Dark Day for Human Rights in UK: Daily Brief

Dark days in the United Kingdom, as the government has proposed legislation to replace the Human Rights Act with a so-called “British” Bill of Rights, a move that would significantly weaken rights across the board for all. Getting rid of the Human Rights Act would be the culmination of a longstanding effort by the ruling Conservative Party to rewind to a period when the British government felt less constrained by the European Convention on and Court of Human Rights. The proposed legislation is deeply concerning for many reasons.

Authorities in the Australian state of New South Wales are disproportionately punishing climate protesters in violation of their basic rights to peaceful protest. New anti-protest laws currently before parliament in the states of Victoria and Tasmania would also invoke harsh penalties for non-violent protest. “The Australian authorities’ crackdown on climate protesters is an alarming new trend,” says Sophie McNeill, Australia researcher at Human Rights Watch. "Citizens who protest and violate the law can face appropriate punishment, but the punishment should not be intended to prevent all protesters from exercising their fundamental right to protest. Climate action will mean more people peacefully taking to the streets, not fewer, and the authorities should accept that.”

The military rulers of Myanmar have moved Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest to solitary confinement in a prison in Naypyidaw, the capital of the country. The junta arrested Suu Kyi on February 1, 2021, when she was head of the then-ruling National League for Democracy party, as it nullified the results of the November 2020 democratic elections. "What we are seeing is the Myanmar junta moving towards a much more punitive phase, towards Aung San Suu Kyi," says Phil Robertson, HRW's deputy Asia director in an article published by France 24. "They are obviously trying to intimidate her and her supporters."

 “My child’s nightmare lasted around a year and a half. She was beaten and locked in a caged bed, sometimes for the entire day or even two days.” This is how a mother described the ordeal her daughter Kasia (pseudonym) went through in a residential institution for girls and women with intellectual disabilities in Jordanów, a small town in southern Poland. Having entered two months before her 18th birthday, when Kasia was removed from the institution almost two years later, her family said she was barely able to speak or walk, a side effect of medication she was given...

And there's news from Ghana, where a group of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) organizations filed lawsuits against the Inspector General of Police and the Attorney General to get justice for 21 activists who were unlawfully arrested by the police last year. Their supposed crime: gathering at a workshop in support of the rights LGBTI people...