Bolivia Threatens to Withdraw from the Inter-American Commission of Human RIghts

By Pearl Rimon
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

SUCRE, Bolivia – Bolivian President Evo Morales has made recent comments about the country’s withdrawal from the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR).

Bolivian President Evo Morales (Photo Courtesy of AP/Peter Kramer).

This announcement came immediately after the IAHCR ‘s hearing on the construct of a road through the Isiboro Sécure National Park and Indigenous Territory.

“We are seriously considering withdrawing from the commission,” Morales said, according to The Associated Press. “We have our dignity and sovereignty to put in place in these kinds of institutions,”

President Morales’ stance is similar to Ecuadorean President’s Correa’s, who is advocating a series of reforms to the IACHR. One of Correa’s reforms is to change IAHCR’s headquarters in Washington D.C. The Commission “has offices in the United States and that country has not ratified any human rights treaty,” said Morales. President Correa and the Bolivian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA) received approval for the proposal to block the Organization of American States (OAS) rapporteur’s office from pushing reports on freedom of expression, block the office from independent financial support and place it under control from member states. The OAS is made up of ambassadors from member states.

The ALBA members have threatened to withdraw from the human rights organization if their proposal was not met. ALBA took advantage of the weakening support for the human rights system in South America. The OAS is in charge of writing the restructuring for the organization that encompasses the ALBA’s recommendations.

Morales has accused the OAS of coming to Bolivia for the purpose of defending governments “that were massacring the Bolivian people.”

OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza said that he would oppose efforts to weaken human rights. However, in response to the ALBA’s recommendations, Insulza proposed a statutory overhaul to govern the IACHR. His recommendations are for the governments to decide the IAHCR monitoring, force delays in the organization’s  findings and restrict the power to issue precautionary measures.

Isuluza has said, “  “The OAS and its member states need an autonomous and strong commission and an autonomous and strong court of human rights. But these bodies also need to take into consideration, in the course of their work, the points of view of the democratic governments of the hemisphere.”

The Inter-American system for the protection of human rights occurred after the adoption of the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man in 1948. The Commission of Human Rights was created in 1959.

Venezuela withdrew from the American Convention on Human Rights in September.

 

For further information, please see:

Christian Science Monitor — Victory for human rights in Latin America? – 25 March 13

 Al Jazeera — The IACHR against colonialism – 23 March 13

 Fox News Latino — Bolivia Threatens To Pull Out of International Human Rights Organization – 22 March 13

Americas Quarterly — Human Rights Under Siege in the Americas – 12 February 13

Liu Hui, Brother-in-Law of Imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Detained on Fraud Charges

By Irving Feng
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

BEIJING, China – Liu Hui, brother-in-law of imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, has been taken into custody and will soon be put on trial because of accusations of fraud.

Liu Xia, wife of Liu Xiaobo and sister of Liu Hui, during a house arrest visit. (Photo Courtesy of Radio Free Asia)

Mo Shaoping, Liu Hui’s lawyer, said that his client Mr. Liu has been detained over a property dispute; however, the evidence the state has against him is insufficient for an actual conviction.  The case against Liu Hui is based on an accusation that he and an old colleague stole from the company they worked for.

The Associated Press reported that Liu and his accomplice allegedly took three million RMB (roughly $483,000) from their workplace.  Liu Xia, the wife of the jailed Nobel Peace Prize winner and sister of Liu Hui, believes that her brother’s detainment is an intimidation tactic to force her to comply with her house arrest.

Liu Xia was sentenced to a lengthy house arrest term alongside her husband who was sentenced to an 11 year prison term.  The couple was convicted based on charges of subversion against the central government in late 2009 when Liu Xiaobo attempted to bring down the one party system in favor of democratic reforms in China.

Hu Jia, a prominent human rights activist in the Beijing area who visited with Liu Xia during her house arrest, perceives Liu Xia’s conditions as weakening.  Liu Hui said during her meeting that she would “go mad soon” after the events surrounding her brother’s detainment.

Mo Shaoping, whose firm defended Liu Xiaobo during his legal proceedings against the state when he was brought up on subversion charges, told local news agencies that Liu Hui had been under surveillance by authorities for several months.  It is uncertain whether the current charges are in any way connected with the subversion activities of Liu Xiaobo.

Mr. Mo further said that the evidence against Liu Hui is insufficient for a criminal proceeding and the current dispute should be settled in civil courts.  Liu Hui has also publicly denied any wrongdoing on his part.  Mr. Liu could face as much as 10 years in prison if found guilty for this property dispute.

China’s judicial branches are firmly in the grips of the Communist party and will usually find defendants, like Liu Hui, guilty for the crimes they have been charged with.  Mr. Liu will stand trial in Huairou, a northern district in the capital city of Beijing.

There has been no notification of a set trial date yet; however, Liu’s lawyers expect a firm date within the month.

For further information, please see:

Democracy Digest – China jails Nobel laureate’s relative – 1 April 2013

BBC – Jailed China Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo’s relative held – 29 March 2013

The New York Times – Relative of Jailed Chinese Laureate Faces Fraud Charges – 29 March 2013

Radio Free Asia – Chinese Laureate’s Relative Held on ‘Fraud’ – 29 March 2013

Brazilian Angel Of Mercy? Or Serial Killer Among The Ill

By Brendan Oliver Bergh
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

BRASILIA, Brazil – Despicable, or misguided? These are the questions some in Brazil are asking as Dr. Virginia Soares de Souza was removed from her Brazil hospital on accusations of murder. The Brazilian health ministry alleges that de Souza killed seven terminally ill patients at the Evangelical Hospital in Curitiba. Why? To free up beds in her hospital for new patients.

Brazilian Doctor accused of killing terminally ill patients in order to  free up beds. (Photo courtesy of Fox News Latino)

De Souza maintains her innocence, claiming that she is being falsely accused. Despite her claims of innocence a few of her statements collected by wiretap indicate that something subversive was going on in Curitiba. “I want to clear the intensive care unit. It’s making me itch.” Not on itself conclusive of serial killing by euthanize, authorities came to suspect de Souza of injecting patients with a drug cocktails and tampering with respirators after nurses began reporting   suspicions that their patients were poisoned.

While the investigations currently has attributed the deaths of seven patients to her actions, investigators are looking at the medical records of some 300 other patients who were treated under de Souza’s supervision and care.

Authorities indicated that de Souza recruited doctors to help her administer drug cocktails of anesthetics and sedatives in order to alter the chemical balance within her patients before they succumbed to death. Beyond de Souza, another seven health care professionals have been charged with the case. Their actions, according to prosecutors, was to euthanize the victims against the wishes of patients and their families, all in the name of clearing up the clutter and over capacity of patients within the ICU.

The investigation is going back seven years, with doctors analyzing the medical charts of more than 1,700 patients. Investigators allege that in cases where de Souza did not herself prescribe the drug cocktails, she ordered underlings to alter respirators, potentially speeding up their untimely deaths.

While society debates the merits of assisted suicide and euthanasia, Virginia Soares de Souza does not have the legal protections that Dr. Kevorkian argued. If convicted de Souza will be facing multiple murder charges ant the possibility of a serial killer moniker.

Dr. Mario Lobato, the doctor in charge of the investigation has told reporters that “they all have the same [M.O.], the same relationship between the drug and the death,” he continued that some of the victims were still conscious and until the time moment of their deaths.

For more information, please see:

CNN – Brazilian Doctor Killed 7 Patients To Free Up Hospital Beds, Police Say – 29 March 2013

Latino Fox News – Dr. Death? Brazilian Doctor Killed Patients To Free Up Hospital Beds, Police Say – 28 March 2013

Christin Science Monitor – Doctor Killed 300 Patients? Doctor Felt ‘All Powerful ‘ Say Prosecutors – 28 March 2013

Digital Journal – Brazilian Doctor May Have Killed Hundreds – 27 March 2013

Hamas bans Mixed-Sex Schools in the Gaza Strip

By Ali Al-Bassam
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — The Education Ministry of Hamas published a law last Monday which will bar men from teaching at girls’ schools and ban children of different sexes over the age of nine from attending the same school together.  The law, known as Article 46, was issued on February 10, was approved by Hamas’ legislative council, and went into effect last Sunday.  It will apply to all public, private, Christian-led, and United Nations schools throughout the Gaza Strip.

Hamas is set to implement a law that segregates children over the age of nine, by gender. (Photo Courtesy of BBC News)

Previously, Hamas tried to instill conservative religious values through laws, including telling schoolgirls in the region to adorn traditional full-length robes and headscarves.

In practice, virtually all public schools in the strip segregate children by sex in grade seven, and proponents say that the act is a codification of conservative Palestinian values into law.  Critics believe that this is an attempt by Hamas to force an Islamist ideology onto society.

A majority of Palestinians in Gaza see segregated schools as a symbol of their culture.  “We are a Muslim people.  We do not need to make people Muslims, and we are doing what serves our people and their culture,” said Waleed Mezher, the Education Ministry’s legal advisor.

Hamas has been in control of the Gaza Strip since 2007, after it won a surprise majority against the secular Fatah Party in Palestinian parliamentary polls.  There was a split between the polarized parties within the parliament, which led to a civil war within the region.  Unable to come to an agreement, laws were unable to be passed in Gaza and the West Bank.  Because of this, critics accused Hamas Parliamentarians of acting alone in pushing this law forward, and accused the group of trying to build “a separate state” in Gaza.  Zeinab Al-Ghoneimi, a Gaza activist for women’s rights, called the new law an imposition of Hamas’ values on the residents of Gaza.  “To say that the old law did not respect the community’s traditions and that they (Hamas) wanted to reform people now is an insult to the community,” said Ghoneimi. “Instead of hiding behind traditions, why don’t they say clearly they are Islamists and they want to Islamize the community.”

It has been questioned as to whether Hamas will enforce the new law.  In the past, Hamas had approved laws that appeased conservatives, such as a ban on men cutting women’s hair or making it illegal for women to smoke water pipes (shishas).  Such laws, however, have never been fully enforced, and it is possible that this law will similarly not be enforced.

Hamas has repeatedly denied accusations from human rights groups that they are trying to enforce Islamic laws on the people of Gaza.

For further information, please see:

ABC News — Hamas Orders Gender Segregation at Younger Age — 1 April 2013

BBC News — Hamas in Mixed-Sex School ‘ban’ — 1 April 2013

Global Post — Hamas Same Sex Schools ban Takes Effect — 1 April 2013

Haaretz — Hamas to ban Mixed-Sex Schools in Gaza Strip — 1 April 2013

The Jerusalem Post — Hamas law bans Mixed Sex Schools in Gaza Strip — 1 April 2013