- Category: Statements
Indian authorities must immediately stop the reprisals against human rights defenders in Jammu and Kashmir, especially Khurram Parvez, Irfan Mehraj, and the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS) stated six international human rights organizations. Khurram Parvez has been arbitrarily detained since 22 November 2021 as a reprisal for his human rights work, including documentation and advocacy in Jammu and Kashmir. We are alarmed by new cases filed against Khurram Parvez and Irfan Mehraj, a journalist and human rights defender, in March 2023, and the ongoing reprisals against JKCCS.
- Category: Statements
For the last couple of years, Indonesia through its government has been romanticizing the criminalization of human rights defenders as a form of keeping civil society away from hoax or untruthful information. Although those that were stated by the human rights defenders were based on research and field practices, the government decided to sharpen their fangs with ‘defamation’ laws. The same pattern happened to Fatia Maulidiyanti and Haris Azhar, two of the prominent human rights defenders in Indonesia.
- Category: Statements
The National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) claims that House Bill (HB) No. 77 or the proposed Human Rights Defenders Protection Act (HRD Protection Act) is a “grave, vicious, and insidious threat against democracy.” This, however, is self-defeating for the task force. Since its formation, NTF-ELCAC has been known to maliciously tag dissenters and critics of the government as communists and rebels, thus opposing the essence of a true democracy in which dissent should not be limited, much less demonized.
- Category: Statements
Re: The Republic of Korea’s speedy accession to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and effective implementation to fulfil its responsibility as a global pivotal state
Dear President Yoon Suk-yeol,
We welcome the National Assembly’s assent to the Republic of Korea’s accession to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance on 8 December 2022. Now, we urge your government to speedily accede to the Convention, followed by declarations recognizing the competence of the Committee on Enforced Disappearances to receive and consider communications from individuals or other states parties under articles 31 and 32 of the Convention and measures to ensure effective domestic implementation of the Convention to fulfil the Republic of Korea’s responsibility as a global pivotal state.
- Category: Statements
A Joint Statement on the occasion of 10 December - International Human Rights Day 2022
Dhaka/ Bangkok/ Geneva/ Hong Kong/ Johannesburg/ Kuala Lumpur/ Manila/ Paris/ Washington DC, 09 December 2022: The undersigned human rights organisations commemorate all victims of human rights violations and stand in solidarity with the victims’ families in Bangladesh and across the world. This year’s International Human Rights Day’s slogan is “Dignity, Freedom, and Justice for All”. International Human Rights Day 2022 is being observed at a time when the human rights situation in Bangladesh continues to worsen. The absence of effective institutions to prevent political intolerance, undemocratic practices and human rights abuses has resulted in rampant impunity. The current authoritarian government has deprived the people of the benefits of good governance and administration of justice through the politicisation of various State institutions, including the judiciary and the Election Commission, and has severely repressed civil and political rights, including the rights to freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly, and freedom of association.
- Category: Statements
The Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) joins the international community in commemorating the 74th Anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). We gather to celebrate the fundamental freedoms that every human being is entitled to. On this day, AFAD renews its pledge to protect and promote human rights and fundamental freedoms for all and stands in solidarity with the countless families of the disappeared across the globe in their fight for truth and justice.
Over seven decades since the adoption of the Declaration in 1948, institutions, organizations, and individuals have worked relentlessly to ensure that human rights are protected and individuals are able to live a life of dignity. Yet, the international human rights community has observed a severe disregard for human rights in recent years as oppressive and populist regimes are coming to power. The inalienable rights mentioned in the UDHR have been under assault.
- Category: Statements
To defend human rights is inherently human. The promotion and fulfilment of human rights in the country involves the empowerment of the people in defense of human rights and the rule of law. The Families of Victims of Involuntary Disappearance (FIND) is driven by its steadfast search for truth and justice for the thousands of principled and committed activists who have been forcibly disappeared through decades, thus transforming family members of the disappeared to become human rights defenders (HRDs) themselves.
FIND strongly urges the government to enact and fully implement a Human Rights Defenders Protection law to attend to these victim-families in their long-drawn search for truth and elusive justice. In fact, HRDs and organizations dedicated to ending enforced disappearances and other human rights violations need to be protected.
- Category: Statements
The undersigned organisations call for the immediate and unconditional release of Kashmiri human rights defender Khurram Parvez, who was arrested one year ago on November 22, 2021 on politically motivated terrorism and other charges.
Parvez, the Coordinator of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS) and Chairperson of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD), has been a champion of human rights advocacy, documentation, and investigations including in the Jammu and Kashmir region, for over 20 years.