100 Days of War Crimes in Ukraine: Daily Brief

Today marks 100 days of Russia's renewed invasion of Ukraine. Russian forces have committed a long list of war crimes, including: indiscriminate bombing civilians; summary executions; enforced disappearances; arbitrary detentions; sexual violence; and torture. There are too many examples of Russia's indiscriminate bombing of civilians in Ukraine to count, but perhaps one stands out: the attack on the Mariupol theater. Satellite photos taken just before the attack in March showed the word "children" in Russian written twice in large Cyrillic script in front and behind the theater in Mariupol. Russia bombed it anyway, killing hundreds. Human Rights Watch has been pushing for justice in Ukraine since the renewed invasion by Russia began on 24 February - and actually for all 8 years of this war, since Russia's initial invasion and occupation in 2014. The big question now is when key suspects of war crimes will be facing a reckoning. Russia's President Vladimir Putin and his generals may think they are shielded from prosecution, but this can change...

Over the past year, the regime in China has stepped up the harassment and persecution of activists for commemorating the June 4, 1989 Tiananmen Massacre. The authorities should instead acknowledge and take responsibility for the mass killing of pro-democracy demonstrators, says HRW. Twenty-six pro-democracy activists – including Joshua Wong, media mogul Jimmy Lai, journalist Gwyneth Ho, and former legislators Leung Kwok-hung, Cyd Ho, and Andrew Wan – were arrested in the past year for participating or “inciting” others to participate in the 2020 vigil honoring massacre victims. They received suspended sentences or prison terms of between 4 and 14 months. The Tiananmen Massacre was precipitated by the peaceful gatherings of students, workers, and others in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square and other Chinese cities in April 1989, calling for freedom of expression, accountability, and an end to corruption. The government responded to the intensifying protests in late May 1989 by declaring martial law. On June 3 and 4, People’s Liberation Army soldiers fired upon and killed untold numbers of peaceful protesters and bystanders. 

For more than a year and a half, a largely invisible campaign of ethnic cleansing has played out in Ethiopia’s northern region of Tigray. Older people, women, and children have been loaded onto trucks and forced out of their villages and hometowns. Men have been herded into overcrowded detention sites, where many have died of disease, starvation, or torture. In total, several hundred thousand Tigrayans have been forcibly uprooted because of their ethnicity. What can be done to stop these horrific human rights abuses? Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International, and Ken Roth, HRW's Executive Director, have come up with some recommendations, published in a new article for Foreign Affairs. 

Before he became President of the United States, Joe Biden vowed to punish the rulers of Saudi Arabia for their brutal assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Now, he wants to travel to Saudi Arabia, to "rebuild relations as he seeks to lower gas prices and isolate Russia" - and meet Saudi's murderous ruler Mohammed bin Salman. According to a US intelligence report Bin Salman, also known as MBS, approved the 2018 murder of Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey. Yet the Biden administration has so far failed to live up to its campaign promise to hold MBS accountable. HRW and 41 other organizations have called on Biden to impose sanctions available under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act on officials at the highest levels of Saudi leadership, including MBS.

And kindly consider joining our new #StudentsNotProducts campaign, calling on governments to better protect our children by passing modern child data protection laws. By demanding protections for how our children’s data is handled, you can help defend our children from being surveilled in online classrooms by actors who may not have our children’s best interests at heart.