Doula Care for Justice in Maternal Health in Florida
The 62-page report, “Witness, Ally, Advocate, Climate Worker: Doula Care for Justice in Maternal Health in Florida,” found that the state provides inadequate financial and programmatic support for doula care, including under state-based Medicaid plans on which almost half of all women who are pregnant or give birth in the state rely. Doulas are non-clinical health workers who provide expert support during birth and provide individualized information about health care options, rights, and resources. Academic and US government research suggests that doula services can help improve the availability, accessibility, and quality of health care services for pregnant people. One multi-country analysis of evidence found continuous labor support by doulas may reduce rates of cesarean delivery and improve Apgar scores (indications of good health in newborns) and women’s ratings of the experience.
Containing background information about human rights violations in Iraq gathered in mid-1992 from victims, eyewitnesses and family members currently living in exile in Syria and Jordan, this report serves as a supplement to our Human Rights in Iraq (1990) and Endless Torment: The 1991 Uprising in Iraq and its Aftermath (1992).
As details regarding a war crimes tribunal develop, we believe that integral to any investigatory effort is a parallel commitment to the safety and integrity of the witnesses who will testify, and to the development and implementation of fair procedural and evidentiary rules.
Hundreds Arrested and Press Muzzled in Aftermath of Election Annulment
On June 12, 1993, Nigerian citizens overcame ethnic and regional rivalries in an effort to rid themselves of military rule and hold a legitimate presidential election. Gen. Babangida and his cronies, however, have shown no intention of allowing civilians a significant voice in government and annulled the election and postponed his exit from politics.
Helsinki Watch Releases Eight Cases for War Crimes Tribunal on Former Yugoslavia
With great fanfare, the U.N. Security Council, in February 1993, called for the establishment of an international tribunal to investigate and prosecute perpetrators of war crimes in the Balkan conflict.
Executions Continue, No Appeal of Death Sentences to Higher Court
In a major shift of policy, the Egyptian government in October 1992 began to try in military courts civilians accused of "terrorism" offenses, bypassing the security-court system staffed by civilian judges that has been in place under Egypt's long-standing emergency law.
In Greece, some citizens are paying a heavy price for their government's hard line on Macedonia. In particular, freedom of expression has been abrogated through an intensive campaign which combines propaganda and a series of extraordinary criminal prosecutions for dissenters.
Indiscriminate Bombing & Shelling by Azerbaijani Forces in Nagorno-karabakh
Armenian and Azerbaijani forces are fighting for control of Nagorno-Karabakh, a territory within Azerbaijan in the former Soviet Union. The Armenians are fighting for self-determination and independence from Azerbaijan; the Azerbaijanis fight for the territorial integrity of their country.
(From our " Struggling for Ethnic Identity" series) Since the demise of the Communist regime in Hungary, the country’s Gypsy or Roma population has benefited from the suspension of decades of assimilationist, and at times overtly racist, government policy and from an increased tolerance for the expression of Roma identity.
With the bloody conflict in Indian-controlled Kashmir now in its fourth year, Indian troops have embarked on a “catch and kill” campaign against Muslim militants, resulting in a sharp escalation of human rights abuses, including summary executions of hundreds of detainees in the custody of security forces.
Between April 29 and May 28, in a move unprecedented since Lebanon’s civil war, the Hrawi government shut down 4 news organizations and filed criminal charges against 4 journalists for violating Lebanon’s restrictive press regulation. The recent measures recall the fall of 1976, when the newly-arrived Syrian troops forcibly shut down 5 newspapers in Beirut.
A narrative account of the Iraqi government’s organized attempt to eradicate the Kurds living in northern Iraq, this report captures in riveting detail the multiple phases of the Anfal campaign. Anfal, meaning "the spoils," is the name of the eighth sura of the Koran. It is also the name given by the Iraqis to a series of military actions that lasted from February 23 until September 6, 1988.
On March 4, 1993 President Chiluba declared a state of emergency, alleging the existence of a plot to overthrow the government by illegal means. The plot, known as the “Zero Option Plan,” was said to have been devised by members of the opposing United National Independence Party with support form the governments of both Iraq and Iran.
In 1990, the Economic Community Cease-fire Monitoring Group entered Liberia as a peacekeeping force, temporarily stopping the bloodshed and ethnic killing. However, Ecomog has not integrated human rights protection and promotion into its activities, leaving it embroiled in a conflict with few immediate prospects for resolution.
The Human Rights Watch Global Report on Prisons summarizes six years of work by the Prison Project and divisions of Human Rights Watch in investigating prison conditions in some twenty countries worldwide.
In this report, we examine five of the largest UN field operations in recent years, in Cambodia, El Salvador, Iraq, Somalia and the former Yugoslavia. These operations span a broad range of regions and circumstances. Yet with the exception of El Salvador, they have in common the low priority given to human rights.