Obama in Burma: Rewarding Cosmetic Changes?

Obama in Burma: Rewarding Cosmetic Changes?

by EditorNo Comments
By Hal Levy, undergraduate student at Columbia University The White House moved with uncharacteristic speed to announce a surprising foreign policy initiative two days after President Obama’s reelection.  He was going to Burma and it was happening right now, less than two weeks after the votes were counted, and because he decided that everything would happen so quickly it was far too late to haggle over his itinerary, which by the way was already in place.  “Why scrutinize this?” was the implicit message to human rights activists, “because we don’t want your input this time.” However, this landmark engagement with the current Burmese regime warrants scrutiny and at the very least revision if it is to go forward.  Burma is finally opening to Western investment, but Obama must not abandon America’s responsibility to protect potential Burmese workers in favor of geopolitical games and economic opportunity.  Fraudulent elections held in 2010 transferred power to a mixture of civilians and military-appointed candidates in name...
Read More
OHCHR Global Panel: Moving Away from the Death Penalty

OHCHR Global Panel: Moving Away from the Death Penalty

by editorNo Comments
By Angélica Hoyos, senior in Political Science and Human Rights at Columbia University On July 3rd the Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights organized the global panel: “Moving Away from the Death Penalty.” Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon opened the discussion by declaring his commitment to end capital punishment: “The taking of life is too absolute, too irreversible, for one human being to inflict it on another, even when backed by legal process.” The goal of the discussion, which included delegates from the states parties, panelists, and members of civil society, was to set up a debate for the upcoming General Assembly in October. In 2007, The United Nations endorsed an international moratorium on capital punishment. Ever since, six nations have abolished the practice. The High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay expressed her hope for many other states to follow this trend. She reminded retentionist states that they ought to comply with Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil...
Read More
UN Negotiations Fail to Disarm Human Rights Abusers

UN Negotiations Fail to Disarm Human Rights Abusers

by editorNo Comments
By Amanda Barrow, M.A. candidate in Human Rights Studies at Columbia University Which is more heavily regulated: the global trade of bananas or AK-47s? In late June, activists led by Amnesty International (AI) highlighted a striking reality: there are more international regulations governing the export and import of bananas than there are on the trade of arms and ammunition. This is particularly problematic when considering the fact that the easy availability of weaponry—rather than, say, bananas—is what facilitates innumerable human rights abuses throughout the world. The indiscriminate transfer of arms undermines economic development, jeopardizes stability and security, and results in hundreds of thousands of deaths every year. You need not look further than Syria, where repressive ruler President Assad has had his will enacted through the use of heavily armed, violent force. Describing Russia’s continued arms sales to Syria in the midst of this crisis, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (UN) Susan Rice argued,“It is not technically a violation of international law since...
Read More

Time to Rethink: The ‘Women’s Dilemma’ and Public Policy

by editorNo Comments
By Yasmine Ergas, Associate Director of the Institute for the Study of Human Rights The ‘women’s dilemma’ is center stage – again. I call it that even though the impossible balancing of family life and professional life that Anne-Marie Slaughter recently dissected in a widely debated article in The Atlantic affects many men too. It still is primarily a women’s issue, and it will take some time before it can be characterized in gender-neutral terms. A recent workshop promoted by the Institute for the Study of Human Rights, with the financial support of ISERP, and the co-sponsorship of the Center for Gender and Sexuality Law, analyzed many of the new terms of the ‘motherhood’ issue. The following remarks are informed by that debate but do not seek to summarize it. Instead, I focus on some of the issues that Slaughter’s article raises. Slaughter has been much criticized for lamenting that “women still can’t have it all.” In truth, the “having it all”...
Read More

Film Review: Brother Number One

by EditorNo Comments
By Laura Reed, M.A. in Human Rights Studies Candidate at Columbia University “I am deeply honored and moved to be here today, given the opportunity to speak.  I realize that this is a privilege made available to a few, especially compared to the numbers of families that suffered under the Khmer Rouge regime.”– Rob Hamill, in the opening statement of his testimony at the trial of Comrade Duch in Cambodia. [vimeo]http://vimeo.com/26093819[/vimeo] Brother Number One, featured at the 2012 Human Rights Watch Film Festival in New York, is a powerful documentary film that explores the legacy of the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia.  Directed by New Zealand filmmaker Annie Goldson, this film depicts the personal journey of Rob Hamill as he travels to Cambodia to testify in the recent trial of former Khmer Rouge leader Duch at the UN-backed war crimes tribunal. A film about this period in Cambodian history, relayed through the story of a New Zealand family’s experience, is bound to raise some eyebrows...
Read More

Summer Update

by editorNo Comments
Hello RightsViews readers! While things have slowed down on campus for the summer semester, we’ve been busy working behind the scenes at RightsViews and have many updates to share with you. First of all, we bid a big farewell to our founding co-editor, Tanya O’Carroll. It was Tanya’s vision for an interactive, digital forum for human rights students and scholars that got this blog up and running. Since graduating from Columbia’s Human Rights Studies MA program, Tanya has moved back to London where she is working at the Amnesty International Secretariat on a project that collaborates with the technology community to help build solutions to human rights challenges. She will remain a member of our editorial board, but is handing the reigns over to Eve and two new members of our team. Good luck Tanya, and don't forget to tweet about us!! This summer, Laura Reed will join RightsViews as an Editor, and Jessica Eaton will be joining us as an Assistant Editor. Bringing together...
Read More

Notes From the Field: Columbia students reflect on a recent field trip to Ecuador

by EditorNo Comments
In the spring of 2012, a group of Columbia undergraduate students took part in the Alternative Spring Break Program for Columbians Vested in Global Exchange for Positive Development. The GEQUA  program offered students the opportunity to engage in a local gender equality project with Fundación Brethern y Unida, one of the oldest NGOs in Ecuador, which focuses on educating youth about sustainable development and the environment. ISHR helped support select undergraduate students to participate in this program. Below, two of these students, Jessica Eaton and Christian Hubbard, reflect on their experience, and consider how their time in the field has altered their understanding of human rights and the environment.   Indigenous Rights, Women's Rights and Organic Farming: Lessons learned in the back of a pick-up truck By Christian Hubbard Prior to going to Ecuador, if you would have asked me what corn and human rights have to do with each other, I definitely would have said nothing. But after my stay in Ecuador I now have...
Read More

Indictment, Trial and Verdict: The ICC’s First-Ever Conviction

by EditorNo Comments
An interview with conveners of the American Coalition for the ICC (AMICC), John Washburn and Matthew Heaphy As the final salvos of the KONY 2012 debate began to retreat from Facebook and Twitter newsfeeds, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has finally announced its first-ever conviction. On March 14th 2012, judges in The Hague found Thomas Lubanga Dylio, 51, guilty “beyond reasonable doubt” of committing crimes of conscription, enlistment and use of children to participate in hostilities under the Rome Statute Article 8.2 (b). Lubanga was a major figure in the Second Congo War (1998-2003) and the Ituri conflict (1999-2003) that saw Lubanga's Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC) participate in murder, torture and rape on a massive scale. Ituri is a fertile region in North-East DRC rich in gold, diamonds, and oil and was often referred to as the bloodiest corner of the DRC—as the longstanding local dispute between the Hema pastoralists (Lubanga's tribe) and rival Lendu agriculturalists was exploited by regional actors. The Lubanga case is...
Read More

Mapping the Kony 2012 Controversy: what does it mean for human rights advocacy?

by Editor1 Comment
If you have a Twitter or Facebook account, you've probably watched Kony 2012. This 29-minute film has more than 65 million hits on YouTube. Invisible Children (IC) co-founder, Jason Russell, directed and narrated the super-viral film that campaigns against Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a militant group that began in Uganda over two decades ago, and a wanted war criminal responsible for the death and abduction of as many as 30,000 children. Russell asks viewers to join IC’s campaign to capture Kony after describing his friendship with one of Kony’s victims, Jacob, and then sharing a compelling narrative about the promise he made to Jacob – “we're going to stop them.” In less than a week, the film has created an uproar. Many criticize the film for misrepresenting the LRA's part in two decades worth of complex regional wars in East and Central Africa. Others praise the film as a social media superstar. Whether or not IC's campaign can overcome...
Read More

Will new constitutional commitments improve respect for human rights in Kyrgyzstan?

by EditorNo Comments
Kyrgyzstan, a small mountainous country in Central Asia, is sandwiched between China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. In the twenty years since independence from the Soviet Union, Kyrgyzstan has seen three regimes. The first post-Soviet President, Askar Akaev, was an early reformer but, after increasing corruption and authoritarianism, was ousted during the ‘Tulip Revolution’ in March 2005. His successor, Kurmanbek Bakiev, promised to rewrite the Constitution and undo the excesses of the Akaev era, but ultimately consolidated power and resources. Bakiev was overthrown in April 2010 (see pictures), setting in motion the first effort to create a parliamentary democracy in Central Asia. Researching the contributions of the Kyrgyz human rights community In summer 2011 I was lucky enough to receive a Kathryn Davis fellowship to study Russian at Middlebury College and also to receive a Harriman Institute fellowship to conduct research in Kyrgyzstan in the late summer and early fall for my Master’s thesis. My research interest was to further understand the contributions...
Read More