Schlagwort: Amnesty International

Military courts continue to investigate possible human rights violations and crimes under international law committed by members of the Colombian security forces, despite express prohibitions in national and international standards, Amnesty International said today in a new report.

The report Insist, persist, resist and never give up? Impact of the use of military criminal justice on impunity for human rights violations in Colombia shows that use of the military criminal justice system (JPM) prevents access to justice, violates the rights of victims and exacerbates the damage caused by impunity.

“The use of military criminal justice in possible human rights violations is not a technical error: it is a structural obstacle that contributes to impunity,” said Ana Piquer, Americas director at Amnesty International.

The use of military criminal justice in possible human rights violations is not a technical error: it is a structural obstacle that contributes to impunity.” 

Ana Piquer, Americas director at Amnesty International.

Undue intervention

According to international human rights standards, military judges should never preside over trials involving civilians, possible human rights violations or crimes under international law. The report points out the contradiction inherent in the fact that the National Police in Colombia is defined as a civilian body, yet its members are investigated and subjected to trial by the JPM. Amnesty International believes that this issue can only be permanently resolved through constitutional reform.

Despite two decades of legal and constitutional reforms to criminal law and military jurisdiction, plus a wealth of case law from the Constitutional Court and international position statements, military justice continues to act in cases involving possible human rights violations and crimes under international law committed by members of the military and police forces, especially crimes against life and personal integrity. “This prevents Colombia from adequately guaranteeing access to justice for the victims,” said Ana Piquer.

A decades-old problem

The report analyses the enforced disappearances in the 1980s of Luis Fernando Lalinde and Nydia Erika Bautista at the hands of the Colombian military; at the time, investigation into these cases was taken on by courts comprised by these same military forces, with impunity prevailing to this day, four decades on.

The situation of protesters injured or killed by members of the National Police in the context of protests occurring over the last two decades is also analysed. Although Colombian case law is consistent in pointing out that these cases must be subject to the ordinary courts, judges and prosecutors from both military and ordinary courts continue to wrongly assign them to the JPM, hindering the judicial process.

The report is based on information provided to Amnesty International by the Attorney General’s Office, the JPM and the Constitutional Court, and includes a systematic review of 398 cases of conflicts of jurisdiction referred to the Constitutional Court for resolution between February 2021 and October 2024.

Demanding justice for human rights violations or crimes under international law allegedly committed by members of the military or the National Police usually takes years and is a process that requires addressing institutional barriers that favour impunity. “The jurisdiction of the military criminal justice system must be strictly limited to crimes committed by active duty military personnel. It cannot be extended to human rights violations or civilians, in accordance with international standards,” concluded Ana Piquer.

The jurisdiction of the military criminal justice system must be strictly limited to crimes committed by active duty military personnel. It cannot be extended to human rights violations or civilians, in accordance with international standards”.

Ana Piquer, Americas director at Amnesty International.

Amnesty International recommendations

Amnesty International calls on the Colombian state to: 

• Constitutionally exclude the National Police from the scope of jurisdiction of the JPM.
• Approve legislative reforms to specify that the jurisdiction of the JPM does not extend to possible human rights violations or crimes under international law.
• Adopt preventive measures to ensure that investigations into such crimes cannot be opened under the JPM, and that any that may already have been opened are transferred to the ordinary criminal justice system.
• Provide mandatory and comprehensive training to JPM and ordinary justice operators on applicable international standards and constitutional jurisprudence.

For further information or to arrange an interview, please contact press@amnesty.org

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By Agnès Callamard, Secretary General at Amnesty International

South Africa has played a leading role in international efforts to prevent, stop and punish Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza. Now, as the nation prepares to host the first G20 Leaders’ Summit on African soil, it has an important opportunity to step up that pressure and fill the alarming void that has emerged in the international order.

While superpowers are undermining multilateralism through inaction and double standards, or actively attacking the international justice system, we look to states like South Africa to show principled leadership and champion a global vision that upholds and protects human rights universally.

The international community’s complicity or inaction in the face of Israel’s livestreamed genocide has been shameful and indefensible. World leaders’ collective failure to put a stop to Israel’s crimes under international law will stain their reputations for generations to come. Sadly, this was not for the first time. They have far too often allowed international law to be trampled on, betraying the legacy of the global consensus who said “never again” to the horrors of the Holocaust and the Second World War.

It has been particularly disconcerting to see the architects of the rules-based order take a sledgehammer at the values, principles or institutions underpinning it, from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to the United States’ military support to Israel and its shameless sanctions against the International Criminal Court (ICC), the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, and the Palestinian NGOs al-Haq, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights and the Palestinian Center for Human Rights.

The G20 summit in Johannesburg comes after the African Union became a permanent member in 2023, affording the group and its members enhanced influence on the international stage. Amid the global leadership vacuum and the Trump administration’s “America First” approach to foreign policy, President Cyril Ramaphosa’s government must seize this opportunity to reinvigorate multilateralism and forge a new order truly committed to upholding international law and equality.

South Africa has set a strong example and shown much-needed leadership in protecting Palestinian rights, including through the case it brought against Israel under the Genocide Convention at the International Court of Justice in December 2023, and in co-founding the Hague Group, a coalition of nations determined to hold Israel accountable, including through the ICC. This is an encouraging start, but the gravity of the situation around the world, with international law set aside in favour of the principle that “might is right”, means South Africa must help build a bigger tent by forging larger and stronger international alliances to press powerful states and their regional proxies into abiding by international law.

To be a credible advocate at global level, South Africa must show greater consistency in its own human rights record.

South Africa must use all its leverage to compel Israeli authorities to lift their 18-year-long illegal blockade and allow unimpeded access to humanitarian aid to civilians in the entire Gaza Strip. All parties must respect the cessation of hostilities and ensure international law and respect for human rights are adhered to. South Africa, like other states, must press Israel to end its unlawful occupation of the Palestinian Territory and dismantle its cruel system of apartheid against Palestinians.

Elsewhere, South Africa should leverage its influence over Russia to press for an end to its crimes and human rights violations in Ukraine and step up its international advocacy work around the overlooked conflicts in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It must throw its full diplomatic weight behind regional and international accountability efforts and ensure the African Union urgently presses the Sudanese and DRC governments and forces such as the RSF and M23 to end their human rights abuses.

The world is also facing growing economic inequality both within and between countries. Much of this is a continuing legacy of colonialism and racial injustice, which South Africa itself still wrestles with, and is compounded by new and perpetuated inequalities driven by the response to human-induced climate change. African countries, including South Africa, have been instrumental in progressing a UN Tax Treaty to replace the current OECD-dominated one to ensure a fairer global tax system and address the billions lost every year to tax abuse. Yet there is still much to do, including a similar process and treaty on debt to tackle the unsustainable amounts owed by low-income countries, which are crippling their ability to deliver better and more climate-resilient economic and social rights enjoyment for their people. At 80 years old, the Bretton Woods financial system is clearly unfit for purpose and remains dominated by high-income countries who set the rules with often catastrophic consequences for lower-income nations. As a powerful voice for the global south, South Africa must ensure the G20 does not continue to neglect these vital issues but grasps the nettle and pushes for radical reform.

That said, to be a credible advocate at global level, South Africa must show greater consistency in its own human rights record. The Ramaphosa administration should address domestic issues, including mounting concern over corruption and impunity, and access to essential services such as water, sanitation and adequate housing. It must reassert its commitment to the ICC, which it had threatened to leave. And it should ensure it does not exhibit the double standards that are destroying universal values and the credibility of international law, by denouncing violations committed by its allies and using its influence to ensure these abuses are stopped and remedied.

From Gaza to Sudan, the DRC, Ukraine and Myanmar, to the planetary crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution, the world is crying out for principled global leadership to help deliver justice, stability and accountability. South Africa should heed those calls, lead or support principled, collective and robust international action, and step up for humanity.

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This article was originally published by The Daily Maverick

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Ahead of an expected vote in Slovenia’s parliament on hastily proposed sweeping changes which would significantly expand police powers, restrict welfare rights and weaken key safeguards, Esther Major Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for Research in Europe, said:

“This draconian bill risks stripping all people in Slovenia of an array of vital human rights protections as well as posing a specific risk to a Roma population that already faces daily discrimination, exclusion and poverty.

“Under the guise of providing security these unjustified and disproportionate measures would significantly expand police and judicial powers, removing internationally recognized and crucial procedural safeguards.

“While not explicitly aimed at the Roma population, the vitriolic rhetoric used by the government to justify these measures raises serious fears that they would be deployed arbitrarily and discriminatorily against the Roma population. Coupled with the security crackdown, punitive restrictions on social benefits could further penalize the most marginalized families.

Under the guise of providing security these unjustified and disproportionate measures would significantly expand police and judicial powers

“Slovenian MPs must reject these harmful measures due to the dangerous consequences they could have for all Slovenians, particularly Roma people, placing them at heightened risk of human rights violations”

Background

The vote is expected on 17 November.

The draft Act on Urgent Measures to Ensure Public Security (dubbed the ‘Sutar Law’) was introduced by the Slovenian government on 6 November 2025, two weeks after a fatal incident in Novo Mesto involving a member of the Roma community.

The government has justified the proposed measures as necessary to restore public confidence in security institutions and to prevent future incidents of serious violence.

If adopted, the draft law would amend eight existing acts.

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Tunisian authorities have increasingly escalated their crackdown on human rights defenders and independent non-governmental organizations (NGOs) through arbitrary arrests, detention, asset freezes, bank restrictions and court-ordered suspensions, all under the pretext of fighting “suspicious” foreign funding and shielding “national interests,” Amnesty International said today.

In an unprecedented step six NGO workers and human rights defenders working for the Tunisian Council for Refugees are being criminally prosecuted on charges solely related to their legitimate work supporting refugees and asylum seekers. The opening trial session on 16 October was adjourned until 24 November. 

In the past four months alone, at least 14 Tunisian and international NGOs received court orders to suspend their activities for 30 days. This includes four prominent organizations in the past three weeks; the Tunisian Association of Democratic Women (ATFD), the Tunisian Forum for Social and Economic Rights (FTDES), Nawaat and the Tunis branch of the World Organization against Torture (OMCT).

“It is deeply alarming to witness the steady erosion of Tunisia’s once-vibrant civil society, one of the most significant achievements of the 2011 revolution, made possible at the time by the adoption of Decree Law 88 on Associations. Authorities are systematically dismantling the rule of law, shrinking civic space and stifling any form of dissent. This is part of a broader trend of authoritarian practices unfolding in different parts of the world,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Senior Director for Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns at Amnesty International.

“Instead of targeting organizations working to support economic, social and political rights, Tunisian authorities must end this campaign of intimidation and immediately release all NGO workers and human rights defenders detained or prosecuted in reprisal for exercising their civic rights and lift all related provisional measures, such as asset freezes. They must drop abusive charges, lift arbitrary suspensions, and end criminal prosecutions of organizations lawfully conducting their activities.”

Since 2023, Tunisian authorities have frequently smeared NGOs receiving foreign funding. In May 2024, President Kais Saied accused NGOs working on migration of being “traitors” and “[foreign] agents,” and of seeking the “settlement” of Sub-Saharan migrants in Tunisia. 

One day later, the public prosecutor in Tunis announced the opening of an investigation against NGOs for providing “financial support to illegal migrants.” Over the following weeks, Tunisian authorities raided the offices of three NGOs and opened investigations into the finances and activities of at least 12 Tunisian and international organizations working in migration. 

This multi-pronged judicial and administrative harassment has created a pervasive climate of fear, restricting the rights to association and freedom of expression and smothering Tunisia’s civic space.

Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International

Police arrested and arbitrarily detained eight directors or staff, and sometimes former staff, of these organizations on accusations linked to supporting irregular migrants or supposed “financial crimes” tied to lawful NGO funding. Two of these organizations have been prosecuted on unfounded criminal charges carrying heavy prison sentences. 

In September 2024, shortly before the presidential elections, the crackdown extended to organizations working on election monitoring, corruption and human rights. By October 2024, the Ministry of Finance had opened investigations into at least 10 organizations, including Amnesty International’s International Secretariat Office in Tunis. During the same period at least 20 NGOs started to experience undue banking restrictions and delays that obstructed the receipt of foreign funds. 

NGO staff targeted and held in arbitrary pre-trial detention

Two of the defendants in the criminal trial against staff at the Tunisian Council for Refugees (CTR) Mustapha Djemali, the founder and director, and Abderrazek Krimi, CTR project manager, have been in arbitrary pre-trial detention since May 2024. They are being tried alongside four other CTR staff members for their legitimate human rights work. CTR worked with UNHCR as an implementing partner to pre-register asylum seekers and provide essential assistance in Tunisia. The staff were indicted on charges of “forming an organization” to “assist the clandestine entry” of migrants into Tunisia and “providing them shelter,” offences that carry up to 13 years in prison. 

In the second criminal prosecution of an NGO, three staff members of the Tunisian branch of the French migrants’ rights organization Tunisie Terre d’Asile – Sherifa Riahi, Yadh Bousselmi, and Mohamed Joo – will face trial on 15 December. The three have been held in pre-trial detention since May 2024, on unfounded charges of “sheltering individuals illegally entering or leaving the territory” and “facilitating the irregular entry, exit, movement, or stay of a foreigner.” In closing the investigation, the investigating judge cited an alleged “European-backed civil society plan to promote the social and economic integration of irregular migrants into Tunisia and their permanent settlement” as basis for the charges.  

Other organizations targeted with criminal investigations and detention include children’s rights organization Children of the Moon of Medenine and anti-racism organization Mnemty whose legal representatives have been in detention since November and May 2024, and a number of their staff and partners have been subjected to criminal investigation for unfounded financial crimes. Authorities have also detained the executive director of the Association for the Promotion of the Right to Difference (ADD), Salwa Ghrissa, since 12 December 2024, pending investigation into the organization’s funding.

Crackdown expands to other human rights groups 

In September 2024, the electoral commission denied accreditation to two reputable election observing organizations Mourakiboun and Iwatch, alleging “suspicious foreign funding.” A few days later, in September 2024, the Ministry of Finance Tax Evasion Investigation Unit (BILF) summoned them for interrogation. Within two weeks, prosecutors froze their bank accounts, effectively paralyzing operations.

From October 2024 onwards, the same Tax Evasion Investigation Unit opened an investigation into Amnesty International’s Regional Office in Tunis along with at least 10 other NGOs. Over the following months, the BILF summoned Amnesty International’s president of the board and two staff for interrogation and requested years’ worth of compliance reporting, all of which was provided. In October 2025, the Gorjani police’s financial-crimes brigade opened a criminal investigation into the organization in parallel. Investigations remain open against Amnesty International’s Regional Office, along with several other organizations. 

In July 2025, the leading Tunisian organization FTDES received a similar summons and complied with all document requests; investigators also questioned contractors and service providers. Additional organizations – including media organizations – are under investigation by the National Guard Criminal Unit of Complex Crimes (El Aouina) or the Gorjani police brigade for alleged “suspicious” foreign funding, financial misconduct, money laundering, and other offences. 

On 21 October 2025, the pro-government daily Al Chourouk reported that prosecutors had authorized police and National Guard units to open investigations into foreign funding received by dozens of associations from the Open Society Foundations, citing reports from the Financial Analysis Committee at the Central Bank and the Court of Accounts, and signalling possible tracing and freezing of funds pending judicial decisions.

Suspension orders

Between July and 10 November 2025, the court issued 30-day suspension orders for at least 14 organizations, including ATFD, Aswat Nissa, FTDES Nawaat and OMCT for 30 days under Decree-Law 88 on Associations. 

Article 45 of Decree Law 88 sets penalties and procedures for organizations that violate specific provisions pertaining to fund management, financial reporting and other. In case of breach, the government Secretary-General must first issue a written warning specifying what needs to be rectified and granting up to 30 days to remedy it. If the association fails to comply, the Secretary General may petition the Court of First Instance to suspend the association’s activities for up to 30 days, a decision that is subject to expedited appeal.   

Several organizations reported never receiving a warning; others – including ATFD – stated they had already remedied the alleged violations before the suspension according to the warning that they had received almost a year earlier, rendering the decisions arbitrary. According to ATFD the 30-day suspension meant closure of its women shelters, its helpline for survivors of domestic violence, with devastating consequences for those seeking protection and support.

Targeted smear campaigns have become common. For example, on 11 October, 25 human rights and civil society organizations issued a joint statement supporting residents of Gabès, who were protesting the health and environmental harms caused by state-owned chemical plants. Immediately afterward, pro-presidential social media accounts and media commentators accused the groups of being “mercenaries,” “foreign agents,” “corrupt,” and “traitors,” and called for a ban on foreign funding. 

Banking restrictions and obstruction of lawful funding

From October 2024 onwards, NGOs have faced undue banking restrictions and undue delays in receiving foreign funding. Amnesty International reviewed the experiences of 20 NGOs whose banks either refused to process their transfers or returned their funds to donors. At least two banks instructed organizations to close their accounts without justification, and several NGOs subsequently struggled to open new accounts, severely disrupting operations and forcing at least one to close its Tunisia office. Other banks now require onerous paperwork for every transfer, generating delays of up to 10 weeks. 

Under international human rights law, NGOs have the right to seek, receive, and use resources, including domestic, foreign, and international funding, as an essential component of freedom of association. Any restriction must be prescribed by law, pursue a legitimate aim, and be necessary and proportionate. Arbitrary or discriminatory limitations – including excessive administrative barriers – violate this right.

“This multi-pronged judicial and administrative harassment has created a pervasive climate of fear, restricting the rights to association and freedom of expression and smothering Tunisia’s civic space. Authorities must immediately take effective measures to uphold human rights and allow NGOs to freely carry out their human rights activities, protect human rights defenders and humanitarian workers, lift suspensions and unfreeze accounts,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas.

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Language used maybe offensive to some readers 

• Thousands of NYPD records secured by the rights groups detail expansive and unlawful surveillance of protesters, and Black, Indigenous and People of Colour communities. 

Records obtained by Amnesty International and the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project (S.T.O.P.), a New York-based privacy and civil rights group, after a five-year long lawsuit against the New York Police Department (NYPD) reveal concerning surveillance abuses against protesters and communities of colour, including the frequent use of rights-violating facial recognition technology.  

Analysis by Amnesty International and the S.T.O.P. of the over 2,700 documents to date reveals that facial recognition technologies (FRT) were used on several occasions by the NYPD, subjecting New Yorkers to invasive, flawed, and deeply discriminatory surveillance technologies. 

The documents further revealed that the technology had been used to identify individuals based on unsolicited reports by the public that deemed certain individuals suspicious on the basis of speaking a different language or wearing culturally distinctive attire. 

“New York promises to be a sanctuary city, but we’ve created nothing short of a surveillance state, 

Michelle Dahl, Executive Director at the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project.

“These costly, error-prone, and biased technologies are wasting billions of dollars. NYPD surveillance puts our neighbors at risk of false arrest, deportation, or even worse. It’s long past time that New Yorkers should see the dystopian ways that the NYPD watches all of us. Now is the moment for lawmakers to take action and hold the NYPD accountable, outlawing facial recognition and imposing true civilian oversight.” 

Facial recognition violates the right to privacy through mass image data scraping without knowledge and consent. It’s plagued by racial bias, disproportionately targeting Black and Brown communities, and suppresses peaceful protest and free expression through its chilling effect. For these reasons, hundreds of organizations consider the technology unlawful. Amnesty International and S.T.O.P. have long called for a ban on the use, development, production, and sale, of facial recognition technology for identification and mass surveillance by law enforcement and other government agencies.  

In its analysis of the disclosures, the groups found that NYPD surveillance frequently puts marginalized communities at risk. NYPD records also documented the profiling of New Yorkers based on language, ethnicity, and other protected characteristics. 

Initial findings from the disclosures of more than 2,700 NYPD documents show that:  

• By 17 April 2020, the NYPD had already spent more than $5 million on facial recognition technology between 2019 and 2020, and is spending at least $100,000 more every year. 

• The NYPD stopped tracking facial recognition accuracy in 2015 after finding the error rate was too high. 

• NYPD Officers conspired with the US Marshalls Service to illicitly contract a controversial facial recognition firm to surveil a private Instagram account, in violation of the Department’s facial recognition policy.  

• On 31 December 2019, facial recognition was used by the NYPD to target New Yorkers who were using slang to describe Times Square on social media, including: “NYE in Times Square is da BOMB,” in a clear overly broad and dangerous violation of the right to freedom of expression, and in a manner that ignores cultural and linguistic context.  

• The NYPD has used facial recognition and selective enforcement against certain NYPD critics, such as on 1 February 2020 when they seemingly identified and arrested one person for “FTP” graffiti art, a common abbreviation for “fuck the police,” against the backdrop of heightened protest and dissent against police brutality.  

• New Yorkers were racially profiled by the NYPD, and two men were wrongly targeted by facial recognition  at the New Year’s Eve celebration in Time Square on 31 December 2019, for not dancing and speaking a Middle Eastern language. The report prompting the facial recognition query stated: “They had no females with them, were not dancing like everyone else and they gave everyone an uneasy feeling… At one point one went in the bathroom and was yelling on his phone in a Middle Eastern language.”   

• On 3 June 2020, the NYPD targeted a “controversial protestor on twitter” for political speech, even though they acknowledged the lack of exigent circumstance or any threats and resolved to continue monitoring all of their social media accounts, regardless. 

• On 5 June 2020, the NYPD deployed facial recognition to identify a Black Lives Matter protester for hyperbolically writing “cops should die” in a social media post.  

• On 22 April 2020, the NYPD used facial recognition to identify two singers purely because of content in their music video, effectively subjecting artists to a virtual line-up and violating their free expression.  

“The disclosures demonstrate multiple instances of discrimination and abuse, using facial recognition, which reinforce what our previous research has consistently shown to be a disregard for the safety of Black and Brown communities in New York City, 

Matt Mahmoudi, Researcher & Advisor on AI and Human Rights at Amnesty International.

“The NYPD has avoided scrutiny for too long and has benefited from a lack of transparency to unlawfully invest in and use facial recognition to curb people’s rights to privacy, equality and non-discrimination, and freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly.”    

Background  

In September 2020, Amnesty International filed a freedom of information request for NYPD records on its surveillance of the historic Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests of the same year. In 2021, the NYPD rejected Amnesty International’s request and administrative appeal. S.T.O.P and the leading litigation law firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP then sued the NYPD on Amnesty International’s behalf, seeking a court order compelling release of the requested documents. In 2022, the New York Supreme Court for New York County ordered the NYPD to disclose more than 2,700 records about BLM surveillance.  

In 2022, Amnesty International, S.T.O.P., and partners in the New York ‘Ban the Scan’ coalition revealed that New Yorkers living in areas at greater risk of stop-and-frisk by police are subjected to greater facial recognition. The groups also showed non-white residents in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens face higher concentration of NYPD cameras. 

Currently, Amnesty International, S.T.O.P., and the ‘Ban the Scan’ coalition are calling on city council members to enact bans on facial recognition. This includes two measures that have already secured sponsorship by a majority of council members. Additionally, the organizations call on the NYPD and New York City mayor to commit to immediately ending use of the discriminatory, invasive, and error-prone technology. 

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