News

Putin Orders Ban on Foreign Adoptions to Homosexual Couples

By Alexandra Sandacz
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

MOSCOW, Russia – Russian President, Vladmir Putin, ordered a ban on foreign adoptions to homosexual couples.

Russian president, Vladimir Putin, wants to ban the adoption of orphans by foreign same-sex couples. (Photo Courtesy of RT)

The issue of same-sex couples adopting sparked in Russia when the French National Assembly approved a bill that legalized marriage and adoption by same-sex couples. As a result, Pavel Astakhov, a Russian children’s rights ombudsman, declared he believes Russian orphans should only be placed with heterosexual couples.

However, despite this movement, Nikolay Alekseyev, a Russian gay rights activist, believes Putin’s and Astakhov’s new ban will be unsuccessful. He states, “It’s purely a political move aimed to show that the government is consistent in its decisions.”

The Russian Foreign Ministry declared a planned to verify the possible “psychological damage” inflicted on Russian orphan, Yegor Shabatalov. An American woman, who lived in a same-sex marriage, adopted Yegor Shabatalov.

Russian Foreign Ministry’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Konstantin Dolgov, believes that after the two women split, the son was drawn into a bitter dispute and the relationship is “rather questionable from the point of view of morality.”

Nadezhda Khramova, head of the ‘All-Russian Parents’ Assembly’ movement, says there should be a complete ban of foreign adoptions, as “it is technically difficult to verify the adoptive parents’ sexual orientation and their legal status can be a marriage of convenience”.

This recent foreign adoption ban accompanies an already implemented law that makes it illegal for Russian children to be adopted by Americans, regardless of sexual orientation.

However, although many Russians are opposed to the American ban, Russians hold a firm stance against homosexual behavior. For example, last August, Moscow’s highest court upheld the city’s ban on homosexual pride parades.

Public polls from 2010 showed that 38% of Russians believed that homosexuality is a “bad habit” and 36% said it was “a sickness or result of a psychological trauma.” Nevertheless, 41% of Russians believe that laws should not “discriminate” against homosexuals.

Putin’s recent bans on foreign homosexuals from adopting Russian children has sparked various reactions.

One commenter stated, “I challenge anyone on here to cite a single scientific study that shows that gay adoption has any negative effects compared to straight adoption, and no, the Bible doesn’t count, because we don’t live in a theocracy. Go to Saudi Arabia if that’s what you want.”

Another stated, “This is best for the children. They must be kept safe even if it hurts some feelings. Putin is smart.”

The Ministry of Education and Science, which deals with issues concerning orphans and adoptions, will fulfill the adoption ban. However, the ministry has not received instructions.

For further information, please see:

RFE/RL – Russians March Against Foreign Adoptions – 4 April 2013

The Advocate – Putin Wants to Stop Foreign Gay Couples From Adopting Russian Children – 1 April 2013

Christian News – Russian President Orders Ban on Foreign Adoptions to Homosexuals – 30 March 2013

RT – Putin Orders Ban on Adoptions By Foreign Same-Sex Couples – 28 March 2013

Human Rights Abuses at U.S. Prison in Iraq, According to British Troops

By Mark O’Brien
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America

WASHINGTON, United States — British troops spoke out on Monday about human rights abuses of Iraqi detainees by American forces at a secret US detention facility in Baghdad.

British troops claim they witnessed human rights abuses of Iraqi detainees carried out by American soldiers at a secret US facility in Baghdad. (Photo Courtesy of Al Arabiya)

The whistleblowers, who included soldiers and airmen from the Royal Air Force and the Army Air Corps, claimed they witnessed various forms of torture after the US-led invasion in 2003.

“I saw one man having his prosthetic leg being pulled off him, and being beaten about the head with it before he was thrown onto the truck,” one British military officer was quoted as saying in The Guardian.

Other allegations included claims that Americans at Camp Nama—a secret center at Baghdad International Airport—gave Iraqi prisoners electric shocks, brutally beat Iraqi prisoners, and locked them in dog-like kennels.  The prisoners reportedly were routinely hooded before allegedly being subjected to these tortures and were interrogated in sound-proof shipping containers.

“The prisoners were taken into a hangar to be bagged and tagged, a bag put over their heads and their hands plasticuffed behind their backs,” another soldier told The Guardian.  “Everyone’s seen the Abu Ghraib pictures, but I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”

Indeed, these new allegations follow the scandal over abuses at the US-run Abu Ghraib prison, as well as the beating death of civilian Baha Mousa by British forces in 2003.

The Guardian’s investigation highlighted that the joint American-British special forces unit, called Task Force 121, was responsible for detaining Iraqis believed to have information about Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction.  No such weapons were ever discovered in Iraq.

“The methods [of abuse] were so brutal that they drew condemnation not only from a U.S. human rights body, but from a special investigator reporting to the Pentagon,” The Guardian reported.

When confronted about the new allegations, Geoff Hoon, Britain’s defense secretary at the time, said he had no knowledge of the secret US camp or anything that may have transpired there.

“I’ve never heard of the place,” Hoon reportedly said when asked about the involvement of British troops in providing support services to help detain inmates at Camp Nama.

Although there is no indication that British troops helped carry out any of the alleged abuses at the camp, Britain’s Ministry of Defense refused to say whether it was aware of concerns about human rights abuses there.

A California-based investigative organization, called Project Censored, estimates that more than one million Iraqis were killed as a result of the US-led invasion and subsequent occupation of the country.

For further information, please see:

Al Arabiya — Baghdad’s Camp Nama: Brutal Prison Torture During Iraq War Revealed — 2 April 2013

Kuwait News Agency — Human Rights Abuses at Detention Centre — 2 April 2013

Press TV — UK Troops Reveal Torture at Secret US-Run Prison in Iraq — 2 April 2013

Daily Mail — British Forces ‘Witnessed Electric Shocks, Beatings and Dog Kennel Torture of Iraqi Prisoners in Secret US Prison in Baghdad’ — 1 April 2013

The Guardian — Camp Nama: Baghdad’s Secret Torture Facility — 1 April 2013

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

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

Two More Former Bosnian Serb Officials Sentenced to 22 Years in Prison

By Alexandra Sandacz
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands – Last Wednesday, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) found Mico Stanisic and Stojan Zupljanin guilty of participating in murder, torture, and persecution of Bosnian Muslims and Croats during Bosnia’s 1992-1995 war.

Mico Stanisic (right) and Stojan Zupljanin (left) arrive at the courtroom at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. (Photo Courtesy of RFE/RL)

Stanisic was the interior minister of the Bosnian Serb republic and Zupljanin was a senior security official. Stanisic turned himself over to the court in 2005. However, after 9 years of hiding, in 2008, Zupljanin was arrested in Budva, Montenegro.

During Stanisic and Zupljanin’s trial, which lasted 365 days, 199 witnesses testified and more than 4,000 pieces of evidence were offered.

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia stated the two men contributed to a “joint criminal enterprise with the objective to permanently remove non-Serbs from the territory of a planned Serbian state.”

The United Nations’ war crimes court sentenced the two former Bosnian Serb officials to 22 years in prison for crimes against humanity, including acts of murder, torture, unlawful detention, deportation and plunder in various parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992.

Nedeljko Mitrovic, president of the RS Organisation of Families of Captured, Killed Soldiers and Missing Civilians, stated, “With this judgment, The Hague proves it did not change its earlier policy towards the Serbs. They prove, once again, their intention to blame the Serbs responsible for everything. We all know how many crimes were committed against the Serbs, but, unfortunately, there is still no justice for those people.”

However, Sonja Biserko, director of the Belgrade Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, said, “It is good this judgment was passed, especially since it points to Serbia’s involvement in the war in Bosnia, because these charges are, in some way, part of the indictment against Slobodan Milosevic. Relations between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia are still low, and to improve them is much work.”

Furthermore, Murat Tahirovic, president of the Bosnia and Herzegovina War Camp Prisoners Association, said, “This is definitely a positive decision of The Hague tribunal and we hope the appeals chamber of court will not reverse this judgment. These men are responsible for mass killings and torture. It’s good that the court proved this as a joint criminal enterprise, because it shows that top police officials knew what was happening on the ground during the war in Bosnia.”

Zupljanin and Stanisic are among 163 individuals sentenced by the ICTY for war crimes in the former Yugoslavia.

For further information, please see:

Southeast Europe Times – Hague Convictions Sparks Mixed Reactions – 1 April 2013

Aljazeera – War Crimes Court Convicts Bosnian Serbs – 27 March 2013

BBC News – War Crimes Court Jails Bosnian Serbs – 27 March 2013

RFE/RL – Two Former Bosnian Serb Officials Jails for 22 years — 27 March 2013