A Senate Committee report released overnight lays bare the horrific abuses committed against refugees and people seeking asylum on Nauru and Manus Island, further demonstrating the urgency of getting people to a place of safety. Amnesty International gave evidence at the Senate Inquiry last month. The report highlights a failure by the Australian Government to …
Author Archives: Anita Harvey
Drop charges against The Fiji Times
The Fijian authorities must immediately drop politically-motivated sedition charges against The Fiji Times newspaper group. “By charging the Fiji Times with sedition, the Fijian authorities are using a crude tactic to intimidate and silence one of the few independent media outlets left in the country,” said Josef Benedict, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for Southeast Asia …
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people denied freedom of speech in racial hatred hearing
Today the Government, who say they are committed to freedom of speech, have gagged the Aboriginal Legal Services and have failed to hear from any Indigenous people about a bill to change the Racial Discrimination Act. In response Tammy Solonec, Indigenous Rights Manager at Amnesty International said: “This flies in the face of Prime Minister …
Yemen: Huthi forces recruiting child soldiers for front-line combat
New evidence has emerged of how the Huthi armed group is actively recruiting boys as young as 15 to fight as child soldiers on the front lines of the conflict in Yemen. Amnesty International has spoken to the families of three boys targeted this month by the appalling practice which violates international law. The families also …
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Pakistan: Wave of violence shows a horrific disregard for human life
A bomb attack in Lahore that killed eight people is the latest in a wave of violence that shows a horrific disregard for human life. Over the past fortnight, a series of bomb attacks claimed by a slew of armed groups has claimed the lives of more than 120 people and injured several more, raising …
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Philippines: The police’s murderous war on the poor
Acting on instructions from the very top of government, the Philippines police have killed and paid others to kill thousands of alleged drug offenders in a wave of extrajudicial executions that may amount to crimes against humanity. Read the report Amnesty International’s investigation,“If you are poor you are killed”: Extrajudicial Executions in the Philippines’ “War …
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Saudi Arabia: Immediately abandon all use of cluster munitions
Saudi Arabia should immediately abandon all use of cluster munitions, destroy its stockpile and accede to the international Convention on Cluster Munitions, Amnesty International said after the Kingdom’s surprise admission today that it used the inherently indiscriminate weapon in Yemen. General Ahmed al-Asiri, the spokesperson for the Saudi Arabia-led military coalition, stated today that it …
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Recommendations from decades ago would have saved Ms Dhu’s life
Following the release of the Western Australian State Coroner’s findings in the inquest into the death of Ms Dhu, an Aboriginal woman who died while in police custody in August 2014, Amnesty International Indigenous Rights Advisor Rodney Dillon said: “Amnesty International pays respects to Ms Dhu’s family and acknowledges their pain, suffering and anguish since …
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Outrageous lifetime ban of refugees rejected by Labor
Amnesty International welcomes the news that the Australian Labor Party has unanimously rejected Immigration Minister Dutton’s outrageous and unnecessary proposal for a lifetime ban on people seeking asylum. “It is encouraging to see the Labor party step up at this time and make the right decision to reject this callous and cruel legislation,” said Dr …
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Australian Government’s lifetime ban proposal callous and cruel
The Australian Government continues to punish and discriminate against how people seeking asylum travel to Australia, with its proposed lifetime ban on people entering the country if they arrive by boat. In an announcement yesterday Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that the Government would seek to rush through new laws that would prevent anyone who …
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