What does it mean to be free to vote? In the U.S. as presidential elections draw near, not only are there 2 party candidates, but there are also slots on the ballot where you can write in the candidate of your choice should you feel that neither of the 2 candidates are your choice for the president. But in the elections that took place in Zimbabwe, there was only 1 candidate - this after an election whose results were controversial, hidden, and ultimately disregarded. Not only that but violent incidents occurred related to the support of the current government's opposition. A country cannot be expected to rise if its people are restricted.
Amnesty International reports on the related Human Rights concerns in Zimbabwe; click here to see their report.
More from other sites:
CNN, BBC, and Human Rights Watch.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
To Add to the Tragedy in China....
As if the tragedy we have seen in the news in the wake of the earthquake in China is not enough, Human Rights Watch researcher and analyst Kay Seok writes about another group of children suffering from the loss of a parent....and a group of children whose suffering has flown below the media radar.
China shares a border with North Korea and in a city in the Jilin province, there are many children who have North Korean mothers. And yet, these children cannot even be registered and given a legal identity because their mothers are North Korean refugees. If their mothers are discovered, they will be separated from their children and repatriated. If these women return to North Korean they face a lot of persecution, as if the fact that they are separated from their children is not persecution enough. There have been more attempts to crackdown on these refugees as the Beijing Olympics draw closer....
Despite China's international obligation towards refugees, as well as their law that declares that all children regardless of their legal status are entitled to nine years of free and mandatory education, schools demand evidence that children are legally registered in the country..... So parents are unable to get any services for their children as well as basic education. If they want to, the mothers have to leave...or risk getting caught and repatriated.
For more on this injustice refer to the article written by Kay Seok here.
China shares a border with North Korea and in a city in the Jilin province, there are many children who have North Korean mothers. And yet, these children cannot even be registered and given a legal identity because their mothers are North Korean refugees. If their mothers are discovered, they will be separated from their children and repatriated. If these women return to North Korean they face a lot of persecution, as if the fact that they are separated from their children is not persecution enough. There have been more attempts to crackdown on these refugees as the Beijing Olympics draw closer....
Despite China's international obligation towards refugees, as well as their law that declares that all children regardless of their legal status are entitled to nine years of free and mandatory education, schools demand evidence that children are legally registered in the country..... So parents are unable to get any services for their children as well as basic education. If they want to, the mothers have to leave...or risk getting caught and repatriated.
For more on this injustice refer to the article written by Kay Seok here.
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