| | Featured in This Issue: - Balkan Youths attend the Fifth Summit of The Youth Initiative for Human Rights
- Abdorrahman Boroumand Center and NGOs Condemn Iran's Crackdown on Protests
- Report Reveals Deteriorating Environment for Freedom of Expression Around the World
- Laotian Blogger Imprisoned for Criticizing the Government on Facebook
- Annual Overview of the State of Safety for Human Rights Defenders in MENA
| | | | | | Balkan Youths attend the Fifth Summit of The Youth Initiative for Human Rights The Youth Initiative for Human Rights (YIHR) held its Fifth Youth Summit in Skopje, North Macedonia earlier this month. Over 200 youths from across the Balkans attended, including NGO activists, media practitioners, artists, and students. Conference events revolved around a theme of young people's capacity to serve as connectors between divided communities, and included interactive workshops to explore creative ways to mobilize communities and to promote democratic processes and peace. Participants examined not just theories but specific tactics, such as using sports and the artistic process as ways of building peace. Organizers released a "Declaration Against Nationalism" which supported several goals, including their desire to be included in official discussions on changes to the EU integration process and to participate in the Conference on the Future of Europe. Read their declaration here. | | Abdorrahman Boroumand Center and NGOs Condemn Iran's Crackdown on Protests The Abdorrahman Boroumand Center has released a letter, co-signed by 45 NGOs, demanding that the Iranian authorities release the thousands of political prisoners it captured during its crackdown on protests there. These protests are estimated to be the largest in Iran since the revolution of 1978/79, with over 7,000 people arrested in November alone. The letter also calls for the government to prosecute state actors who committed abuses of power, including the killing of over 200 people. Read the letter here. | | Report Reveals Deteriorating Environment for Freedom of Expression Around the World Article 19 has released its Global Expression Report for 2018/19, surveying the state of freedom of expression around the world. The report, one of the most comprehensive in the field and covering 161 countries, concludes that this freedom is at its lowest level in a decade. The report found that 99 journalists were killed worldwide in 2018, 21 more than in 2017. Read the report here. | | Laotian Blogger Imprisoned for Criticizing the Government on Facebook Reporters Without Borders documented the sentencing of a Laotian woman to five years in prison for publically describing the Laotian government's inadequate response to flooding in her province, Champasak. Houayheuang Xayabouly, or Muay Littlepig as she is known on social media, was arrested on Sept. 12 for posting a video on Facebook of herself talking about the government's response to the deadly flooding in southern Laos, which displaced over 100,000 people and killed dozens. For this she was convicted of "spreading propaganda against the Lao People's Democratic Republic," given the maximum prison penalty, and fined 20 million kip (US $2,228). Read the article here. | | Annual Overview of the State of Safety for Human Rights Defenders in MENA The WHRD MENA Coalition, a regional coalition of women human rights defenders, has released a review of the safety of human rights and civil society defenders in the Middle East and North Africa in 2019. Surveying conditions in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Yemen, Morocco, Iraq, Palestine, and Lebanon, the authors conclude that women performing this work have faced increasingly threatening and unsafe environments over the course of the year. Read the overview here. | | | | As a participant of the World Movement for Democracy, your privacy is important to us. Effective June 13, 2018, the National Endowment for Democracy, which serves as the Secretariat for the World Movement for Democracy, has updated its privacy policy. You may review our amended privacy policy here. | | | | | | | |
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