maintain that her inclusion or exclusion had no bearing on her rescue.

According to a report by officers who found Knight, she accepted a ride from Castro, but he instead drove her to his house. She was tied up in his basement and beaten, and was eventually moved upstairs to a locked room.

Before she escaped, police and family members came to believe that Knight may have left on her own, frustrated after losing custody of her son. Her mother thought she had once seen her with an older man at a shopping plaza on West 117th Street.

Amanda Berry
Amanda Marie Berry went missing on April 21, 2003, at age 16, one day before her 17th birthday. She was believed to have made it home from her job at a Burger King at West 110th Street and Lorain Avenue, and she changed from her uniform at her family’s apartment, but no one witnessed her there. She left money and all her clothes at home. She was known to have had plans to celebrate her birthday the next day. Berry has told police that after her shift a Burger King, she accepted a ride home from Castro, who said he had a son who worked there as well. She called her family to say she was getting a ride home, but instead was taken to Castro’s house and imprisoned.

Police initially considered Berry a runaway, until a man used her cell phone to call her mother, Louwanna Miller, claiming the teenager would return in a few days and that they were married. Miller searched for her daughter for three years, but died in 2006 of heart failure.

Berry was featured in a 2004 segment of America’s Most Wanted, which re-aired in 2005 and 2006 and linked her to Gina DeJesus, who at that point had subsequently also gone missing in Cleveland. They were profiled on The Oprah Winfrey Show and The Montel Williams Show, where self-described psychic Sylvia Browne told Miller in 2004 that her daughter Amanda was dead, and that she was “in water.” Browne received significant media criticism for her prediction being “false and potentially damaging.”

Before her disappearance, Berry had been in a gifted program at John Marshall High School, but had switched to an online home school program in which she was on track for early graduation.

Gina DeJesus
Georgina “Gina” Lynn DeJesus went missing at age 14. She was last seen at a pay phone at about 3 p.m. on April 2, 2004, as she headed home from her middle school at West 105th Street and Lorain Avenue. She and suspect Ariel Castro’s daughter Arlene Castro had called Ariel’s wife, Grimilda Figueroa, asking to have a sleepover at DeJesus’ house, but Figueroa said they could not. Berry and DeJesus disappeared within five blocks of each other, perhaps even on the same block.

DeJesus said Castro offered her a ride to his house to see his daughter, her friend. Instead she was taken captive.

No AMBER Alert was issued the day DeJesus disappeared, because no one had witnessed her being abducted. The lack of an AMBER Alert angered her father, Felix DeJesus, who said in 2006 that he believed the public would listen even if the alerts become routine.
A week after Gina’s disappearance, police released a sketch and description of an Hispanic man aged 25 to 35, 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m) tall, weighing 165 to 185 pounds (75 to 82 kg), with green eyes and a pencil-thin beard. The suspect had been seen near her school driving a light blue or white car, and asking for Gina.

DeJesus was featured on America’s Most Wanted in 2004, 2005, and 2006, and the television program also linked her to Berry. The disappearances received regular media attention over the years, as recently as 2012, while family and others held vigils and searched for DeJesus and Berry. Ariel Castro was identified by Gina’s family in video footage of two of these vigils and he reportedly participated in a search party and tried to get close to the family. Police kept an active investigation open, offering a $25,000 reward for information on their location.

THE DISCOVERY
On May 6, 2013, Knight, DeJesus, Berry, and a previously unknown 6-year-old female child of Berry were found in a home at 2207 Seymour Avenue, in the residential Tremont neighborhood 3 miles (4.8 km) from where the three young women had disappeared. Neighbor Angel Cordero responded to the noise of a woman screaming, but was apparently unable to communicate with the women inside the house, since he spoke little English.

Another neighbor, Charles Ramsey, joined Cordero at the door and said that a woman, later identified as Berry, told him that she was being kept in the house with her baby against her will. Because the door was locked, Ramsey and Cordero together kicked a hole in the bottom of it, and she crawled through, carrying her daughter. Berry was wearing a jumpsuit, white tank top, rings, and mascara.Upon being freed, she went to the house of another Spanish-speaking neighbor and called 9-1-1, saying, “Help me, I’m Amanda Berry … I’ve been kidnapped and I’ve been missing for 10 years. And I’m here, I’m free now.”

Several responding officers crawled in the broken bottom of the front door and searched the house with guns drawn. One of the officers saw a pair of eyes peeking through a slightly opened upstairs bedroom door. Michelle Knight fled the room and leapt into the arms of an officer, repeatedly saying “you saved me”. Soon DeJesus entered the hall from another room. The women were able to walk out of the home and all three women and the child were taken to MetroHealth Medical Center. They were all released from the hospital by the next morning, although Knight later returned for unspecified reasons.

INVESTIGATION DEVELOPMENTS
A suspect, Ariel Castro, was arrested on May 6, 2013, and charged with four counts of kidnapping and three counts of rape on May 8. Two brothers of Castro’s were also initially taken into custody, but they were released a few days later after police announced that they had no involvement in the kidnappings.

Police said that, based on victim interviews, the women were initially kept in chains and ropes in the basement before being locked in upstairs rooms. They were only twice taken outside, in disguise, and only as far as the garage. An unnamed police source said the young women had multiple miscarriages and at least one live birth. WKYC reported that the women were raped repeatedly by their captor, and beaten severely when they became pregnant. According to The New York Post, one young woman had three miscarriages, and Knight may have suffered hearing loss from the beatings. According to a police report obtained by CBS News, Michelle Knight had five miscarriages caused by starvation and beatings by Castro to her stomach.

The suspect is believed by police to have fathered Berry’s 6-year-old daughter, and the suspect’s DNA has been obtained to compare against the girl’s DNA. The girl was at times taken from the home, and visited the suspect’s mother, calling her “grandmother”. Castro’s DNA is being tested on a high priority basis so it can be compared to unknown DNA in other crimes.

Various law enforcement officers searched Ariel Castro’s property collecting evidence. A cadaver dog was used, but no human remains were discovered. The criminal investigation is ongoing as the Cleveland Police Department faces public scrutiny and questions about how it handled the women’s abductions.

Reprint, primary source: Wikipedia (verified through other reliable news sources)

Related: Amanda Berry’s 9-1-1 Call  (Audio)

Transcript of Amanda Berry’s 9-11 Call (Text)

An Open Letter to Charles Ramsey from a Fellow Cleveland Resident –By Eris Zion Venia Dyson | Guardian UK

 

No End In Sight For Guantánamo Hunger Strike –By Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel (Prisoner)| NYT

People dress in orange jumpsuits and black hoods as activists demand the closing of the U.S. military’s detention facility in Guantánamo during a protest, part of the Nationwide for Guantánamo Day of Action, on April 11 in New York’s Times Square. (Photo: Stan Honda/AFP/Getty)

One man here weighs just 77 pounds. Another, 98. Last thing I knew, I weighed 132, but that was a month ago.

I’ve been on a hunger strike since Feb. 10 and have lost well over 30 pounds. I will not eat until they restore my dignity. I’ve been detained at Guantánamo for 11 years and three months. I have never been charged with any crime. I have never received a trial.

I could have been home years ago — no one seriously thinks I am a threat — but still I am here. Years ago the military said I was a “guard” for Osama bin Laden, but this was nonsense, like something out of the American movies I used to watch. They don’t even seem to believe it anymore. But they don’t seem to care how long I sit here, either.

When I was at home in Yemen, in 2000, a childhood friend told me that in Afghanistan I could do better than the $50 a month I earned in a factory, and support my family. I’d never really traveled, and knew nothing about Afghanistan, but I gave it a try.

I was wrong to trust him. There was no work. I wanted to leave, but had no money to fly home. After the American invasion in 2001, I fled to Pakistan like everyone else. The Pakistanis arrested me when I asked to see someone from the Yemeni Embassy. I was then sent to Kandahar, and put on the first plane to Gitmo.

Last month, on March 15, I was sick in the prison hospital and refused to be fed. A team from the E.R.F. (Extreme Reaction Force), a squad of eight military police officers in riot gear, burst in. They tied my hands and feet to the bed. They forcibly inserted an IV into my hand. I spent 26 hours in this state, tied to the bed. During this time I was not permitted to go to the toilet. They inserted a catheter, which was painful, degrading and unnecessary. I was not even permitted to pray.

I will never forget the first time they passed the feeding tube up my nose. I can’t describe how painful it is to be force-fed this way. As it was thrust in, it made me feel like throwing up. I wanted to vomit, but I couldn’t. There was agony in my chest, throat and stomach. I had never experienced such pain before. I would not wish this cruel punishment upon anyone.

I am still being force-fed. Two times a day they tie me to a chair in my cell. My arms, legs and head are strapped down. I never know when they will come. Sometimes they come during the night, as late as 11 p.m., when I’m sleeping.

There are so many of us on hunger strike now that there aren’t enough qualified medical staff members to carry out the force-feedings; nothing is happening at regular intervals. They are feeding people around the clock just to keep up. During one force-feeding the nurse pushed the tube about 18 inches into my stomach, hurting me more than usual, because she was doing things so hastily. I called the interpreter to ask the doctor if the procedure was being done correctly or not.

It was so painful that I begged them to stop feeding me. The nurse refused to stop feeding me. As they were finishing, some of the “food” spilled on my clothes. I asked them to change my clothes, but the guard refused to allow me to hold on to this last shred of my dignity.

When they come to force me into the chair, if I refuse to be tied up, they call the E.R.F. team. So I have a choice. Either I can exercise my right to protest my detention, and be beaten up, or I can submit to painful force-feeding.

The only reason I am still here is that President Obama refuses to send any detainees back to Yemen. This makes no sense. I am a human being, not a passport, and I deserve to be treated like one.

I do not want to die here, but until President Obama and Yemen’s president do something, that is what I risk every day. Where is my government? I will submit to any “security measures” they want in order to go home, even though they are totally unnecessary. I will agree to whatever it takes in order to be free. I am now 35. All I want is to see my family again and to start a family of my own.

The situation is desperate now. All of the detainees here are suffering deeply. At least 40 people here are on a hunger strike. People are fainting with exhaustion every day. I have vomited blood. And there is no end in sight to our imprisonment. Denying ourselves food and risking death every day is the choice we have made.

I just hope that because of the pain we are suffering, the eyes of the world will once again look to Guantánamo before it is too late.

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Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel

Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel is a 35-year-old citizen of Yemen. As of April 30, 2013, he has been held at Guantánamo for 11 years three months. Moqbel told this story, through an Arabic interpreter, to his lawyers at the legal charity Reprieve in an unclassified telephone call.

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Reprint: Hunger Striking at Guantánamo  –By Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel | NYT

Related: The Guantánamo Docket | NYT

Photos: Stark Scenes from Guantánamo Hunger Strike –By Dave Gibson | MotherJones

 

Four Year Old Rape Victims Dies in India -By Sharma & Vyawahare | NYT

© Mukesh Gupta/Reuters

NEW DELHI — A 4-year-old girl who was raped and dumped near a crematorium in central India died on Monday evening from cardiac arrest, hospital authorities said Tuesday.

The girl, the daughter of day laborers, was lured from her home in the town of Ghansor in Madhya Pradesh State on April 17 and found the next day by her parents, bleeding profusely, the police said.

Her kidnapper seized her after promising to buy her bananas from a nearby shop, a police official said Tuesday. She had been in a coma since April 18, Ashok Tank, a doctor who cared for her at Care Nagpur Hospital, said in a telephone interview Tuesday. She suffered severe brain injuries and severe injuries to her vagina, he said, and had been on a ventilator.

“Her heart and lungs stopped functioning,” Dr. Tank said. “It is very inhuman that such a young girl was subjected to sexual abuse.” The girl was transferred from a hospital in Madhya Pradesh to Care Nagpur, in nearby Maharashtra State, on April 20.

The police have arrested Firoz Khan, 27, a welder who worked at the nearby Jhabua Power Plant, in the attack. They have also arrested a second man, Rakesh Chaudhary, 25, who is accused of bringing the girl to her attacker.

“The investigation is going on,” said Mithlesh K. Shukla, superintendent of police for the Seoni district. “They will be charged soon and we will ensure that they get the strictest punishment.”

Excerpt, read: 4 Year-Old Rape Victims Dies in India –By Betwa Sharma & Malavika Vyawahare| NYT

 

New Delhi: Five Year Old Kidnapped, Gang-Raped by Neighbors –By Krista Mahr | TIME

Dozens of news vans are again camped in front of a major hospital in New Delhi, jockeying for space behind the yellow police barricades so ubiquitous in the Indian capital in recent months. Inside, the 5-year-old victim of another grotesque rape has been making the first steps in what is sure to be a long recovery after being kidnapped, sexually assaulted and left for dead last week in an apartment one floor beneath her family home. On April 22, doctors at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) hospital told reporters that the girl was showing steady signs of recovery after undergoing several procedures. Two men have been arrested in connection with the attack.

For days, scenes across the capital have recalled the weeks following the Dec. 16 gang rape of a 23-year-old student, who later died of her wounds. Demonstrators have again been gathering by the hundreds, clashing with authorities in their outrage at the failure of the police and the government to better protect India’s citizens and, in particular, its women. Several streets near the government in central New Delhi were barricaded as protesters from the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, among others, marched toward Parliament.

Before this most recent attack, the initial outrage over the brutality of the Dec. 16 crime had been slowly fading in New Delhi, in spite of the unnervingly steady stream of violent rapes that have continued to be reported by Indian media across the country. In March, the government passed a new, tougher rape law that, among other things, allows for rapes resulting in fatalities to be punishable by death. But many say that the more systemic problems at the root of India’s rising violent crime — such as chronic police understaffing, poor training and a lack of political will to change either — have not been addressed. Sexual assaults are considered to be vastly underreported, and the ones that are reported often go nowhere. In New Delhi alone, of more than 600 rape cases filed last year, just one resulted in a conviction.

Photo: Manish Swarup/ AP

The police handling of both sexual assault and crime against children came under fresh attack as the circumstances of the 5-year-old’s ordeal emerged. After their daughter had gone missing two days before, the family of the victim heard her crying in a locked ground-floor room in the building they live in. After breaking into the room and rushing the girl to local police, the family told reporters that the officers on duty offered them 2000 rupees — a little less than $40 — to quietly disappear and not register a report, a practice observers say is common in a system ill-equipped to handle its caseload. Over the weekend, protesters stormed police headquarters, calling for the resignation of the police commissioner. In response, police handed out pamphlets promising that both the rape case and the offending authorities would be dealt with swiftly, and on Monday, Indian Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde told Parliament that the government had taken action against the officers on duty.

Reprint: Rape of 5-Year-Old Indian Girl Sparks New Outrage, Old Questions –By Krista Mahr | TIME

Related: Second Man Arrested in Rape of 5-Year Old Indian Girl | WashPost via AP

 

SCOTUS: Courthouse Doors Closed to Foreign Nationals Alleging Corporate Human Rights Abuses –By Nicole Flatow |ThinkProgress

What started out as a case about whether corporations could be held accountable in U.S. courts for human rights abuses against foreigners abroad turned into a case about whether anyone can be held accountable. And on Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the answer is, mostly, no.

In a sweeping holding, Chief Justice John Roberts led a splintered court in ruling that several Nigerians alleging an oil company aided an abetted torture, arbitrary killings, and indefinite detention could not sue, because the corporate conduct occurred outside the United States. Roberts reasoned that what is known as the “presumption against extraterritoriality” applies to a 200-year-old statute that authorizes civil lawsuits by “aliens” for “violations of the law of nations,” meaning courts should err against enforcing a law intended to punish egregious foreign conduct in the frequent instances when that conduct takes place in a foreign country.

“[T]here is no indication that the ATS was passed to make the United States a uniquely hospitable forum for the enforcement of international norms,” Justice Roberts wrote for the majority in Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum.

Roberts’ conclusion is rebutted by the very conduct the Alien Tort Statute was designed to prevent. Piracy was one of the primary torts targeted by Congress at the time of ATS’ passage – conduct that inherently takes place on the high seas. Justice Stephen Breyer explains in a four-justice concurring opinion that would decide the case on significantly narrower grounds:

As I have indicated, we should treat this Nation’s interest in not becoming a safe harbor for violators of the most fundamental international norms as an important jurisdiction related interest justifying application of the ATS in light of the statute’s basic purposes—in particular that of compensating those who have suffered harm at the hands of, e.g., torturers or other modern pirates. Nothing in the statute or its history suggests that our courts should turn a blind eye to the plight of victims in that “handful of heinous actions.

Now, that handful of heinous actions will have to find remedy elsewhere. This decision not only means that Nigerians cannot sue foreign corporations for their conduct abroad. On this particular point, the four-justice Breyer concurrence agreed that this case did not pass muster. Roberts’ sweeping pronouncement against extraterritoriality may also mean that foreign nationals subject to abuse, for example, at the hands of a U.S. corporation that houses its factories in places whose laws shield it from liability, or an American citizen who commits human rights violations abroad against foreigners, also could not be subject to suit in the United States.

In two recent federal appeals court decisions, lawsuits that challenged torture abroad by two foreign actors were allowed to proceed in U.S. courts because the defendants had lived or were living in the United States. As Justice Breyer points out, Congress is aware that the ATS is the basis for these sorts of lawsuits, and has not sought to amend the act in any way – likely because they recognize that the act was intended to target foreign conduct that is otherwise difficult to reach. But that did not stop the Roberts majority from inferring the narrowest possible congressional intent.

The scope of the opinion will not become clear until it is interpreted by courts. Extraterritoriality is a legal concept that asks not just whether conduct took place abroad, but also whether the claims “touch and concern the territory of the United States” such that a plaintiff can overcome the presumption against them. The only hint the court gives is that lawsuits against corporations will face a particularly heavy burden, noting, “Corporations are often present in many countries, and it would reach too far to say that mere corporate presence suffices.”

What is clear is that the presumption is exceedingly difficult to overcome, and that both individuals and corporations have a high chance of skirting liability simply by doing their dirty work elsewhere.

Reprint: High Court Squelches Ability to Hold Anyone Accountable for Any Human Rights Violations Abroad  – By Nicole Flatow |ThinkProgress

Related: Kiobel v. Shell Test Corporate Personhood –By Katie Redford | HuffPost

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My Two Cents: All the justices agreed the statute was inapplicable to the case at bar but for different reasons. In doing so, the SCOTUS served a major blow to human rights organizations that have used the statute, at least in recent times, to hold multinational corporations (MNCs) accountable for human rights violations committed against foreign nationals in their country of origin. Justice Roberts could have dismissed the case on a number of procedural grounds or simply deferred the case back to the lower court. Instead the majority used the case to redefine the ATS so narrowly as to render it useless. Why, I ask, was necessary to throw out the baby with the bath water? In my opinion, this case was not about policing the world or opening American courts to every frivolous claim of abuse on the planet.  This case was about a MNC, with significant ties to the U.S., allegedly committing gross human rights on foreign soil against U.S. foreign nationals.  MNCs are now free to set up shop in a foreign country, collude with host countries’ government for precious resources and land rights, pollute the soil and water, poison the air and have those who protest too much (or too loudly) summarily disappeared or executed w/o fear of being sued or held accountable in any meaningful way!

Silver lining: The SCOTUS left open the possibility that it might review other cases that are filed under the statute so long as the new elements and jurisdictional prerequisites are met.

 

G8 Agree War-Time Rape Is a Violation of Geneva Convention | Trustlaw

Nzigire Chibalonza lives in Minova. She is 60 years old. She was raped by three men on the night of 22 November 2012, when soldiers went on the rampage in the town. They were so brutal, she says, that she thought she would die. Image © Fiona Lloyd-Davies. DRC, 2013.

The world’s eight richest nations have reached a historic agreement to work together to end sexual violence in conflicts, Britain’s foreign minister William Hague announced on Thursday. Hague called the “horrific” use of rape and sexual violence as a weapon of war” one of the greatest and most persistent injustices in the world”. From Bosnia to Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo, rape has been used against hundreds of thousands of women and girls – inflicting unimaginable suffering, destroying families and fueling conflict, he said.

“To my mind, this cause is the slave trade of our generation,” said Hague, who was been hosting a two-day meeting of G8 foreign ministers in London.

Flanked by Zainab Bangura, the U.N. special representative on sexual violence in conflict, and Hollywood actress Angelina Jolie, another U.N. special envoy, Hague said G8 states had agreed on six major steps to tackle the culture of impunity. He also announced nearly $35.5 million (£23 million) in new funding from the G8 for the issue, including more than £10 million from Britain.

Declaring war-time rape a breach of the Geneva Conventions – also known as the laws of war – gives G8 nations the responsibility to seek out and prosecute perpetrators regardless of their nationality and wherever they are in the world.

The United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Canada and Russia will also back an international protocol setting out ideal standards for investigating rape and sexual violence. The aim is to increase the number of successful prosecutions by collecting the strongest possible evidence. Amnesties for sexual violence must never be included in peace treaties, the group agreed, pledging to improve training for military and police deployed to war zones. They are often the first to come into contact with survivors of rape.

G8 Reaches ‘Historic” Agreement to End Rape as Weapon of War | Trustlaw

Aftermath of a Mass Rape in Congo | Fiona Lloyd-Davis (Photo Gallery)

 

The Best & Worst Human Rights Developments of 2012 -By Mary McGuire | Freedom House

Today is the first day of the new year, 1 January 2013. Before embarking on the new year, I wanted to share a list compiled by Freedom House that reflects back on some of last year’s human rights developments. How did the world do following an eventful 2011?

Unfortunately, the bad seemed to outweigh the good this year, as many authoritarians held on to power and continued upheaval in the Middle East threatened to derail any democratic progress. Internal conflicts in a number of African countries boiled over, and the bulk of the former Soviet Union appeared to be moving in the wrong direction. Meanwhile, widely hailed political achievements in countries like Burma, Egypt and Georgia were complicated by negative twists.

Ongoing ethnic conflicts in Burma have undercut a recent democratic opening that was significant enough to allow the first visit by a U.S. president. Relatively free and competitive elections in Egypt have been overshadowed by continued unrest and authoritarian maneuvers by President Mohamed Morsi. In Georgia, what was considered a historic democratic transfer of power has been potentially jeopardized by what some regard as politically motivated prosecutions of former ruling party officials.

Though this list is far from exhaustive, the following were some of the best and worst human rights developments in 2012.

BEST 

LGBTI Victories in the Western Hemisphere:

There were several important victories in the battle for LGBTI rights in 2012, particularly in the United States and Latin America. A U.S. president voiced public support for gay marriage for the first time, and three states — Washington, Maryland and Maine — passed laws allowing same-sex marriage, bringing the total number of states with such rules to nine. In addition, the first openly gay woman was elected to the U.S. Senate. In Argentina, where same-sex marriage has been legal since 2010, the Senate passed legislation that allows gender to be legally changed without medical or judicial approval, and includes sex-change surgery and hormone treatment in government health insurance plans. The same month, Chile passed an anti-discrimination law that penalizes all forms of discrimination. Although not specifically written to protect LGTBI rights, the measure was spurred by the brutal killing an openly gay man. Even Cuba has jumped on the bandwagon, electing its first transgender person to municipal office. Same-sex marriage is also legal in Canada and some parts of Mexico. Sadly, for all of the progress seen in this hemisphere, the situation for LGBTI people has actually worsened in much of Eurasia and Africa.

Passage of the Magnitsky Act:

Russia’s human rights decline made it an easy choice for this year’s “worst” list, but one development is worthy of celebration — the passage by the U.S. Congress of the Magnitsky Act. The legislation is named after Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who died in jail after exposing a multi-million dollar fraud by Russian officials. It will place visa bans and asset freezes on Russian officials involved in human rights abuses. The bill received overwhelming bipartisan support as part of a larger measure that normalizes trade relations with Russia and Moldova. President Obama signed the legislation on December 14 despite harsh objections from the Kremlin. This law could set a precedent for how the United States and other free societies address gross human rights violations around the world. The European Parliament has endorsed the adoption of similar legislation.

Conviction of Charles Taylor:

In April, former Liberian president Charles Taylor became the first former head of state to be convicted of war crimes since World War II. He was sentenced in May by a UN-backed special tribunal to 50 years in prison for his role in a decade-long civil war in Sierra Leone. He was specifically found guilty of aiding and abetting the “commission of serious crimes including rape, murder, and destruction of civilian property” by rebel forces in that country. Taylor stepped down as Liberian president in 2003 amid serious domestic challenges to his rule and international calls for his resignation. His departure ended 14 years of intermittent civil war that had killed some 200,000 Liberians. He sought asylum in Nigeria, but was eventually handed over to the special tribunal.

Survival of the Tunisian Revolution:

While the freely elected transitional authorities in Tunisia have been buffeted by public frustration with high unemployment and pressure from conservative Islamists, the country has not yet suffered the fate of many of its neighbors in the aftermath of the 2011 Arab Spring. Varying degrees of instability and repression persist in Libya, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen and particularly Syria, but Tunisia has made slow if uneven gains in its democratic transition. The constitutional drafting process is creeping forward without the bitter conflicts seen in Egypt, and the ruling Ennahda party, which was at one time a radical Islamist faction, has largely followed through on its commitment to govern moderately and work peacefully with secular parties. As the country approaches the two-year anniversary of the revolution, however, economic struggles have led to anti-government protests, one of which left nearly 200 people wounded, and support for the ruling coalition has definitively waned. The constitution is two months overdue, and there have been some concerning violations of press freedom. Despite these challenges, Tunisia continues to provide a positive example to the wider region.

WORST

Civil War in Syria:

The civil war in Syria is the worst human rights and humanitarian catastrophe in the world today. The latest estimates put the death toll at 42,000, with no end in sight. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, an alarming number of reporters — 28 — have been killed while covering the conflict in 2012. President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has been on the verge of collapse for months, with many of his top advisers defecting or fleeing the country, yet he has vowed to remain in Syria, dead or alive. It is not even clear that his removal alone would end the fighting. Meanwhile, attacks by government forces on civilians in rebel-held areas are unceasing, and there are now concerns that the military is arming missiles with chemical weapons. Some rebel groups in the fragmented opposition have resorted to kidnapping and retribution killings, raising serious questions about postwar governance. No amount of diplomacy or international pressure has succeeded in convincing Russia to stop providing arms to government forces, or China to back broad-based demands for al-Assad to step down. And there is simply no political will within the United States or the rest of NATO to hasten the end of the conflict through direct intervention.

Devastation in Congo:

Over the past century, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, one of the most resource-rich countries on the African continent, has been gutted by a combination of colonialism, corrupt and ineffective government, ethnic conflict and a succession of armed militias and rebel groups that have raped and pillaged their way through the countryside, often using conscripted child soldiers. As many as five million people have died since the late 1990s. The fraudulent 2011 reelection of feckless president Joseph Kabila was followed by the mutiny of hundreds of ethnic Tutsi soldiers, who then formed the March 23 (M23) rebel movement, widely believed to be funded by neighboring Rwanda. In November, M23 invaded and took control of Goma, a provincial capital with a population of 1 million, leading nearly 140,000 people to flee their homes. The international community has largely turned a blind eye to the country’s seemingly endless crisis, perhaps because there does not appear to be an easy solution. On a positive note, international pressure forced M23 to vacate Goma after just a few weeks, and the United States and Britain, which had long tolerated Rwanda’s denials that it was contributing to the unrest, cut military aid to the country as a result of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. But these steps on their own appear unlikely end the fighting.

Coup and Extremism in Mali:

As in Congo, the horrific human rights situation in Mali was not caused by any single event. Rather it was a cascade of disasters that included a military coup, a reinvigorated Tuareg separatist movement, an influx of hard-line Islamist militants and the combined effects of long-term drought, poverty and corruption. This perfect storm has created a humanitarian crisis that demands international action. Northern Mali is now controlled by militant groups that blend radical Islam with transnational crime. These militants have quickly introduced a crude imitation of Sharia, banning music, destroying historic sites deemed “un-Islamic,” and summarily punishing alleged crimes like alcohol use and adultery. There are widespread reports of rape and forced marriage, as well as the recruitment of child soldiers. According to the latest UN report, over 200,000 people are currently displaced. The international community, deeply concerned by these violations as well as the broader security threat posed by such a sizeable haven for terrorists, has pressured what remains of the Malian government to overcome its internal divisions and prepare for an international invasion to reclaim the rebel-held north.

Russia’s Precipitous Decline:

Since Vladimir Putin’s tightly controlled reelection as president in March, the political situation in Russia has become increasingly dismal, with some experts comparing it to the Soviet era. As part of an escalating clampdown on anti-corruption activists and political opponents, the government has enacted numerous pieces of legislation that will have a harmful impact on human rights and the functioning of civil society. Most disturbingly, one new law requires civil society organizations that receive foreign funds to register as “foreign agents” or face possible criminal charges. In a related development, USAID was forced by the Russian government to withdraw from the country. Expanded definitions of “treason” and “espionage” in the penal code have opened the door for authorities to round up government critics as well as citizens who consult with foreign firms or simply monitor human rights abuses. Other repressive measures have recriminalized libel, curbed Internet freedom, outlawed “homosexual propaganda,” and imposed additional restrictions on public gatherings. Independent voices, some within the government, who have tried to speak out against this wave of legislation have been expelled, arrested or otherwise muzzled.

Repression in Bahrain, Other Gulf States:

After an independent report commissioned by Bahrain’s King Hamad uncovered widespread human rights abuses committed during the violent suppression of a protest movement in February 2011, the government promised to implement the recommended reforms. That was a year ago. Not only has the regime failed to enact anything other than minor cosmetic changes, seemingly designed to mollify the international community, it has also continued on a path of repression. Impunity for the security forces and censorship persist, and dozens of human rights activists remain imprisoned, including 2012 Freedom Award winners Abdulhadi al-Khawaja and his daughter Zainab. In recent weeks, the government has stepped up the pressure, banning “unlicensed” demonstrations and stripping 31 opposition members of their citizenship. Journalists and human rights groups, including Freedom House, have been repeatedly denied entry to the country to report on these abuses. Sadly, Bahrain is not the only Gulf state in decline. Several neighboring governments have begun to make some alarming moves to silence their critics. Deportations, travel bans and unexplained detentions, as well as disturbing new legal restrictions freedom of expression, have been seen in the United Arab Emirates. A ban on “unlicensed” peaceful demonstrations was passed in Kuwait. And Oman has jailed dozens of people for making critical comments about the regime.

The Menace of Blasphemy Laws:

The online dissemination of an offensive film that mocked Islam and sparked violent anti-American riots and protests in more than two dozen countries served as a reminder of the pernicious nature of laws that prohibit blasphemy in many parts of the world. These laws, which ban insults to religions and religious figures, not only have a chilling effect on free expression but are often used to justify violence, repress religious minorities, and settle personal grudges rather than combat intolerance. According to a Freedom House special report, there is no evidence that restricting speech reduces religious intolerance. In fact, the evidence shows that prohibitions on blasphemy actually lead to a wide range of human rights abuses. This does not prevent some Islamic leaders from using global bodies like the United Nations to push for international norms that prohibit blasphemy. In 2011, after enormous advocacy efforts by human rights groups and a number of countries including the United States, Canada and much of Europe, the push for this kind of legislation was replaced by a more circumspect call for the promotion of religious tolerance and dialogue. Sadly, these moderating efforts were endangered this year by yet another flare-up of religious outrage.

Reprint: The Best & Worst Human Rights Developments of 2012 -By Mary McGuire | Freedom House.

*This piece originally appeared on Freedom House’s blog, Freedom at Issue. To read the original, click here .

Related: Most Popular Human Rights Topics on Twitter in 2012 | HRW

 

The Delhi 14 | Gordon Brown

Just 72 hours ago in the Indian capital of Delhi 14 children were freed from slave labor. They were being held in dark, insanitary conditions and forced to work for up to 15 hours a day making Christmas decorations. Two were just eight years old.

The suffering of these young children, cruelly trafficked into slave labor, is the real Christmas story of 2012. Their plight must become a wake-up call for all concerned about the treatment of vulnerable children around the world. It demands we move immediately to ban all child labor.

The children rescued in Delhi had been beaten and intimidated. Imprisoned in dingy, locked rooms where they were forced to make Christmas goods with no access to light or fresh air. Malnourished and underfed, many had injuries as a result of using glass to make trinkets and because of violent assaults by their gangmasters. All had been sold into slavery and trafficked by middlemen.

The Christmas decorations and seasonal gifts they were making were for export from India to the West. There are near identical items on sale in shops in America and Europe right now.

The courageous morning break-in that freed the children from this slave labor was organized and carried out by Kailash Satyarthi and his co-leaders of Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA) and Global March Against Child Labour (GMACL). They faced violent resistance by the gangmasters and thugs.

Because the gangmasters had received a tip off that a raid would take place, most of the children had been whisked away from the workshop and 12 were incarcerated in a pitch-black cell no bigger than 6ft by 6ft.

Only with police help were the locks to the cell broken and all children rescued. They are now receiving rehabilitative care and arrangements are being made for them to go to school.

The ‘Delhi 14′ are just a few of the thousands of children forcibly conscripted into a multi-billion Christmas sweatshop trade in hundreds of hidden factories and workplaces. The child laborers are just a tiny proportion of the 15 million children under the age of 12 who do not go to school because they are forced to work.

Christmas is supposed to be a festive celebration but for the ‘Delhi 14′ it had become a nightmare of exploitation, cruelty, neglect and violence. Their suffering is amongst the most tragic Christmas tales of our times.

The cry for help of a child should be an international language we all are able to understand and respond to immediately.

We must now demand that before the Indian Parliament finishes its session on December the 20th legislation is passed banning all child labor for under fourteens and outlawing hazardous work for under eighteens.

Our petition on EducationEnvoy.org asks concerned citizens around the world to support our call to end child labor.

The figures of child exploitation makes appalling Christmas reading: of the 61 million children who do not go to primary school one in four work full-time. In Africa child labor is rising.

My report on child labor — published with the help of the Brookings Institution‘s Kevin Watkins and a number of organizations including the excellent Understanding Child Work project demonstrates — many children who go to school part-time also work part-time. In total, 215 million children are in some kind of employment.

More alarming is the number of children aged less than 12 who are involved in hazardous forms of labor, 90 million in total. These children are to be found risking their young lives down narrow tunnels mining for gold in Tanzania. They are working on cocoa farms in Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire or in garment factories in South Asia. More than half of these vulnerable children are trafficked, forced into prostitution or armed conflict. The anti-slavery organization Walk Free reports that in some parts of the world children as young as five and six are sold as slaves.

People assume all too readily that child labor will simply die out of its own accord. So we fail to press companies and consumers hard enough to demand the policing and enforcement of anti-child labor laws. For too long governments around the world have stood by and not taken sufficient action to eradicate child labor. That’s why I am now calling on governments, donors and UN agencies to come together and put in place the policies needed to get children out of exploitative employment and into education. Just as universal education was the catalyst a century ago for consigning child labor to the history books of the rich world, so it can free a generation of children today.

The new exposé of the children denied schooling because of child labor comes just six weeks after the Taliban’s shooting of Malala Yousafzai simply because she wanted to go to school. The world is discovering that in 2012 millions of children are forcibly prevented from attending lessons because of child labor, child marriage, child militias, child trafficking and the brutal discrimination against girls. In total 32 million girls and 29 million boys are denied their right to education.

We now know from these appalling new revelations the sheer scale, severity and depth of inhumane treatment visited upon young children, it is time for the U.N. to draw up a plan to end child slavery.

The education of all children cannot of course start to happen until we end the exploitation of children. 2012 must be the year when the casual complacency about the plight of 61 million out of school children ends, 2013 must be the breakthrough year that ushers in urgent and practical action. Let this year’s grim Christmas tale lead to a New Year resolution the world will honor – the end of child slavery once and for all.

Reprint: The Delhi 14 -By Gordon Brown | HuffPost

 

Number of Jailed Journalists in 2012 Sets Global Record | CPJ Special Report

Imprisonment of journalists worldwide reached a record high in 2012, driven in part by the widespread use of charges of terrorism and other anti-state offenses against critical reporters and editors, the Committee to Protect Journalists has found. In its annual census of imprisoned journalists, CPJ identified 232 individuals behind bars on December 1, an increase of 53 over its 2011 tally.

Large-scale imprisonments in Turkey, Iran, and China helped lift the global tally to its highest point since CPJ began conducting worldwide surveys in 1990, surpassing the previous record of 185 in 1996. The three nations, the world’s worst jailers of the press, each made extensive use of vague anti-state laws to silence dissenting political views, including those expressed by ethnic minorities. Worldwide, anti-state charges such as terrorism, treason, and subversion were the most common allegations brought against journalists in 2012. At least 132 journalists were being held around the world on such charges, CPJ’s census found.

Eritrea and Syria also ranked among the world’s worst, each jailing numerous journalists without charge or due process and holding them in secret prisons without access to lawyers or family members. Worldwide, 63 journalists are being held without any publicly disclosed charge.

Vietnam, Azerbaijan, Ethiopia, Uzbekistan, and Saudi Arabia rounded out the 10 worst jailers. In two of those nations, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan, the authorities used retaliatory charges such as hooliganism and drug possession to jail critical reporters and editors. In 19 cases worldwide, governments used a variety of charges unrelated to journalism to silence critical journalists. In the cases included in this census, CPJ determined that the charges were fabricated.

In Turkey, the world’s worst jailer with 49 journalists behind bars, the authorities held dozens of Kurdish reporters and editors on terror-related charges and a number of other journalists on charges of involvement in anti-government plots. In 2012, CPJ conducted an extensive review of imprisonments in Turkey, confirming journalism-related reasons in numerous cases previously unlisted on the organization’s annual surveys and raising the country’s total significantly. CPJ found that broadly worded anti-terror and penal code statutes have allowed Turkish authorities to conflate the coverage of banned groups and the investigation of sensitive topics with outright terrorism or other anti-state activity.

These statutes “make no distinction between journalists exercising freedom of expression and [individuals] aiding terrorism,” said Mehmet Ali Birand, a top editor with the Istanbul-based station Kanal D. Calling the use of anti-state laws against journalists a “national disease,” Birand said “the government does not differentiate between these two major things: freedom of expression and terrorism.” Among the imprisoned is Tayip Temel, editor-in-chief of Azadiya Welat, the nation’s sole Kurdish-language daily, who faced more than 20 years in prison on charges of being a member of a banned Kurdish organization. As evidence, the government has cited Temel’s published work, along with his wiretapped telephone conversations with colleagues and news sources.

Excerpt, read: Number of Jailed Journalists Sets Global Record | CPJ (Special Report)

Related: Database of Jailed Journalists

 

Mexican Mayor Maria Santos Gorrostieta Assassinated by Drug Cartel | Telegraph UK*

A doctor and mother of three, Maria Santos Gorrostieta served as mayor from 2008 to 2011. Over that time she survived at least two assassination attempts, including one that killed her husband Jose and another that left her body peppered with bullet holes and scars .

Although Mexico has been a producer of, and transit route for, illegal drugs for decades, in recent years the country has found itself caught up in violent turf wars between powerful and well-financed cartels. In 2006 Mexico’s newly-elected President Felipe Calderon launched a military assault on the gangs. But although some key players have been killed or captured, the carnage has continued. Indeed some claim it has got worse, due to splits between formerly allied cartels. Official estimates say 50,000 people have been killed since the crackdown began, but others put the toll at twice that.

Michoacan, known for growing illegal marijuana and poppy crops, has become a key battleground due to the shipments of cocaine which arrive on its Pacific coast from South America as well as chemicals from Asia for making synthetic methamphetamines. The main player is a group known as La Familia Michoacana, a cartel notorious for its grisly killings and beheadings.

In a country known for its machismo, it has often fallen to Mexican women to take on “los narcos”. Without weapons or financial resources, and often with no help from the police, women have come to the fore in an effort to improve the quality of life for their families and communities.

Like many others Maria Santos Gorrostieta focused on improving social services for her small town and left Mexico’s drug cartels to the federal police, explaining that “I have a responsibility toward my people, the children, women, elderly and men who each day rip apart their souls just to bring home a loaf of bread”. But that made no difference to the drug barons, who came for her anyway.

In October 2009 a group of gunmen shot her at least seven times in an ambush in which her husband was killed. Three months later, another armed gang opened fire on her brother’s car while she was in the passenger seat. Shortly afterwards she made the front pages after she went public with photographs of her wounds in Tiquicheo’s municipal newsletter. “I wanted to show you my wounded, mutilated body,” she wrote, “because I’m not ashamed of it. It’s living testimony that I am a strong and righteous woman, and despite my wounds, I’m still on my feet.”

The Mexico City Daily has also said that there were at least two other assassination attempts that she never reported.

Maria Santos Gorrostieta was born in 1976 and qualified in Medicine at a university in the city of Morelia. She never knew what she had done to upset the drug cartels, though she clearly incurred the animosity of La Familia Michoacana.

On November 12, according to the newspaper El Universal, Maria Santos Gorrostieta was driving her young daughter to school in the city of Morelia when she was ambushed by a gang of armed men who pulled her from her car and beat her up in full view of passers-by. Witnessess described how she begged the men to leave her child alone and then got into her abductors’ car, leaving her daughter, screaming but unharmed, in the road.

Five days later the badly mutilated body of a woman, who had evidently been tortured before she was killed, was found dumped by a roadside. It was later identified as Maria Santos Gorrostieta.

She is survived by her daughter and two sons as well as by her second husband, Nereo Delgado Patinoran.

*Maria Santos Gorrostieta, born 1976, found dead November 17 2012.

(I thought I posted this story a couple of weeks ago, my apologies for the delay.)

Reprint: Maria Santos Gorrostieta | Telegraph (Obiturary)

Related: Cartels Assassinate Outspoken Mexican Mayor | TYT (Video)