Africa

Photos of the cakes, some topped with genitalia fashioned out of fondant icing, went viral online.

Working as a journalist in Zimbabwe has been particularly hazardous for investigative journalists in a country that makes regular appearances in global top rankings of corruption. Zimbabwe’s press freedom remains fragile. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS

By Ignatius Banda
BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Jan 19 2021 (IPS)

A long-running gag says “in Zimbabwe there is freedom of speech, but no freedom after the speech”. But for journalists and activists who have been forced to endure nights in the country’s overcrowded and filthy holding cells, this is no laughing matter as prison inmates have no personal protective equipment to guard against COVID-19.

And when government spokesperson Nick Mangwana warned ominously last year that, “No one is above the law,” it only confirmed what many here have always feared: that the ruling Zanu PF party will not hesitate to arbitrary apply the law to silence critics.

Mangwana’s comments had come after the arrest of journalist Hopewell Chin’ono, who was accused of using social media to foment public violence.

Chin’ono was back behind bars on Jan. 8 on charges of posting “fake news” on Twitter.

Soon after Chin’ono’s arrest, opposition Movement for Democratic Change – Alliance (MDC-A) spokesperson Fadzayi Mahere and Job Sikhala, an opposition legislator who also serves as a MDC-A vice chairperson, were also detained by the police for posting the same story Chin’ono had shared on social media.

The widely-shared story alleged that a police officer attempting to enforce COVID-19 restrictions had aimed his baton stick at a woman carrying a child, but fatally struck the child instead.

According to reports, the child died on the spot. Police, however, dismissed the story as fake news despite video footage of the mother wailing that the police officer had killed her child. 

The arrests were immediately condemned by rights defenders with Amnesty International, which demanded their release.

“The latest arrests are part of a growing crackdown on opposition leaders, human rights defenders, activists, journalists and other critical voices,” said Muleya Mwananyanda, Amnesty International’s deputy director for southern Africa said in a statement dated Jan. 13.

“Zimbabwean authorities must immediately and unconditionally release and drop the malicious charges against them,” Mwananyanda said.

However, it is the arrest of Chin’ono – for the third time in six months – that has placed the spotlight back on Zimbabwe’s fragile press freedom, where critics say journalism has for years remained a dangerous occupation for a country not in a warzone.

It has been particularly hazardous for investigative journalists in a country that makes regular appearances in global top rankings of corruption.

“I was jailed after exposing corruption,” Chin’ono wrote last year after his first arrest, which came after the authorities criticised the media for allegedly reporting falsehoods about members of President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s family being involved in shady COVID-19 equipment procurement deals which prejudiced the country of millions of United States dollars.

Chin’ono’s exposé reportedly led to the firing of Zimbabwe’s health minister, yet it was to prove to be just the beginning of the investigative journalist’s brushes with the law for his work reporting corruption in high places.

“The onslaught on investigative journalists is part of the administration’s hostile campaign against human rights defenders,” Tawanda Majoni, an investigative journalist and National Coordinator of the Information for Development Trust, a local media NGO, told IPS.

“Media freedom campaigners have done a spirited job, but what they can achieve will always be severely limited in a repressive regime,” he told IPS.

According to Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index of 2019, Zimbabwe ranked 158 out of 180 countries making it one of the most corrupt in the world.

“In Southern Africa, journalists and others working to expose corruption face an unacceptable level of risk,” Transparency International said in a statement last year.

The international press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders ranked Zimbabwe number 126 out of 180 countries in the 2020 World Press Freedom Index, making the southern African country one of the worst places to work as a journalist.

“Zimbabwe’s serious abuses of press freedom, free expression and the rights of government critics are worsening as the year begins,” Dewa Mavhinga, Human Rights Watch southern Africa director, told IPS.

“It seems there are some within government who wish to undermine Zimbabwe’s re-engagement efforts through their reckless abuses that entrench the pariah state image,” Dewa told IPS.

The European Union in Zimbabwe also added its condemnation of the arrest of Chin’ono, Sikhala and Mahere, posting on Twitter on Jan. 13 that “the current pre-trial detentions, delays of proceeding without serious charges are questionable”, while the Dutch Embassy in Harare reminded the country’s minister of foreign affairs Sibusiso Moyo the commitments Zimbabwe made on Dec. 9 at the World Press Freedom Conference to increase the safety of journalists.

The crackdown continues almost six years after the disappearance of journalist and activist Itai Dzamara whose whereabouts remain unknown but is widely feared dead. 

“We have a government that is driven by paranoia and doesn’t want to be held accountable,” Nqaba Matshazi, of the Media Institute for Southern African (MISA) – Zimbabwe chapter, told IPS.

While police say Chin’ono faces up to 20 years in prison, his lawyers are challenging the constitutionality of the charges and the journalist remains defiant in a country where media activists say journalists are shying away from probing investigative journalism for fear of arrests. 

“The persecution of investigative and other journalists routinely face has several retrogressive effects, among them fear, self-censorship and capture. When you see a journalist being brought to court in leg irons for posting a Tweet, you naturally wonder whether if your next story is worth dying for,” said Majoni.

Human rights attorneys say it has been particularly frustrating defending journalists.

“Journalists are being arrested for doing their job and our real challenge is that the arrests show an increase in the monitoring of journalists’ social media activity,” Roselyn Hanzi, executive director of the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, who are representing Chin’ono and other journalists and citizens arrested under questionable charges, told IPS.

“Despite constitutional provisions, what is required are administrative reforms to weed out bad apples in the system and also human rights training for institutions that have become very partisan,” Hanzi told IPS.

There are concerns however that there still are no critical voices emerging from regional bodies, which analysts say could be emboldening impunity and continued human rights violations in Zimbabwe.

“The silence and indifference of Zimbabwe’s neighbours like South Africa, SADC and the African Union has emboldened rogue elements with the Zimbabwe regime to go for broke,” Mavhinga told IPS. 

“But tyranny has a witness and one day there will be justice and accountability for all the abuses,” Mavhinga said.

 

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French court’s landmark decision is a new milestone in fighting environmental disasters

By Kamal Ahmed
Jan 19 2021 (IPS-Partners)

The recent verdict by a French court stopping the deportation of an unnamed Bangladeshi on the grounds of deadly air pollution in Dhaka has raised eyebrows among many of us. In some of our newspapers and portals, an undertone of ridicule and aspersion against the assumed lack of patriotism in him was evident. Environmentalists, however, celebrated it as a landmark ruling as governments will now have to take tackling air pollution as a matter of urgency to prevent mass migration. For the last few decades, we have heard a lot about climate refugees, mostly as a result of forced displacements following extreme natural events or disasters caused by climate change. However, the person in question is probably the first legally recognised “pollution” refugee of the world.

This verdict also has special significance as it comes after a ruling by the United Nations Human Rights Committee from a year ago, stating that it would be unlawful for governments to return people to countries where their lives might be threatened by the climate crisis. The UN decision was largely a symbolic one as it did not have any legal binding on any country, which the French court’s ruling has on its national government. It has special significance due to the fact that the appeals court not only upheld the man’s plea on the increased risks of premature death, it further observed that the drugs that the man was receiving in France were not available in Bangladesh.

There is no question about the lethal danger in the quality of air in Dhaka. Its deterioration during winter is particularly noticeable. According to the United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) BreathLife campaign, Dhaka’s air quality is 5.7 times over the safe level recommended by the World Health Organization. It is well-known that many elderly people with breathing problems, in recent years, have been forced to leave Dhaka to other parts of the country in search of fresher air. But, shockingly, air quality in many other cities are even worse, as the BreathLife data shows—Khulna and Barishal both have over eight times the safe level. It puts the number of deaths annually in Bangladesh from air pollution at 166,598 and worryingly enough, the quality of air indoors is not less harmful than outdoor air quality.

The reasons behind air pollution are not unknown—it mostly comes from brick kilns, the fumes coming out of automobiles and industrial chimneys and dust generated from the construction work of various infrastructure projects and ever expanding urbanisation. Environmentalists allege that the government response to combatting air pollution is at best a feeble one. It is true that the government has taken some actions against the polluting brick kilns. However, it has failed to take any meaningful steps to ensure setting up Air Treatment Plants at large industrial units and reduce emissions from traffic. Banning older polluting vehicles from plying the roads to restricting imports of such automobiles have been deferred repeatedly due to political pressure from some vested groups. The irony, however, is that while French automobiles are rarest of the rare on Dhaka’s streets, the largest beneficiaries of exporting the worst polluting vehicles, including diesel run and used or refurbished ones to Bangladesh, are the countries in Asia—namely India, Japan and China.

A few years ago, there was quite a global stir when it emerged that some companies were selling fresh air in bags or cans. Soaring air pollution in world cities created demands for fresh air and some innovative entrepreneurs came up with a solution that was as unthinkable as it was expensive. And the obvious market was China, which at that time had the worst ranking of urban air pollution in the world. A BBC report then quoted the price of a bottle of fresh air at USD 24, which holds around 160 breaths—15 pence or about Tk 12 for one breath. A Canadian company named Vitality used to collect air from the Canadian Rockies and compress it into containers. Later, they entered the Indian market too. A few other companies, including some British ones, also joined to exploit this opportunity, reported The Guardian a year later. I wonder whether it would shock anyone if we discover that those fresh air bottles have a market in Dhaka too.

In this context, the court victory by one of our fellow countryman in France should be welcomed. There is more than one reason to see it as a positive development. It will certainly make government leaders in Western countries look at the issue of climate migration in urgency and assist developing and vulnerable nations with more resources to tackle pollution. Until they do, rights groups will be able to explore legal recourse to help migrants with health conditions linked to pollution. Big corporations will also face closer scrutiny in relocating polluting industries to developing countries.

Besides, governments in the worst affected countries will face increased domestic pressure to act sooner and more decisively as pollution becomes an important factor in hurting the image of the country. However, there is nothing more effective than resistance from within.

Kamal Ahmed is an independent journalist based in London.

This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh

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Excerpt:

French court’s landmark decision is a new milestone in fighting environmental disasters

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By Mandeep Tiwana
NEW YORK, Jan 19 2021 (IPS)

Two events generated significant interest and global solidarity in the final days of December 2020. A court in Saudi Arabia handed down a five years and eight months sentence to activist Loujain Al-Hathloul for publicly supporting women’s right to drive. Nicholas Opiyo, Ugandan human rights lawyer and defender of persecuted members of the LGBTQI community and political opponents of the president was arbitrarily detained on trumped up charges of ‘money laundering.’ Nicholas Opiyo was granted bail on 30 December following an outpouring of global support for his activism for justice. In handing out the verdict to Loujain Al-Hathloul, the court partly suspended her sentence raising hope that she might be released from prison in a couple of months due to time already served.

As we await the release of Loujain Al-Hathloul and an end to judicial harassment of Nicholas Opiyo it’s notable that their struggles for justice are not unlike those of Sudha Bharadwaj, general secretary and voice of conscience of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties in Chhattisgarh, India or that of Teresita Naul, sixty-three year old committed advocate for health and social services in the Philippines. In Honduras, the Guapinol Water Defenders exposing harmful mining activities should have been receiving a national award. Instead, like Nicaraguan economic justice activist Maria Esperanza Sanchez Garcia and their fellow human rights defenders above, they’re languishing in prison.

It’s an anathema that in the 21st century when humanity claims to have made great progress in cultural and technological spheres that we should still have prisoners of conscience. The right to a fair trial and due process under the law are part of customary international law. Yet, around the world, thousands of rights defenders are wrongfully imprisoned following flawed trials for their peaceful efforts to create just, equal and sustainable societies. It’s no secret that public spirited work that exposes wrongdoing by the powerful or seeks justice for the excluded has become exceedingly dangerous in the past few years. This trend bears out in democracies, dictatorships and in countries with hybrid regimes.

In December last year, the CIVICUS Monitor – a participatory research platform that tracks enabling conditions for the work of human rights defenders globally – released its annual People Power Under Attack report. The findings reveal that 87 percent of the world’s population live in countries with poor civic space conditions. Civic space is the bedrock of open and democratic societies. It’s predicated on the ability of concerned individuals and civil society groups to organise, participate and communicate without hindrance to actively shape the social, political and economic structures around them.

Struggles for justice and rights hinge on the free exercise of civic freedoms of association, peaceful assembly, and expression recognised by international law and are included in the bill of rights of almost every country. Nonetheless, over a quarter of people live in countries that have completely ‘closed’ civic space where conditions are so terrible that those who express dissent and defend rights are routinely imprisoned, injured or killed. The list of such countries is long and forbidding, stretching from China to Cuba.

One might expect a momentous event like a pandemic which has caused huge amounts of suffering to open the doors for more compassionate governance. But the COVID-19 pandemic seems to have accelerated negative civic space trends. Our research shows that several governments have ramped up censorship and surveillance of human rights defenders to suppress criticism when they should have been prioritising access to information and making space for open and constructive dialogue with civil society.

In too many places, activists fighting for things as basic as equality before the law or women’s rights over their bodies or free and fair elections are being arbitrary imprisoned and subjected to the full force of the law and more for peaceful acts of civil disobedience. In the past few years, people’s mobilisations against leaders with authoritarian tendencies in places as diverse as Belarus and Uganda have been met with unusual cruelty.

Yet, people power managed to force a constitutional referendum in 2020 to make Chile an economically fairer place, and made futile a president’s attempt to unconstitutionally hold on to power in Malawi. In the United States, a historical reckoning with racist law enforcement through the Black Lives Matter protests helped bring out the vote in record numbers and defeat a delinquent president in the elections. In the final days of 2020, Argentina passed legislation to legalise abortion following years of determined activism by advocates for women’s sexual and reproductive rights.

Presently, a huge peaceful mobilisation is taking place by farmers and their supporters on the outskirts of India’s capital, Delhi against hurriedly drawn up legislation that supports big business interests and was pushed through parliament without adequate consultation and debate. Illustratively, the country’s present government which has shown scant respect for democratic norms is already trying to paint the protestors as ‘misguided’ or acting at the behest of outside forces.

In the end people power needs public support to counter vilification and criminalisation of rights defenders. The cost of repression is enormous for both the persecuted individuals and their loved ones. It took 27 years of people’s mobilisations and international pressure to secure Nelson Mandela’s release from apartheid prisons. It doesn’t have to be the same for Buzurgmeher Yoruv, a Tajik human rights lawyer who’s presently serving a 22 year sentence for defending members of the political opposition in his country.

Global solidarity did help secure the release of intrepid rights defender and advocate for the democratic rights of the Bahraini people, Nabeel Rajab in June last year. Just before Christmas, the IWACU4 Burundian journalists who were imprisoned merely for their investigative reporting on security matters following a flawed trial were granted a pardon. Nevertheless, the struggle for the release of other prisoners of conscience continues.

Even if the cascading impact of civic space restrictions seems heavy today, history shows us that another way is possible through the manifestation of people power. It’s vital not to forget the sacrifices of those who fight for our rights and are persecuted for their pursuit of justice. Let’s hope 2021 will be a better year for them. We all have a responsibility to act in the spirit of global solidarity to remove this collective blot on our humanity.

Mandeep Tiwana is chief programmes officer at CIVICUS, the global civil society alliance. To learn more about CIVICUS’s #StandAsMyWitness campaign to free imprisoned human rights defenders, click here. The People Power Under Attack 2020 report can be accessed here.

 

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The death of Shannon Wasserfal sparked protests in Namibia against sex and gender based violence.

Secretary-General António Guterres and Donald Trump, at a UN briefing. Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elias

By Asoka Bandarage
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka, Jan 19 2021 (IPS)

According to the mainstream narrative, President Trump’s incitement of his supporters during the certification of Joe Biden’s electoral victory led to the ‘insurrection’ at the US Capitol on January 6, resulting in the banning of Trump’s social media accounts and his second impeachment by Congress.

According to so-called ‘conspiracy theories,’ however, the victory of the November Presidential elections was ‘stolen’ from Trump through electoral fraud and the storming of the Capitol was staged or allowed to happen in order to impeach Trump and prevent him from coming back to power in 2024.

It may be even more complicated; a report by the Swiss Policy Research website, for example, suggests that the right-wing QAnon movement, heavily supportive of Trump and prominent at the event, like Russiagate, is the product of an FBI psyop (psychological operation) launched to discredit Trump.

The public may never know the truth behind the January 6 events, the mysterious ‘Deep State’ or the growing polarization between so-called pro-Trump white supremacist, ‘domestic terrorists’ and the anti-Trump multicultural, progressive liberals.

However, the search for peace, justice and democracy at this critical time requires transcending simplistic polarizations and understanding the systemic roots of the conflict that is tearing America apart.

Polarization

Donald Trump is a member of the ruling elite representing its own interests. His assaults on the environment and mismanagement of the Covid pandemic has put the entire country at risk. While claiming to represent the interests of the alienated and underprivileged white population, he introduced massive tax cuts and corporate deregulation worsening their social and economic position.

His rhetoric against minorities and immigrants has exacerbated racial and ethnic tensions and political extremism.

Joe Biden and the Democratic Party, heavily funded by the billionaire class, also represent elite interests at the expense of the general population. Under the Obama administration, economic inequality increased and Black poverty, mass unemployment and police brutality persisted.

The identity-focused rhetoric of liberals has stimulated racial and ethnic politics, and the rise of groups like Black Lives Matter (BLM). Often portrayed as progressive and “radical,” BLM has been significantly co-opted by corporate liberal interest and has received extensive funding from leading corporations including Amazon and Microsoft.

The corporate media has aided and abetted disunity and violence by silencing moderate and alternative voices that seek to understand and question the motives and strategies of both pro and anti -Trump extremists.

The polarization of politics and media hinder and mask an understanding and dialogue needed to move forward. For example, is there an equal risk of fascism, albeit more insidious, arising from the corporate liberals opposing Trump?

Reclaiming Perspective

A handful of corporations led by big tech and finance control the US political process and practically all aspects of society. The overwhelming focus on identity politics deflects attention from the dangers of deepening techno-corporate control and the destruction of freedom of speech.

The events of January 6 have already contributed to plans for a federal law against ‘domestic terrorism’ and the criminalization of dissent, which would likely be based on the 2019 Confronting the Threat of Domestic Terrorism Act introduced by California Representative Adam Schiff. Anti-terrorism acts, such as the Patriot Act, are notorious for their use in crushing dissent and marginalized groups.

Systemic violence and repression are not new to the United States. The noble ideals of democracy, freedom and human rights aside, the United States was founded on plunder of the land and exploitation of people ¬– Native Americans, Blacks, Asians as well as underprivileged whites.

Likewise, the American Empire was established and maintained with systematic plunder and exploitation and massive military and political interventions around the world that continue today.

The costly military adventures (now up to 2021’s approved $740 billion military budget), along with global economic shifts such as manufacturing and job outsourcing and displacement by technology, impoverished large segments of the US population, both white and people of color.

Corporate deregulation and the decimation of labor unions weakened the working class and strengthened corporate authoritarianism. In recent decades, Republican and Democratic parties have differed little in their pursuit of corporate and imperial interests.

While the United States has had a history of social movements for people’s rights including labor and civil rights, recent initiatives for systemic change have experienced serious setbacks. The anti-globalization movement that came to prominence during the WTO (World Trade Organization) meetings in Seattle in 1999 was undermined by the Patriot Act (with Joe Biden being a key architect) and other policies introduced soon after the 9/11 terror attacks.

The Occupy Wall Street movement that emerged following the 2008 financial crisis and its slogan ‘We are the 99%’ brought attention to the excesses of the financial sector and growing economic inequality. But this movement also dissipated, largely due to state and corporate tactics of division, repression and propaganda to reinstate the narrative.

In the electoral realm, despite an unprecedented grass roots movement backing him, Bernie Sanders was blocked from winning the Democratic presidential nomination by the party elite in both 2016 and 2020.

The ideals of true socioeconomic reform have been squashed and subverted by the liberal establishment adopting the language of the progressive left but equating justice with racial and gender diversity and downplaying economic equality. This reframing channels the progressive energy away from threatening corporate control and profit, into a safe zone of identity politics, which only further divides and disempowers the general population.

Techno-oligarchy

Just as unemployed and uninsured Americans are pleading for support during the Covid crisis, the combined wealth of US billionaires ‘surpassed $1 trillion in gains since March 2020 and the beginning of the pandemic,’ according to a study by the Institute for Policy Studies.

The top five US billionaires – Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Warren Buffett and Larry Ellison – saw their wealth grow by a total of $101.7 billion, or 26%, during this short period. The increasing digitalization of life during this period represent an enormous augmentation of the political and ideological power of the technocratic oligarchs.

Silicon Valley tech firms, financial supporters of Joe Biden, withdrew attention from issues potentially harmful to his campaign. Even some left-leaning media platforms like the Intercept refused to publish an article critical of Biden just before the election. It led its co-founder, investigative journalist, Glen Greenwald to resign from the Intercept.

Social media companies swiftly deleted the accounts of President Trump and thousands of others following the January 6 event in Capitol Hill on grounds that they incite violence and extremism.

While hate speech and incitement of violence should not be allowed, should a handful of unrepresentative, unregulated tech corporations, such as Facebook, Twitter, Google and YouTube exercise social and political control that exceed that of the state elected to represent people’s interests? Who decides what is appropriate and inappropriate and on what grounds?

Clearly, democratic policies and institutions are needed to oversee the First Amendment right of free speech. Elizabeth Warren, a candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination, called for corporate accountability and planned to introduce policies for deregulation including the break-up of monopolistic companies like Facebook, Amazon and Google.

However, given lack of support from the dominant corporate wing of the Democratic party, Warren was not able to secure even the Vice-Presidential nomination over Kamala Harris, the choice of the liberal corporate establishment.

System Change

The mainstream narrative propagated around the world paints a rosy picture of a return to a post-Trump era of freedom and democracy with the Biden-Harris inauguration on January 20. However, even if Trump is debarred from running for office in 2024, the attitudes and grievances of 70 million or more Americans who voted for him are unlikely to dissipate without serious efforts for change from those in power, and not just a return to corporate-dominated gesture-liberalism.

Indeed, all the issues of polarization and the inherent racism of society cannot be reduced to economic inequality and corporate dominance. Yet there has to be a recognition of the suffering and despair of ordinary people on both sides, be they incarcerated Blacks or unemployed whites.

As economic inequality deepens and the middle class disappears, vast segments of people of color as well as whites have become economically desperate and politically alienated from the status quo.

In the absence of genuine leaders to unite people and bring fundamental change, self-interested parties exploit and fuel discontent, anger and hatred by directing it towards each other. Use of epithets such as, ‘criminals and rapists’ against Latino immigrants by Trump and ‘basket of deplorables’ against Trump supporters by Hillary Clinton, have only fueled division and animosity.

Political ‘street warfare’ between the extreme right Trump supporters and extreme left antifascist groups is now a common occurrence across the US.

It is urgent that more and more people speak up and help move society beyond the polarization that is helping solidify techno-corporate totalitarianism and the police state. The us vs. them, good vs. bad dualism needs to be overcome with an appreciation of inherent human and planetary interdependence and the need for freedom and justice for all.

To quote the words of Robert F. Kennedy on the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. on June 6, 1968:

“In this difficult day, in this difficult time for the United States, it is perhaps well to ask what kind of a nation we are and what direction we want to move in. [Y]ou can be filled with bitterness, with hatred, and a desire for revenge. We can move in that direction as a country, in great polarization…filled with hatred toward one another. Or we can make an effort … to understand and to comprehend, and to replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand with compassion and love… What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black.”

 

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The post Capitol Hill ‘Insurrection’ appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Dr Asoka Bandarage, a scholar and practitioner, has taught at Yale, Brandeis, Mount Holyoke (where she received tenure), Georgetown, American and other universities and colleges in the U.S. and abroad. Her research interests include social philosophy and consciousness; environmental sustainability, human well-being and health, global political-economy, ethnicity, gender, population, social movements and South Asia.

The post Capitol Hill ‘Insurrection’ appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Jan 19 2021 (IPS)

Covid-19 infection and death rates in the Western world and many developing countries in Asia and Latin America have long overtaken East Asia since the second quarter of 2020. Perhaps unsurprisingly, considering prevailing Western accounts of the Asian financial crises, there have been no serious efforts to draw policy lessons from East Asian contagion containment.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Lockdowns necessary?
Although most East Asian economies have successfully contained the pandemic without nationwide ‘stay in shelter lockdowns’, many governments have seen such measures as necessary. But lockdowns are blunt measures, with inevitable adverse consequences, especially for businesses and employment.

Many countries have thus imposed lockdowns, citing China’s response in Wuhan. But as the first WHO fact-finding mission to China noted, “The majority of the response in China, in 30 provinces, was about case finding, contact tracing, and suspension of public gatherings—all common measures used anywhere in the world to manage [infectious] diseases.

Lockdowns were limited to a few cities where contagion went “out of control in the beginning”. The key lesson from China was “all about…speed. The faster you can find the cases, isolate the cases, and track their close contacts, the more successful you’re going to be.”

To be sure, lockdowns ‘flatten the curve’ by temporarily preventing further contagion. But unless accompanied by appropriate complementary measures, undetected infectious individuals may cause silent community transmission that becomes evident only too late. Instead of lockdowns, it is far more prudent to find and isolate cases before numbers become unmanageable.

South Korean lessons
The Republic of Korea was the first country to dramatically reduce the number of Covid-19 cases and related deaths without nationwide movement restrictions. It checked the spread of Covid-19 infections without imposing lockdowns, even in Daegu its most infected city.

Mass testing has been key to its response, doing the most by mid-March. By late March, Korea’s newly confirmed cases had fallen from second to eighth place in the world. Meanwhile, Korean authorities urged physical distancing, personal hygiene and remote work while discouraging mass gatherings.

The government also had legal authority to collect phone, credit card and other data to expedite contact tracing, and initially only restricted incoming travellers from Hubei province, where Wuhan is, for precautionary reasons, and from Japan in political retaliation.

Just as China had rapidly identified pathogen characteristics using artificial intelligence and big data access, Korea innovatively deployed new technologies to expedite rapid responses to trace, test, treat and isolate those infected.

Lessons from Vietnam
Three months ago, a Vietnamese official described how “Vietnam is fighting Covid without pitting economic growth against public health”. Besides testing and contact-tracing, “the government has depoliticised the pandemic, treating it purely as a health crisis, allowing for effective governance”.

Hence, there is “no political motive for government officials to hide information, as they don’t face being reprimanded if there are positive cases in their authority area that are not due to their mistakes”.

He noted that “With the head of the Hanoi centre for disease control being arrested for suspected corruption in relation to the purchase of testing kits, and small traders getting fines for price-gouging face-masks, the government has also been clear that public health cannot be entangled with commercial interests”.

After China announced its first infections and deaths in January 2020, “Vietnam tightened its border and airport control of Chinese visitors. This wasn’t an easy decision, given that cross-border trade with China accounts for a significant part of the Vietnamese economy”.

Vietnam also “took precautionary measures above and beyond World Health Organization recommendations”. Preparations started “a week before the outbreak was officially declared a public health emergency of international concern, and more than a month before WHO declared Covid-19 a pandemic”.

The communist-led government also ensured “freedom of information on Covid-related matters”. “Lockdown and isolation are more selective” from the outset, without resorting to nationwide lockdowns, as has happened elsewhere without much benefit.

Vietnam is one of the few countries with “positive GDP growth” in 2020; “the supposed trade-off between the economy and public health… looks to be something of a false choice”.

In their war, Vietnam is believed to have lost over three million people compared to 58,209 US lives. In fighting the virus, Vietnam, with 97 million people, has lost 35 lives so far, while the US, with a 332 million population, has lost almost four hundred thousand.

Mass testing crucial
After a year of living with Covid-19, all governments can learn a great deal from critical evaluation of their own country experiences, other experiences as well as accumulated, especially new knowledge relevant to feasible policy options.

Thus far, appropriate East Asian policy measures for rapid early detection, isolation and contact tracing, while protecting the most vulnerable and treating the infected, have succeeded in flattening the curve.

More reliable, cheaper methods (e.g., ‘lateral-flow’ antigen tests) allow more frequent mass testing. As undetected cases are more likely to spread infection, such tests enable more frequent, faster and easier testing and quicker results, and facilitate faster, more efficacious actions.

This can help check contagion by identifying more of those infected earlier, thus reducing transmission. Even though less accurate than supposed ‘gold standards’, lower costs allow more widespread and frequent testing to identify many more of those infected.

Easier to administer and delivering results more rapidly, such cheaper, simpler and quicker tests more speedily detect the infected, especially among the asymptomatic, in time for appropriate and timely action.

As SARS-CoV-2 transmission peaks several days after infection, together with the viral load, more frequent testing is necessary to check contagion. More frequent mass testing is probably going to detect many more of those infected much earlier, while they are still infectious.

Look East
In the early 20th century, a young Cambridge-trained doctor, Wu Lien Teh returned to practice in the British colony of Penang where he mobilised thousands against the opium trade. The authorities arrested him, forcing him to seek employment outside the British empire.

He eventually found work with China’s Ching emperor in Manchuria where a plague was raging, eventually claiming 60,000 lives. Recognising it as pneumonic, Wu recommended use of multi-layered masks he designed to protect users against airborne infection, now recognised as forerunner of the N95 mask.

His later analysis of the socio-behavioural determinants of zoonotic transmission of the epidemic was also pioneering. Sadly, a famous French doctor Gerald Mesny, who rejected Wu’s mask advice as diagnostically wrong, died of the plague soon after arrival.

Over a century later, and over two decades after the 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis exposed the systemic financial fragility creating conditions for the 2008-2009 global financial crisis, the reluctance to learn from the East continues, ignoring Prophet Muhammad’s advice to ‘seek knowledge, even unto China’.

 

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Demonstrators angered by high unemployment and an economic crisis clash with police.

The shooting dead of striking miners in 1949 continues to have resonance in Nigeria today.

Cape Verde are forced to withdraw from the Men's Handball World Championship in Egypt after squad is decimated by Covid-19.

Online services were restricted ahead of last week's vote, and social media remains blocked.

Nadia Helmy Ahmed

By Sania Farooqui
NEW DELHI, India, Jan 18 2021 (IPS)

As a Muslim woman born and brought up in Denmark, Nadia Helmy Ahmed broke many stereotypes when she started boxing at the age of 15. “Back then it was not common for girls to take up elite boxing, let alone common for Muslim girls, I used to be the only girl in my gym, along with ten others boys,” said Nadia to IPS News.

Elite boxing is defined by who the boxers fight, how they fight and how they handle top ranked competition on a consistent basis. Nadia has been an elite boxer for over 15 years, and is one of the only ten Danish women in the sport, representing Denmark in world championships.

“Being a girl in a male dominated sport means that you have to learn to deal with all the obstacles that come with it, sometimes you are treated differently, both from inside the community of the sport and outside from the Muslim community as well. Sometimes the tone in the gym can be a bit harsh, but I quickly learnt to turn that direct language into positive fuel.

“Boxing happened by chance in my life and I fell in love with the sport and it has stayed on with me. I am lucky to say my family has always been very supportive, and that’s why I have been able to pursue my passion,” said Nadia.

As a boxer, Nadia continues to challenge various gender stereotypes and cultural discourses. Nadia says, “by living my life the way that I have chosen to live, I have challenged many norms and expectations of what a Muslim woman should look like, what she should do, what her goals and ambitions should be. I have chosen another way for myself, a different path and I feel at home when I am training.”

Nadia is part Egyptian and part Danish and she says she no longer wants to be caught between the discourse of identity and nationality, between her parents’ countries of origin, and her own country of residence.

Denmark is home to almost 320,000 Muslims, which is about 5.5 percent of the population, putting the country in a slightly higher proportion than in the rest of Europe. According to a report published in Reuters, a growing number of Danish Muslims say that they have faced verbal abuse, exclusion and hate crimes since mainstream political parties began adopting anti-immigrant policies. Immigration in Denmark has become a strong issue especially during elections.

In December 2020, Denmark’s government decided to separately classify people from or with heritage in primarily Muslim countries and regions in their official crime statistics. A move which was deeply criticized by many. Immigration and integration minister Mattias Tesfaye supported the differentiation of people in Denmark with Middle Eastern and North African heritage.

“Pluralism is based on trust, and the recognition between people, whether they want it or not, said Nadia. Religion plays an important role in cultural encounters, partly because it highlights differences and opens up new understandings of plurality and community. We as Muslim women have to use our understanding of liberal European politics to protest against the exclusion of immigrants from the public sphere.

“I crave to find a stance of cultural dignity, to find a moral community of mutual acceptance and purpose. The crucial issue for us has been to achieve a status in which is is legitimate and acceptable to be both Muslim woman and Danish at the same time,” said Nadia.

Over the past few years, Nadia has taken her passion for boxing to Muslim girls in local communities living in Braband in Gellerup, an area of western Aarhus, which holds the biggest housing associations in Denmark. Nadia encourages women to empower themselves by teaching them how to tap in and use their physical and mental strengths.

“When I started coaching young girls from the community, I wanted to transfer my passion for boxing to them. My mission was to enable them, to empower them, to give them a space where they could be themselves, at the same time have fun using their bodies to do so”, said Nadia.

“Boxing is a way of life. The combination of the mind and the body in sports gives a smaller picture of life in itself. When you think you can’t give anymore, there is always a little more to give in sports. Without individual strength and power, it is impossible to fight for your rights, for a better society,” said Nadia.

Integration remains a debate and challenge for those who come to Denmark, especially from Muslim countries. Human Rights organizations have reported numerous violations against refugees, immigrants and asylum seekers and have often described Danish policies towards immigrants as some of the most aggressive in the western world. In the current climate where European countries have been opening their doors towards immigrants and refugees, it is important for Denmark to re-think it’s value-based policies which has become one of the biggest reasons for countries’ polarizations especially towards its immigrants, religion, identity and culture.

According to Nadia, the way forward for Denmark is to identify the challenge of integration, without politicization, and interpret differences and similarities in real contexts, defining common goals and interests.

Sania Farooqui is a journalist and filmmaker based out of New Delhi. She hosts a weekly online show called The Sania Farooqui Show where Muslim women from around the world are invited to share their views.

 

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Conflict in the Ethiopia region has created a "dire" situation, an official said in leaked notes.

While the opposition leader Bobi Wine is under house arrest, analysts say Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni must make concessions to those who voted against him. Courtesy: UN Photo/Amanda Voisard

By Jonathan Irumba
KAMPALA, Jan 18 2021 (IPS)

Thirty-five years ago when President Yoweri Museveni talked, a majority of citizens listened. But now, as he approaches almost four decades in power, his message is not resonating well — particularly with the country’s youth who constitute about 70 percent of the voting population in Uganda.

On Saturday the Electoral Commission of Uganda declared the incumbent president winner of the vote. While the opposition leader Robert Kyagulanyi, also known as Bobi Wine, remains under house arrest it is unclear how and when he will dispute the election results, as he’s vowed to do. But one thing is clear as analysts say Museveni must make concessions to those who voted against him.

In an election notable because of the nationwide internet shutdown that began on the evening before the elections, and is yet to be restored, Museveni secured 58% of the vote compared to 35% of the vote cast for opposition candidate, musician-turned-politician Bobi Wine.

Bob Wine has rejected the results as rigged. And has indicated that his party will challenge the result through all legal recourses available — this includes filling a case challenging the result within the next 14 days with the Electoral Commission of Uganda; going to court to challenge the results; as well as peaceful demonstrations, which are legal according to the country’s constitution.

Joseph Kalema, 38, resident of Kakindu Village near Kampala is convinced his candidate, Bobi Wine, won against Museveni in the Jan. 15 election but was simply “rigged out”.

“We are waiting for our generation president to tell us the next course of action,” Kalema told IPS, referring to Bobi Wine who is president of the opposition National Unity Platform (NUP).

Bobi Wine shut off from party officials and the world

However, it may take sometime before 38-year-old Bobi Wine can make that call as he has been under house arrest since the elections, with his residence surrounded by state forces, and his mobile phones reportedly disconnected.

The media have been denied access to his residence as well as his close colleagues.

In a tweet from Bobi Wine’s account but with ADMIN written in brackets— and presumably sent from outside Uganda’s borders as at the time of filing in the morning of Monday Jan. 18 the internet still remained shutdown — it was claimed that Member of Parliament Francis Zaake was beaten after he allegedly attempted to enter the residence. He is reportedly still in hospital.

Everyone including media and my party officials are restricted from accessing me. @ZaakeFrancis was arrested outside my gate as he made his way to my house, he was badly beaten by soldiers. He is now in Rubaga hospital.
(ADMIN)

— BOBI WINE (@HEBobiwine) January 17, 2021

In another tweet yesterday, again from Bobi Wine’s account but with ADMIN written in brackets, it was claimed that the opposition leader and his wife had run out of food and when his wife attempted to pick food from the garden she had been “blocked and assaulted by soldiers”.

It’s now four days since the military surrounded our home and placed my wife and I under house arrest. We have run out of food supplies and when my wife tried to pick food from the garden yesterday, she was blocked and assaulted by the soldiers staged in our compound. (ADMIN) pic.twitter.com/MLEtSbyCcW

— BOBI WINE (@HEBobiwine) January 17, 2021

 

Today, Jan. 18, elected members of the NUP called a press conference, demanding Bobi Wine’s immediate release, saying despite claims that the state forces surrounding him were there for his own protection, the current conditions under which their presidential candidate is living can be classified as house arrest.

Mathias Mpuuga the vice president of the NUP, and a newly-elected member of the party, said party officials had attempted to meet Bobi Wine were blocked by security. NUP demanded the immediate release of Bobi Wine, adding that he should be allowed to have access to his party leadership and lawyers to guide the next course of action.

Museveni blames ‘foreign forces’

When this will happen remains unclear. After being declared the winner in the election, Museveni said his main challenger Bobi Wine was an agent of foreign forces who wanted to push for their interests and were using him as their vessel to achieve their agenda.

Who the foreign forces are, was not clarified but Museveni alluded to “promoters of homosexuals” and a neighbouring country which was not named, and those intent on frustrating Uganda from reaping the benefits of its oil discovery

With the internet, a key mobilisation tool for the NUP, still shut down any large scale demonstrations would be difficult to organise. 

Heightened security across the country

A few weeks ago when Bobi Wine, the main challenger to Museveni and the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM), was arrested after being accused of flaunting COVID-19 guidelines during campaigning, there were spontaneous riots in urban centres across the country by his supporters.

The national security apparatus swung into action to quash the riots. Over 50 people died.

But Kalema, like many of his peers, simply do not care about the risk of being arrested or killed in confrontations with security.

“Many of our colleagues are languishing in jail, many have been killed, including innocent citizens. Should we just look on?” wondered Kalema.

Security is not taking matters lightly and are armed to the teeth to quail any violence.

“Last time they took us by surprise. Now we are more than ready for any riots,” Lieutenant Colonel Deo Akiiki, the deputy spokesperson of Uganda People’s Defence Forces told IPS.

The army and the police had deployed heavily on the streets of Kampala and other major towns across the country ahead of the election. They are still patrolling the streets days after the election for fear of a repeat of riots, following the declaration of the election results that announced Museveni victorious.

Museveni must make concessions 

Museveni is credited for ushering in peace and security to a country that had descended into anarchy following the overthrow of Idid Amin that subsequent short-lived governments.

The biggest challenge to Museveni is that the majority of voters in this election were not born when he took power. Many were born during Museveni’s reign and did not experience that difficult period in the country’s history.

What they understand are the issues the of unemployment and poverty, which they have to deal with now, with many blaming this on Museveni’s continued stay in power.

Political analyst Dr Samuel Kazidwe says that situation is very fluid and a lot will depend on how the parties react.

“It is not over yet because Preside Museveni must find a way to reach out to Bobi Wine and his supporters and be able to make some concessions. Otherwise we could be headed for trouble,” Kazidwe told IPS. 

Kazidwe said Museveni could learn from the Kenya experience and the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI), which was agreed between Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta and opposition leader Raila Odinga following a disputed 2017 election.

Kazidwe said that when looking at the election results, it was clear that the whole of the central region had rejectedMuseveni and his party as evidenced by the numbers of votes for the opposition. 

Meanwhile, the  Secretary General of the ruling NRM, Justine Kasule Lumumba said on Saturday that were looking for evidence of foreign interference in the country’s election.

Some see this as an attempt to justify the earlier shutdown of Facebook after it to blocked NRM activists’ accounts over allegations of impersonating other users and unethical conduct.  However, the NRM has taken this as evidence of foreign interference in the election. 

 ** The story notes that internet was not restored at time of publication of this piece. It was later restored around 14.30 Ugandan time. 

 

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Stuck in Bosnia amid rough winter, Bangladeshi migrant pleads for help

By External Source
Jan 18 2021 (IPS-Partners)

Temperatures have plummeted way below zero in Bosnia, making life even more miserable for hundreds of migrants and refugees — including entire families with small children — sleeping rough while trying to reach Western Europe.

After days of snow earlier this month, a spell of extreme cold that hit the region this week has brought freezing days and nights for the people stranded in northwest Bosnia, near the border with European Union member Croatia.

Meteorologists in Bosnia and Croatia have warned their citizens not to stay out long during the cold spell, predicting that temperatures could drop to minus 15 degrees Celsius (5 Fahrenheit).

While Bosnian authorities, under international pressure, have improved conditions for several hundred people stuck in a burned-out camp, hundreds more are in makeshift tent camps and abandoned houses without heating or any facilities.

“Last night was very cold. We are suffering very much,” said Shahin, a mechanic from Bangladesh, who is staying in a small tent in a forest near the town of Velika Kladusa. “I (didn’t) sleep last night.”

Migrants like Shahin have been sleeping rough for months while hoping to cross illegally into Croatia, sometimes making dozens of attempts while allegedly facing violence and pushbacks at the hands of Croatian border police.

The makeshift camp near Velika Kladusa consists of several small tents on frozen, uneven ground among trees. Some migrants wash outside in the cold in freezing temperatures, they light fires for warmth and have no toilets or electricity.

Shahin said there’s no clean drinking water. “It is not safe, it is a very big risk for our health. … Please save us,” he told an Associated Press reporter.

Bosnia’s often-chaotic response to Europe’s migration crisis has drawn international criticism and warnings from humanitarian groups that both the Balkan country and the EU must find a durable solution.

Twenty-year-old journalism student Mohammad Khan from Afghanistan, who is staying with several dozen other migrants at a garbage-strewn abandoned factory near the town of Bihac, said he just wants a “safe” and “clean” life in Europe.

Inside the crumbling, communist-era factory, migrants could be seen lying wrapped tight in blankets or sleeping inside small tents. The windowless building offers little protection from the cold.

A couple from Afghanistan with their four children aged between 18 months and 10 years, have found temporary shelter in an abandoned house in a village near the Croatian border.

The family cook on a wood-fueled stove, light candles after dark and use old furniture left behind in the house while waiting for a chance to cross the border. They told the AP they have tried 40 times to enter Croatia but have been sent back each time.

Mustafa, the father of the family who refused to give his surname for fear of reprisals, said it’s been hard after failing so many times and having no help except occasional aid packages from humanitarian groups.

“Too (much) hard here, too much game,” Mustafa said, using a migrant term for attempts to illegally cross borders.

According to Reuters, Bosnia has since early 2018 become part of a transit route for thousands of migrants from Asia, the Middle East and North Africa aiming to reach Europe’s wealthier countries.

There are about 8,000 migrants in Bosnia.

Most migrants in Bosnia flock to the northwestern corner of the country because it borders Croatia. Local authorities have said they are overwhelmed but most other Bosnian regions have refused to accept the migrants amid protests from residents.

This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh

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Excerpt:

Stuck in Bosnia amid rough winter, Bangladeshi migrant pleads for help

The post ‘Please save us’ appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Stop killing journalists. Credit: UNESCO

By External Source
Jan 18 2021 (IPS-Partners)

When journalists are targeted, “societies as a whole pay a price”, the UN chief said on November 2, 2020, the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists.

“If we do not protect journalists, our ability to remain informed and make evidence-based decisions is severely hampered”, Secretary-General António Guterres spelled out in his message for the day.  

And when they cannot safely do their jobs, “we lose an important defense against the pandemic of misinformation and disinformation that has spread online”, he added.

Free press ‘essential’

There were at least 21 attacks on journalists covering protests in the first half of 2020 – equal to the number of such attacks in the whole of 2017, Mr. Guterres said.

As the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted new perils for journalists and media workers, the UN chief reiterated his call for a “free press that can play its essential role in peace, justice, sustainable development and human rights”.

“Fact-based news and analysis depend on the protection and safety of journalists conducting independent reporting, rooted in the fundamental tenet: ‘journalism without fear or favour’”, he concluded.

Adverse consequences

In her message, Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), maintained that through accurate reporting, journalists “bring truth to light”.

However, she noted that for too many “telling the truth comes at a price”.

While journalists are in “a unique and compelling position” to “speak truth to power”, the UNESCO chief observed that the two “do not always see eye to eye”.

Between 2010 and 2019, close to 900 journalists were killed while doing their job, according Ms. Azoulay – more than 150 in the last two years alone.

Journalists in crosshairs

Although many have lost their lives covering conflicts, far more are being killed for investigating issues such as corruption, trafficking, political wrongdoing, human rights violations and environmental issues.

And death is not the only risk journalists are facing.

“Attacks on the press can take the form of threats, kidnappings, arrests, imprisonments or offline and online harassment with women being targeted in particular”, the UNESCO chief elaborated.

Preserving freedom

Even though the 2019 death toll for journalists was the lowest in a decade, the UN official pointed out that wider attacks are continuing “at an alarming rate”.

States have an obligation to protect journalists — UNESCO chief

She noted that in seven-out-of-eight killings, the perpetrators go unpunished, and asserted: “We can and should do more”.

“Journalists are essential in preserving the fundamental right to freedom of expression, guaranteed by Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights”, she explained. “When journalists are attacked with impunity, there is a breakdown in security and judicial systems for all”.

End impunity

UNESCO commemorates the day annually on 2 November to raise awareness and highlight some of the specific risks that journalists face in their quest to uncover the truth.

“On this day, I call on…all Member States and international and non-governmental organizations to join forces to guarantee the safety of journalists and root out impunity”, said the UNESCO chief.

“Only by investigating and prosecuting crimes against media professionals can we guarantee access to information and freedom of expression”.

Unleashing information

UNESCO also marked the day by releasing the brochure Protect Journalists, Protect the Truth.

Among other things, it revealed that most journalists were killed in countries with no armed conflict.

And while impunity for crimes against journalists continues to prevail, in 2020, 13 per cent of cases worldwide were reported as resolved in comparison to 12 per cent in 2019, and 11 per cent in 2018.

The findings also showed that in 2019, Latin America and the Caribbean region represented 40 per cent of all killings registered worldwide, followed by the Asia and Pacific region, with 26 per cent.

“States have an obligation to protect journalists”, and judges and prosecutors must promote “swift and effective criminal proceedings” to ensure that perpetrators of crimes against them are held accountable, upheld Ms. Azoulay.

A mural on a blast wall in downtown Kabul commemorates journalists killed in Afghanistan in 2016. Credit: UNAMA/Fardin Waezi

Source: UN News

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A healthcare worker at a testing facility collects samples for the coronavirus at Mimar Sinan State Hospital, Buyukcekmece district in Istanbul, Turkey. Credit: UNDP Turkey/Levent Kulu

By Ilze Brands Kehris
GENEVA, Jan 18 2021 (IPS)

A year into the COVID-19 crisis, countries across the globe continue to face alarming levels of pressure on their health and social services. Education and other essential rights, such as water and sanitation, have been severely compromised.

Inequalities and poverty have further deepened with devastating impact on the most vulnerable and marginalised individuals and communities. Many other rights have come under further pressure.

The crisis has required taking necessary and proportionate measures to contain the pandemic, but we have also seen the imposition of opportunistic or unintended restrictions on public freedoms, threats on privacy, curtailment of free speech, overreach of emergency powers and heavy-handed security responses.

It is essential that the pandemic is defeated with a sense of humanity that respects human dignity and human rights for all.

Importantly, going forward in the recovery process, we have a unique if not historic opportunity to change course and rebuild more sustainable, human rights based, socially just and equitable economies and societies as envisioned in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

This is also what the Secretary-General’s Call to Action for Human Rights asks from all of us – stepped up and joint efforts to squarely place rights at the core of sustainable development.

Recovering better will require a new social contract that reduces inequalities and prioritises the realization of economic, social and cultural rights for all. Among the first steps to be taken by States should be to reverse the chronic underinvestment in public services.

Prioritizing resources to social protection, health, and education systems is an investment in the future sustainability of our societies.

Food, healthcare, education and social security cannot remain privileges only for those who can afford them; they are, and must be seen, as basic human rights to which all entitled, without discrimination.

This is a defining moment to see economic, social and cultural rights as legally binding commitments, as essential benchmarks for social policy, that are directly related to achieving a speedy and sustainable recovery.

To recover better, we will also need a global coordinated effort to secure equal access to safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines that can be distributed to all those who need it.

In this context, we must strengthen international cooperation and ensure development assistance and debt relief to reduce inequalities within and between countries and facilitate equitable access to COVID-19 tests, treatments and vaccines.

In building forward better, we need to reset our economies, as well as the global financial and debt architecture, to put the protection of human rights, including the right to development, at the heart of economic policies and choices.

The international financial institutions should be encouraged to promote fiscal and policy space for economic, social and cultural rights as an essential part of economic recovery and economic sustainability.

Our Office, OHCHR, has stepped up its work on economic and social rights and in support of the implementation of the SDGs, through its Surge Initiative. This initiative further strengthened the Office’s ability to work on human rights-based economics in support of State’s efforts to ‘build back better.’

The Surge team has worked with States to encourage transformative economies, providing advice on the human rights impact of economic reforms and austerity policies as well as strategies to secure ‘minimum core obligations’ on economic and social rights and link them up to national SDG and development plans.

In this context, OHCHR has provided seed funding to 20 field presences to reinforce sectoral analysis and interventions in the context of the UN COVID-19 response and recovery with the view to assessing those most vulnerably and ensuring that no one is left behind.

Disaggregated data is crucial to the realization of the international community’s promise to ‘leave no one behind’. It helps States, civil society and other partners to better understand and monitor progress for all groups and to develop evidence-based responses that considers, incorporates and benefits equitably all segments of society. National human rights institutions are a critical partner in these efforts.

We have also revamped the Universal Human Rights Index in a way to make it easier for States to see the linkages and synergies between specific human rights obligations and SDG commitments. This is aimed to facilitate efforts of States to work comprehensively toward achieving both agendas, keeping in view the current COVID-19 challenges.

In this context, OHCHR is also continuing its work on human rights indicators and promoting a human rights-based approach to data that expands disaggregation and strengthening collaboration between NHRIs and National Statistics Offices, including in Albania, Kenya, Kosovo, Liberia, Mexico, the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Philippines and Uganda.

The Office is also continuing its work on human rights indicators, including for SDG 16 indicators, and to guide the UN’s socio-economic response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Also high on the Office’s agenda is our work on civic space, providing technical assistance to Member States and stepping up cooperation with National Human Rights Institutions, civil society organisations and grassroots movements, including human rights-based COVID-19 response and recovery and implementation of the SDGs.

The recently launched first-ever UN System wide Guidance Note on Protection and Promotion of Civic Space will be a critical tool for UN Country Teams to support and strengthen civil society.

Furthermore, reports and COVID-19 guidance prepared by OHCHR, international human rights mechanisms and other partners such as the Danish Institute carry a wealth of information relevant to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and COVID-19 recovery.

Similarly, the Office will continue to support efforts to strengthen the engagement of National Human Rights Institutions in implementation and reporting on the 2030 Agenda as well as responding to the challenges of the pandemic through human rights approaches.

Recovering better will require concerted efforts to rebuild trust in the institutions of governance, with a renewed commitment to eliminating discrimination, promoting meaningful participation and accountability, and protecting fundamental freedoms. We need to reverse the worrying trend of shrinking civic space, and create platforms – including through the use of online platforms – for meaningful participation of those affected that will help us to draw on people’s unique experiences, resilience, insights, ideas and visions.

I look forward to listening to your views and practical experiences on how we can make this a reality – achieve the 17 sustainable development goals by 2030 on the basis of international human rights standards.

 

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Ilze Brands Kehris is Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights heading the UN Human Rights Office in New York

 
Addressing an online event organized by the Danish Institute for Human Rights in conjunction with the Human Rights Council’s third inter-sessional meeting on Human Rights and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development

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A partial withdrawal of US troops from Somalia is coming at a critical time for the country.

Fighting erupted after a man was stabbed in a row between two men from different ethnic groups.

The main opposition candidate rejects the result that saw President Museveni win a sixth term.