Pax Gaea Human Rights World Post

• Promises to alleviate African debt must be kept, says Bono
• Racism on the rise in Eastern Europe with Jews, turks and gypsies as scapegoats
• Rise in violence in Nepal's 'bread basket' concerns UN, ethnic minorities
• Foreign medics not likely to be executed comments Libya ruler Gadhafi's son
• World population explosion reaching unsustainable UK government leaders report
• Eviction of Belarusian rights group by Europe's "last dictator" condemned by US
• Millions fleeing conflict in Iraq at the forefront of worldwide refugee crisis
• Child trafficking concerns forces new restrictions for Mozambique adoptions
• Corruption in Nigeria eroding rights of citizens

Bono: failure to honour debt pledge is 'corruption''

There were serious promises made. The cheques were signed but, as you know, politicians like signing cheques but they don't like cashing them', Bono

By Geoffrey Lean, and Susie Mesure

Published: Sunday, 28 January 2007

Davos, Switzerland- Rock star Bono yesterday challenged rich country governments to make good on their promises to help Africa, or create "a generation of cynics". Speaking to the World Economic Forum in Davos, he said that failure to honour pledges made at the 2005 Gleneagles G8 summit would be "corruption of the highest order". Ministers at the meeting of top political and business leaders announced an agreement to resume international trade talks, and Tony Blair outlined his hope that this year's G8 summit would agree the basis of a "comprehensive" and "radical" treaty to combat global warming. Bono - who received an honorary knighthood in the New Year's list - did not mince his words to get leaders to implement their Gleneagles commitment to double African aid to some $47bn (£24bn) by 2010. "There were some serious promises made," he said. "The cheques were signed but, as you know, politicians like signing cheques but they don't like cashing them." He also urged a better trade deal for "Southern" developing countries, saying: "Unfairness in trade agreements is corruption from the North."A meeting of about 30 trade ministers agreed to restart the Doha Round of talks, suspended six months ago after failure to bridge deep divisions. Mr Blair predicted that a deal was "more likely than not" within "the next few months". But more cautious observers doubted that the US or France would give enough ground over farm subsidies - a crucial sticking point. The Prime Minister also set out his aim "to agree at least the principles of a new, binding international agreement" on climate change before he leaves office. He said that the agreement - for which he and the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, have been lobbying - would be "more radical than Kyoto and more comprehensive, one which this time includes all the major countries of the world". Achieving such an agreement, he said ,was a "a prize of tantalising significance". He said he based his optimism on a "quantum shift" in the mood in America where, for the first time, targets for a reduction in oil consumption have been set. Independent (United Kingdom) (2/2)

Xenophobes, not workers, are uniting across Europe

East European racists are giving new muscle to the continental far right by preying on the losers from the region's upheaval

Yudit Kiss

Published: Monday, 29 January, 2007

The long awaited and welcome accession of Bulgaria and Romania to the European Union has already had a nasty side-effect. It has made it possible for the extreme right to form its own group in the European parliament - giving its parties extra time and money - Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty.Jean-Marie Le Pen's National Front, formerly a vociferous opponent of the EU's enlargement, has delegated Bruno Gollnisch, a recidivist Holocaust denier, to head the group. He has received with open arms the five representatives of the Greater Romania party and Dimitar Stoyanov of the Bulgarian Ataka party, who had already made his debut in the European parliament commenting on the bodies and purchase price of Gypsy women. The newcomers will certainly feel at home in the company of Alessandra Mussolini ("proud to be a fascist"), Ashley Mote (formerly of the British Ukip), and the MEPs of the migrant-bashing Belgian Vlaams Belang, and the Austrian FPO, formerly headed by Jorg Haider. The proletarians of the world seem to be so disoriented by the blows of industrial change and deregulation that they are rather slow to move. So it is the xenophobes of Europe that are uniting - and demonstrating a great deal of mutual tolerance, despite not so long ago having depicted each other as dangerous aliens. Bulgaria, a delightful country that saved its Jewish citizens during the second world war and has been living in peace with its Turkish minority, will be represented at the highest political forum of Europe by a party whose manifesto calls for "Bulgaria for the Bulgarians" and whose leader is quoted as claiming that Turks still dominate his country and Jews exploit it. Its supporters have been accused of calling for Gypsies to be turned into soap. Guardian (United Kingdom) (2/2)

U.N. says alarmed at violence in Nepal's plains

By Kamil Zaheer

Published Sunday, 28 January, 2007 1:28 PM ET

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Sunday it was "deeply concerned" by rising violence in Nepal's food producing southern plains which has left seven people dead. Ethnic Madhesis in the country's Terai lowlands have been protesting for 10 days over what they say is the political and commercial dominance of people who live in the hills and mountains of Nepal's north. In the latest unrest, one man was shot and killed by police on Sunday. Since the protests began dozens have been injured and three towns placed under curfew. "We are seeing a very worrying escalation of tension and violence in communities in the Terai," said Lena Sundh, representative in Nepal of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.Madhesis say they face widespread discrimination, resulting in their under-representation in parliament, political parties, the army and police, despite being the majority in an area that is home to almost half the country's population of 26 million. The Madhesis, who live in the fertile strip of land by the Indian border, are ethnically and culturally closer to people from neighboring Indian states than to Nepalis from the hills. "We want to be treated as equals in politics and in running the nation. Why can't they understand that?" said one of the protesters, 36-year-old Ram Chandra Patel, in Jeetpur, 90 km (60 miles) southeast of Kathmandu. Yahoo! News (2/2)

Libya balks at executing MD, nurses in HIV case

Gadhafi's son eyes `happy end,' says verdicts `unfair'

Tsvetelia Ilieva, REUTERS NEWS AGENCY

Published Tuesday, 30 January, 2007 04:30 AM

SOFIA, Bulgaria–Libya will not execute five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor who were sentenced to death last month, says the son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, who called the verdicts unfair. A Libyan court sentenced the six for intentionally infecting hundreds of children with the HIV virus in a case that started eight years ago and has triggered widespread international concern about its fairness. Speaking to the Bulgarian daily 24 Chasa, Gadhafi's son, Saif al-Islam, said a solution would soon be found to save the six and satisfy families of the infected children, but he gave no details. "There will be no executions. I hope there will be a happy end soon. ... My father is also against the executions," said Saif al-Islam, Gaddafi's leading envoy. "The case went in the wrong direction from the very beginning. There were many manipulations in the original files, many errors... This is why we should seek a compromise," Saif al-Islam said, adding Tripoli had already discussed a plan with Germany and France.Saif al-Islam runs a charity foundation that has played a key part in negotiating with Western countries over compensation for bombings in which Libya was implicated. Experts have said the six may escape the firing squad with a government-led body having the final word on their fate. Toronto Star (2/2)

Birth rates 'must be curbed to win war on global poverty'

Published: Wednesday, 31 January, 2007

The earth's population will approach an unsustainable total of 10.5 billion unless contraception is put back at the top of the agenda for international efforts to alleviate global poverty. A report by MPs released today challenges world leaders to put the contraceptive pill and the condom at the centre of their efforts to alleviate global poverty, tackle starvation and even help to avert global warming. Gordon Brown has staked his future premiership on leading the world in tackling global poverty. And the report, by the all-party parliamentary group on population, development and reproductive growth, makes the point that the population surge presents a massive stumbling block for his ambition. Since the 1970s, when coercion was used in India and China, family planning has become a dirty word among environmental and hunger campaigners. But the report warns that eight UN targets for reducing poverty in the developing world will be missed unless world leaders do more to stop the soaring birth rates. The group says the UK will have to take on the religious ideology of the neoconservatives in the White House against contraception. The MPs call for an end to the so-called "global gag rule", that was reintroduced by President George Bush. It has put non-governmental organisations outside the US "in an untenable position" and forced them to choose between carrying out their work safeguarding the health and rights of women or losing their funding from the US. Independent (United Kingdom) (2/2)

Belarus condemned over eviction

Published Tuesday, 30 January, 2007

The US has condemned a decision by Belarus to evict a human rights group, the Belarusian Helsinki Committee, from its offices in the capital, Minsk. A state department spokesman said it showed the steady deterioration of human rights in Belarus. He added that it deprived the country of its most significant human rights group, and urged the government to reverse the eviction order immediately. The US has frequently attacked the human rights record of Belarus. It has called President Alexander Lukashenko Europe's last dictator. Last week in his State of the Union address, President Bush reaffirmed US commitment to seek democratic change in Belarus. The Belarus Helsinki Committee has long alleged abuse by the authorities, citing an ongoing court case for alleged tax evasion. It says that because it no longer has a legal address, it will be subject to liquidation under Belarus law.A lawyer for the group said it had sent a letter to president's office, which he says owns most of Minsk's office buildings, but had yet to receive a reply. BBC (2/2)

Iraqis fleeing conflict flood over borders

(This overview is part of a special report on the exodus from Iraq)

By Alistair Lyon, Special Correspondent

Published Wednesday, 31 January, 2007 18:04:00 GMT

BEIRUT, Jan 31 (Reuters) - Violence in Iraq and instability in Lebanon are driving hundreds of thousands of people abroad in an upheaval not matched in the Middle East since the exodus of Palestinian refugees when Israel was created in 1948. While Lebanese usually migrate legally to countries of their choice, Iraqis are fleeing across borders in distress to escape the bombings, death squads and sectarian cleansing that have savaged their country since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Most of the Iraqis are ending up in countries that already host large Palestinian communities drawn from the 4.3 million Palestinian refugees registered with the United Nations. The carnage in Iraq has also uprooted about half the 30,000 Palestinian refugees who lived there in Saddam Hussein's time, forcing them into a second exile or stranding them in limbo. About 700 Palestinians have been stuck for months in wretched camps on the Iraqi-Syrian border after fleeing violence in Baghdad, despite U.N. appeals for Arab states to let them in. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees says up to 50,000 Iraqis abandon their homes every month. "Iraq is the big one," UNHCR's regional representative Stephane Jaquemet told Reuters. The agency estimates that up to 2 million Iraqis have moved to neighbouring countries, mainly Syria and Jordan, before and since the war, while 1.7 million are internally displaced. Jaquemet said he feared Syria and Jordan, which each host anywhere between half a million and a million Iraqis, might eventually close their borders to the refugees -- many of whom are fast exhausting whatever resources they brought with them. Reuters AlertNet (2/2)

MOZAMBIQUE: Legislation reviewed to curb child trafficking

[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

MAPUTO, 31 Jan 2007 (IRIN) - International child traffickers may be using Mozambique's weak adoption laws to target orphaned children, to the growing concern of the government, said a senior official from the Ministry of the Interior. The use of the adoption process to gain access to disadvantaged children is the latest form of child trafficking to hit the Southern African country, according to Lurdes Mabunda, head of the ministry's Department of Women and Children. "Adoption cases have arisen over the past couple of years, in which people applied to adopt a child, went through the procedures, and then abused the child placed in their care. We view these as instances of child trafficking, an activity we are trying to eradicate in Mozambique," she said. Mozambique's 19.8 million people are desperately poor: 40 percent live on less than one US$1 a day, and most are still recovering from a 16-year civil war that ended in 1992. According to UNICEF there are 1.6 million orphans, 380 thousand of whom have lost their parents to HIV/AIDS. Cases involving orphan adoptions by foreign nationals living abroad have prompted the government to reconsider whether it should still allow international adoptions. Mabunda described how two orphans had been adopted by foreigners and taken to live in the USA, where they were abused before being abandoned and found living as street children. Another case involving an adopted girl, who had disappeared after being taken to live in Germany, was also under investigation. Most recently, the motives for adoption by a faith-based organisation from Spain were being investigated after a number of its applications were stopped due to suspicious behaviour. IRIN News (United Nations) (2/2)

Pakistani rape victim says attacks increasing

By Waheed Khan

Published Thursday, 01 February, 2007 10:26:08 GMT

KARACHI, Feb 1 (Reuters) - A Pakistani rape victim who became a prominent women's rights campaigner said on Thursday violence against women was increasing in Pakistan because authorities were not serious about punishing the perpetrators.Mukhtaran Mai, who was gang-raped in 2002 on the orders of a traditional village council, said she was appalled by a similar attack on a 16-year-old girl at the weekend. "Such inhuman acts are increasing in Pakistan as the government is not sincere about punishing offenders," Mai told Reuters on Thursday. "When I read about this girl's ordeal, I felt the work we have done for women in the last four years was for nothing," she said. A group of Pakistani men has been accused of raping the 16-year old girl in the southern Sindh province at the weekend and forcing her to parade naked through her village because one of her relatives eloped with a young woman from the men's family. Such attacks, known as honour crimes because they are committed in response to a perceived slight on a family's honour, are common in predominantly Muslim Pakistan, especially in backward, rural communities. "When I read about it I realised what this girl must have gone through, and all this in the name of honour," Mai said.Mai, who runs a community centre for women and a school in her home village in Punjab province, urged the government to provide swift justice for the girl. Mai was gang-raped in Punjab province in 2002 as a punishment because her brother had had a relationship with a young woman without the approval of the woman's family. Reuters AlertNet (2/2)

Nigeria: Corruption and Misuse Robs Nigerians of Rights

Published Thursday, 31 January, 2007

Lagos– Local government officials in Nigeria's wealthiest oil-producing state have squandered rising revenues that couldprovide basic health and education services for some of Nigeria'spoorest people, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Human Rights Watch found that the government's failure to tackle local-level corruption violates Nigeria's obligation to provide basic health and education services to its citizens. The 107-page report, "Chop Fine: The Human Rights Impact of LocalGovernment Corruption and Mismanagement in Rivers State,Nigeria," details the misuse of public funds by local officials in thegeographic heart of Nigeria's booming oil industry, and the harmfuleffects on primary education and basic health care. The report is based on scores of interviews in Rivers state with government and donor agency officials, civil servants, health care workers,teachers, civil society groups and local residents. Human Rights Watch also analyzed state and local government budgets. "Many state and local officials in Rivers have squandered or stolenpublic money that could have gone toward providing vital health and education services," said Peter Takirambudde, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "State and local budgets have expanded dramatically in recent years, but mismanagement and theft has left basic health and education services in a terrible state of decay." Human Rights Watch (2/2)