First Dog’s tips for the Grozny Cup
Human rights
Time to stand up for human rights in Sri Lanka — at last
It’s Sri Lanka Week, but rather than thinking about investments, perhaps we should focus on the 300,000 Tamils being imprisoned in an internment camp in the country, in direct violation of their human rights rights, writes Jake Lynch.
Can it ever be ethical to let women die?
So refusing an abortion should be a doctor’s right, even if that refusal may see a woman die? asks Leslie Cannold. Religious freedom is important, but it shouldn’t trump other human rights.
Let’s not regress to that dark Tampa chapter
The government hasn’t ‘gone soft’ on immigration, rather worldwide immigration is booming, with Australia’s numbers minuscule to many European nations. Let’s not go back to ignoring human rights, says Zhi Yan.
Has the US agreed to stop criticising Russia’s human rights abuses?
According to Russian newspaper Kommersant, the White House has agreed to stop mentioning Russia’s shabby human rights record, and ease up on the “democracy” evangalising, in return for better relations with the country.
busted 
The cruel craziness of Japan’s death row
It’s not just innocent people on death row that has Amnesty giving the Japanese legal system a swerve. Prisoners are being driven clinically insane and then executed anyway.
Behind the veil of Afghanistan’s women
Despite the billions pumped into the war in Afghanistan, women’s rights have barely changed since the rule of the Taliban, claims Globe and Mail, in an in-depth report on women in the conservative city of Kandahar.
The death penalty: clumsy, costly and morally dubious
Stories of grotesque bungles abound in death penalty literature, writes Lizzie O’Shea. So, why does the US continue to hand it out?
Greenwald: Obama’s Guantanamo closure was a sham
Obama’s pledge to close Guantanamo is the “biggest sham in American politics”: the administration just filed a legal brief [PDF] stating that detainees at Bagram Airfield have no constitutional rights whatsoever — including habeas corpus.
Treatment of asylum seekers in Thailand
Reports continue to appear of dreadful conditions and treatment of refugees and asylum seekers in countries such as Malaysia and Thailand, writes Andrew Bartlett.
World turns blind eye to North Korea’s labour camp abuse
The 200,000 prisoners in North Korea’s gulag subsist on a diet of corn and salt, live in rags, work 12- to 15-hour days and are regularly beaten and raped. So why aren’t the world’s leaders (or Bono) paying attention?
Criminalising the imagination
ast month, Christopher Handley, a collector of comic books, pled guilty to federal charges of importing and possessing obscene cartoon drawings of children; he faces a maximum prison sentence of 15 years.
Scientists argue for human rights approach to water
Fighting droughts with droits: as scientists warn that the world’s fresh water supplies will soon run critically short, and companies scramble to privatise them, some researchers and activists are calling for water to be labelled a basic human right.
Human rights good for Canadians but not for Australians
Canadians share with Australians many of the same values and have a similar outlook on life, however…
Shanghai hosts China’s first gay pride festival
China’s first ever Gay Pride festival was a victory for Shanghai activists and, they hope, a step toward gay rights in China. But it is not, as one observer put it, the great leap forward.
Chatting to “ordinary people” about human rights
The committee behind Australia’s National Human Rights Consultations has gone to great lengths to engage with ‘ordinary’ people, says Andrew Bartlett.
A win for Victoria’s Human Rights Charter
The tale of Victoria’s first successful human rights claim. What could this mean at a Federal level?
British soldiers protected by Human Rights Act
The UK Court of Appeal has ruled that British army chiefs can be sued over decisions taken in the midst of battle.
Tamils in Torres Strait
The Torres News has a piece on their website (and the front page of their dead tree version) about the recent arrival of fifty Tamil asylum seekers in the region. The style and detail of the story makes an interesting contrast to a lot of the mainstream media coverage of asylum seeker arrivals.
SA Labor government: “screws civil rights”
New legislation presently consuming our country under the guise of anti-biker laws is no more than a deliberate attempt to destroy our civil rights, writes Mark Aldridge.
Guy Rundle misinformed on Israel
Guy Rundle demonstrates what seems to be his own “long slide to paranoia” and conspiracy theory in “Israel’s de facto apartheid”, writes Dr Colin Rubenstein.
