Prominent Indian-origin academics in the United Kingdom have asked for immediate release of renowned human rights activist Binayak Sen, who has been imprisoned in Chhattisgarh since May 2007 for alleged links with Naxalites. "As the world's economic powers gather in London this week, with India among them, we hope they will take the time to consider human rights as well as the credit crunch. In particular, we call attention to the continuing imprisonment of Dr Sen," they said
Varavara Rao reached home in Hyderabad on Thursday morning, while activists Vernon Gonsalves and Arun Ferreira, were sent to Mumbai by road.
'This insanity must stop. Or else, the State will lose its legitimacy in the eyes of the people. Then, the Maoists will have achieved their purpose of discrediting not just the State, but democracy itself.'
Col Hariharan joins readers on Rediff Chat on February 5, 2009 to answer their queries on the crisis in Sri Lanka and about India's role in the conflict, if any.
For two weeks, the Asian American Action Fund debated its choice for Person of the Year 2008, from among men and women of Pacific Asian origin who had impacted on the political arena. The eight-year-old Democratic organisation finally settled on Swati Dandekar, the Iowa assemblywoman who in the 2008 election cycle won to the state senate.
Even as Bangladesh introduced its new counter-terrorism ordinance in a bid to curb terror, it has already come in for flak with Human Rights activists demanding that the ordinance be repealed or amended as per international standards. The ordinance, according to HRW, sets out an overly broad definition of terrorist acts, including mere property crimes as well as attacks targeting individuals, contrary to United Nations recommendations.
Ansar Burney, the leading Pakistani Human Rights activist on Wednesday said that he would file a fresh mercy petition to Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari on behalf of Sarabjit Singh on Thursday.
The Commonwealth on Monday gave an ultimatum to Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf asking him to repeal the emergency provisions.
Pakistani human rights activist Ansar Burney was denied entry into India on his arrival at the New Delhi airport last week due to a 'misunderstanding' and the matter was subsequently sorted out, a Foreign Office spokesman said in Islamabad on Thursday.The Indian government was in touch with Burney, former Pakistani human rights minister, after the incident and the matter had been sorted out, Mohammad Sadiq said.
Burney, who was the human rights minister in the interim government in Pakistan, was deported back from the Indira Gandhi International Airport by an Emirates Airways flight at Airways flight at around 2030 hours because of a "look-out" notice against him, they said. It was, however, not immediately clear who had issued the notice against him and in what connection.
'So many civil liberties activists have been killed by the State and their deaths left unaccounted for that I am beginning to despair.'
K P S Gill, former director general of Punjab police, has refuted allegations against him in a 125-page human rights report in which he was accused of personally questioning human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra.
Pakistan's former Federal Minister for Human Rights and Expert Advisor in the United Nations Human Rights Council at Geneva, Burney, who arrived in terror struck Mumbai in the wee hours of Sunday, wasted no time in showing his solidarity with India in its war against terrorism. "They are beast of jungles and killers of humanity," was Burney's instant reaction about the terror carnage in Mumbai that left 183 dead.
The Olympic torch arrives in Hong Kong on Wednesday with authorities under fire for barring at least half a dozen activists from entering the city. Three Tibetan activists from the groups Free Tibet and Students for a Free Tibet were denied entry by Hong Kong authorities on Tuesday, while three Danish human rights activists including sculptor Jens Galschiot were barred over the weekend.
Amidst appeals for clemency for Sarabjit Singh by his family and human rights activists, hundreds of students in Lahore took to the streets demanding that the Indian death row prisoner not be pardoned. The demonstrators termed former Pakistani human rights minister Ansar Burney, who has sent a mercy petition on behalf of Sarabjit to President Pervez Mushrraf, an Indian agent. The students marched in the city on Friday and sought withdrawal of all moves to pardon Sarabjit.
The Ansar Burney Trust International has taken up the issue of Azhar Ansari, 17, and his cousin Zohaib Ansari, 10, with India's ministries of home affairs and external affairs for their early release. "Their only wrongdoing was that they had crossed the border into India illegally by digging the earth under the barbed wire fence which divides India and Pakistan at the Munabao border and sneaked into Barmer in India," the statement said.
A fact-finding committee, comprising of human rights activists formed to look into the recent violence in Mangalore, has stated that the attacks were carried out by the Bajrang Dal and the Sri Rama Sene (a local Hindu group). The team said the 'planned attacks' were aimed at causing hurt and resentment among Christians. It was also used as a pretext by the police to let lose a savage assault on the community and its sacred institutions, the report said.
During his visit to India, Burney is expected to meet senior officials, including the ministers for home affairs and external affairs, and human rights activists in an effort to secure the release of all Pakistani prisoners who had completed their sentences.
Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Jaswant Singh on Wednesday claimed that Pakistani human rights activist Asma Jehangir had been allowed to visit Jammu and Kashmir as a United Nations rapporteur and questioned the clearance for it."Are we seeking reciprocal arrangements from Pakistan government for such visits by Indian human rights activists," Jaswant Singh, Leader of Opposition in the Upper House, said while replying to a debate on the President's address.
Seething with anger the banned United Liberation Front of Asom has called for a 12-hour dawn to dusk Assam bandh on Tuesday for demanding the release of human rights activist and chief convenor of the ULFA-constituted People's Consultative Group Lachit Bardoloi.
The arrests were made on the basis of confessions made by arrested ULFA cadre Manoj Tamuly, who was allegedly trained by an Inter Services Intelligence operative.
'This includes increasing restrictions on freedom of expression and the detention of human rights activists and journalists'
The deportation of Pakistani human rights activist Ansar Burney from India could delay the release of Indian death row prisoner Sarabjit Singh in Lahore, Singh's sister said on Saturday and asked Indian politicians not to play "dirty politics".
The Pakistan government has told leading human rights activist Ansar Burney's family that it had no role in his deportation from India to Dubai, his brother said on Saturday.Ansar Burney, who played a key role in the release of Indian death row prisoner Kashmir Singh and has been campaigning for clemency for another death row prisoner Sarabjit Singh, was deported from New Delhi shortly after he arrived at the Indira Gandhi Airport on Friday night.
Addressing a health card distribution ceremony in Peshawar, Chief Minister Khan said the government has issued orders to rebuild the temple. The attack on the temple in Terri village in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's (KP) Karak district on Wednesday drew strong condemnation from human rights activists and the minority Hindu community leaders.
'Saudi Arabia's standing internationally and in the West is going to take a big hit even if MBS is dethroned.'
Welcoming Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen's decision to remove a controversial portion from her book Dwikhondito, the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind on Friday said that the author was free to return to West Bengal.
The state government was committed to achieve zero HIV positive rate among new-born babies by having effective screening of pregnant women to prevent vertical transmission of the disease, he said.
'One of the most unfathomable aspects of Gujarati society is the utter lack of reflection about the horrific violence of 2002,' says social analyst Suchitra Sheth.
He apologised to Asma Jehangir whose hotel room in New Delhi was searched by police without any warrant.
Political economist and human rights activist Vithal Rajan and healthcare professional Lalita Malhotra were appointed officer and member respectively to the Order of Canada on Monday
In an interview to BBC, the King said Saudi Arabia passed on to Britain information that might have helped avert the July 2005 bombings that killed 52 people.
Palbinder Kaur Shergill, a sole practitioner with Shergill & Company, has extensive trial and appellate experience and has appeared before courts and tribunals across Canada, including the Supreme Court of Canada.
The Supreme Court on Friday refused to interfere in the arrest of five rights activists in connection with the Koregaon-Bhima violence case and declined to appoint a SIT for probe into their arrest.
Parvez was arrested on September 16 and placed in administrative detention in a jail in Kupwara for allegedly posing an imminent threat of breach of peace.
'The security forces and the state mechanism have virtually wiped the indigenous people out of the hills of Chittagong.'
Khan, alleged to be a JeM militant who had gone to Pakistan for training, was killed in a police encounter in 2002. Human rights activists have alleged he was killed in a false encounter and not while fleeing from the police.
The workers break ships with their bare hands. Their general living conditions after coming to these yards are extremely bad.
Six policemen, including a Deputy Superintendent of Police, were on Friday convicted by a Patiala court for kidnapping and murdering human rights activist Jaswant Singh Khalra in 1995.
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