Daily Brief Audio Series
Are you a brutal dictator short of cash or maybe just looking for a side hustle? Is crushing your critics not having the economic benefit you’d hoped for? Would you like to get paid more for your repression?
The European Union is offering huge piles of cash to authoritarians just like you! We’ve got mountains of money – big notes, small notes, sacks of coins – all to help you strengthen your hold on power and continue your repression for decades to come!
Just pick up the phone and call EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on 1-800-BLOCK-MIGRANTS. That’s 1-800-BLOCK-MIGRANTS. Call now! Operators are standing by!
Join the EU’s many satisfied customers, like Egypt’s autocratic leader, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. EU Commission President Von der Leyen and friends handed him EUR 7.4 billion yesterday. And all he has to do in return is repeat some blah blah about a “comprehensive and strategic partnership” and – most importantly – prevent migrant departures toward Europe.
And Egypt is not alone. Mauritania and Tunisia have also walked away smiling from the EU’s ATM for autocrats. It’s very simple: you promise to stop the migrants, you get the cash.
How are you supposed to stop them? EU leaders don’t care! Do whatever you want! Are you worried about so-called “European values” of democracy and human rights? Well, don’t be!
In Egypt, authorities wrongfully arrest and mistreat migrants, asylum seekers, and refugees. They deport them to Eritrea, an even more repressive country. They also reportedly deported Sudanese asylum seekers back to Sudan, where there’s a war raging. None of this stopped the EU handing al-Sisi the money. It’s almost as if mistreatment of migrants is the whole point… Wink, wink.
Plus, if you act now, the EU will throw in at no extra cost to you a free set of silences about other horrific human rights abuses in your dictatorship.
After yesterday, you can bet Brussels won’t be saying much about the al-Sisi regime’s long list of crimes since he took power in a 2013 coup. Massacring protesters, jailing and torturing thousands of critics and opponents, grossly unfair trials, crushed media, the courts an obedient arm of government repression.
So, dictators of the world, what are you waiting for? Billions of euros could be yours! Call 1-800-BLOCK-MIGRANTS today!
I know: it’s not funny. These so-called leaders of Europe are behaving in the most appalling manner. They fear and despise desperate people fleeing war and oppression so much, they are literally paying brutal dictators to abuse them just so the desperate people don’t reach Europe. It’s not funny at all, but their disgusting inhumanity deserves to be mocked.
Progress in the Fight against Forced Labor, Daily Brief March 14, 2024
Daily Brief, 14 March, 2024
When long-debated legislation is finally agreed on, optimists and pessimists often argue about whether the result of the political negotiations is a theoretical glass half-full or glass half-empty. This one tends toward the former.
Yesterday’s news that EU politicians approved a forced labor import ban is certainly encouraging. It will eventually help stop products linked to forced labor from entering the EU and increase pressure on governments and companies to stop forced labor practices.
It should ultimately have a positive impact on the estimated 3.9 million people trapped in state-imposed forced labor programs worldwide, not to mention on European manufacturers facing unfair competition.
Regular readers will recall our recent look at aluminum from Xinjiang, China, used by global automakers, as we asked: Is your car driving repression? The conclusion was that, while individual consumer awareness is important, the scale of the problem of forced labor in large-scale manufacturing requires the broader regulatory approach that only governments can provide.
What happened yesterday in the EU was a step in the right direction. After agreement between EU member state ambassadors and members of the European Parliament negotiating the deal, it now goes to the EU Council and Parliament for formal approval.
Experts who’ve been working for years to see this happen were rightly pleased.
Chloe Cranston of Anti-Slavery International called it a “huge result … Despite its weaknesses, this is a major step forward for ending forced labour globally.”
Steve Trent of the Environmental Justice Foundation, said it sent “a powerful message that the EU is upholding the fundamental values of dignity and respect for all people.”
My Human Rights Watch colleague Jim Wormington said it was “great news,” adding: “When it comes into force, the law will mean companies benefitting from forced labor, in Xinjiang and elsewhere, cannot sell to EU markets.”
But everyone involved also recognizes the EU’s new forced labor law is not all it could be.
It is, as my colleague Jim notes with regard to Xinjiang, weaker than the US law called the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act. That US law, which came into force in 2022, rightly establishes the presumption that any product produced in whole or in part in Xinjiang, China, is made with forced labor and cannot be imported.
Still, the EU law does include measures to help investigators identify and stop products linked to state-imposed forced labor from entering the EU.
So, overall, the news is good. There is progress. The optimists can say the theoretical glass is half-full.
But the struggle continues to make sure your actual glass has not been manufactured with forced labor.
For most of the world, restrictions put in place during the Covid-19 pandemic are a distant memory.
In North Korea, however, key pandemic-related restrictions are still in place – and it’s making people’s lives even more miserable in the hellscape of the so-called “Democratic People’s Republic.”
Specifically, this is about restrictions on movement and trade. In 2020, as the global pandemic raged, North Korea’s government largely sealed its border with neighboring China. It imposed excessive and unnecessary quarantines and new restrictions on economic activity and freedom of movement.
These measures have severely undermined food security in the country. Previously, many products North Koreans needed to survive entered the country from China through formal and informal trade routes. The Covid-related restrictions have worsened the already grave humanitarian and human rights situation in the country.
UN Security Council sanctions from 2016 and 2017, which limited most exports and some imports, add to the difficulties. The intention of the sanctions may have been to try to push the North Korean government to moderate some of its more unhinged geopolitical actions.
However, the sanctions have had the unintentional effect of hurting ordinary North Koreans. Their economic impact has harmed people’s ability to make a living and access food and essential goods.
In a sense, people are caught between the hammer of an extremely abusive government and the anvil of an international community, which is so frustrated with the totalitarian regime in Pyongyang, tries policies that have unintended consequences for long-suffering, ordinary North Koreans.
But while the UN Security Council should certainly review current sanctions on North Korea and their impacts, let’s be clear: the primary problem is the government, one of the most repressive in the world. Even before Covid-19 restrictions were put in place, North Korea was among the most authoritarian and isolated countries anywhere.
Ultimately, easing the hardships ordinary North Koreans face would take some serious policy reversals from North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un: reopening the borders for trade, relaxing internal travel restrictions, and allowing monitored international emergency assistance. In short, he should end all these “policies that have essentially made North Korea a giant prison.”
Just scrapping the pandemic-related restrictions would be a start. It is 2024, after all, so it’s long overdue.
“The country is falling apart. There is no state authority left. The authorities now are the criminals.”
The words[SN1] of a senior police official sum up the situation in Haiti today.
What this means for ordinary Haitians, however, was perhaps better expressed by a 23-year-old mechanic in the capital, Port-au-Prince: “There is no state, the police are scared, and they have no way to defend us from the gangs that shoot, kill, kidnap, rape women, and take away everything from us on a daily basis.”
Haiti is on the brink of a total collapse. In fact, it’s probably already past that point, as violent criminal groups seek to overthrow the government.
The groups’ actions have practically shut down the economy and the delivery of humanitarian aid. Their assaults on two prisons have set loose almost 4,700 prisoners. Nearly all transportation, including the country’s main port and international airport, is at a standstill.
The prime minister, Ariel Henry, failed to organize elections and step down by February 7 as promised, leading to protests and deeper chaos. Now, he’s outside the country, unable to return since he traveled to Kenya to finalize arrangements for the Kenyan-led international security support mission, which has been beset by legal, funding, and operational problems.
Right now, the most powerful person in the country may be Jimmy Chérizier aka “Barbecue,” the leader of Haiti’s main criminal coalition, known as G9. He’s working with a rival criminal gang to remove Henry from power and confront the international support mission when it arrives.
Criminal gangs already control much of the country. They have killed more than 1,100 people and injured nearly 700 others in 2024 alone. Some 13,000 people have been killed, injured, and kidnapped by criminal groups since January 2022. Thousands of women and children have been victims of sexual violence.
More than 362,000 people have been internally displaced. Food insecurity in Haiti is among the worst in the world. Many children are out of school, and often fall prey to recruitment by criminal gangs.
The people of Haiti desperately need international support, and the Kenyan-led mission will certainly be entering an extremely hostile environment. Pledges of support have come from the US, Canada, and France. Benin, Chad, Bangladesh, Barbados, and The Bahamas have committed to deploying forces alongside Kenyan police officers.
The history of international interventions in Haiti is littered with serious errors, even horrors. Governments need to avoid past failures, which means putting the protection of human rights at the core of the mission.
Haitian civil society could help show the way. Independent charities and activist groups have developed proposals to restore the rule of law, security, and access to basic necessities. International actors should work with these folks on the ground who understand the situation best.
Only by working together locally and internationally is there a chance to help bring about true democratic governance as the ultimate basis of long-term security in Haiti.
[SN1]Should we not link to presser?
France made history on Monday. It became the first country to add to its national constitution an explicit recognition of the freedom to have an abortion.
On the one hand, obviously, it was a tremendous victory for human rights. Even though abortion has been legal in France since 1975, the positive vote by an overwhelming majority of France’s parliament confirmed it as a right at a more fundamental level.
On the other hand, equally obviously, it begs the question: how is it that, in the year 2024, there’s even a debate about whether a person has the right to control their own body? It’s self-evident that an individual should be free to decide questions about their own health.
So, while France’s move is of course welcome, it’s also a reminder of just how pathetically behind so many places are when it comes to human rights, even one as clear as the right to keep the government out of your body.
In some countries, things are going backwards. The 2022 US Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, which constitutionally protected the right to abortion on privacy grounds, opened the floodgates. Abortion is now restricted in 21 US states, and 14 US states have taken measures to criminalize healthcare providers who perform abortions.
As with so many political movements that aim to increase government power at the expense of individual rights, the abuses build and build beyond even the point of absurdity.
In the US state of Alabama, for example, the state supreme court ruled frozen embryos have the legal status of “children.” Meanwhile, Alabama law allows children – real children – to be beaten in schools.
But don’t think France is somehow now perfect either.
The new protection of abortion is a victory, but even in other areas of women’s rights, France’s government is not setting a shining example. As my expert colleague Hillary Margolis notes, the country still fails to sufficiently prevent violence against women, protect victims, and hold perpetrators accountable. France has had 31 reported femicides in 2024 so far.
France has also actively restricted women’s and girls’ dress, banning full-face veils in public places, head scarves in schools, and head coverings for athletes, including in national and international competitions. So, you have a right to decide what to do with your body, but not what you wear? It all disproportionately impacts Muslim women and girls, of course.
Of course, the confirmation of the right to abortion in France is good news. Not only does is bolster the rights of people in France, it also sends an important message internationally after attacks on abortion access and sexual and reproductive health rights elsewhere.
But it also reminds us there is so much more to be done everywhere, including in France.