Human Rights

• December 22, 2017

As its people of the year, Time magazine recently named the Silence Breakers — people who have spoken against sexual harassment and launched the hashtag #MeToo into an international phenomenon with more than seven million hits on social media. Just before the announcement, more than 230 women who work in national security for the …

Gender Violence, Human Rights, Secretary-General, UN Diplomats, Women

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In East Africa, Threats to LGBTQ Rights Intensify

Amanda Leigh Lichtenstein

• December 12, 2017

STONE TOWN, Tanzania — When a story circulated in August 2017 of male lions attempting to copulate with each other in Kenya’s Masai Mara national park, headlines and Twitter feeds went wild with speculation, ridicule and accusation. Despite Kenya being one of the more progressive countries in East Africa regarding LGBTQ awareness and rights, the …

Africa, Gender Violence, Human Rights, LGBT

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TOPIC: WOMEN

‘Period Poverty’: Why No One Is Talking About Eco-Friendly Solutions

Rhona Scullion

• November 30, 2017

The United Nations has recognized menstrual hygiene as a global public health and human-rights issue, yet across the world, “period poverty,” as some call it, is the reality for millions of women and girls. In India, for example, it is estimated that only 12 percent of the country’s 355 million menstruating women can afford …

Climate and Environment, Human Rights, Poverty, Women

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WORLDVIEWS

Modernizing the Role of Human Rights in the UN Security Council

Bertrand Ramcharan

• November 28, 2017

The Security Council is the most authoritative organ of the United Nations, and supporters of the Council naturally expect it to exercise that authority when gross violations of human rights shock the conscience of humanity. During the Cold War, such actions were rarely done, except partly in relation to situations in southern Africa. Since …

Human Rights, Security Council, US Foreign Relations, WORLDVIEWS

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WORLDVIEWS

António Guterres, Please Reform the UN’s Human Rights Tools

Vincent Ploton

• November 20, 2017

When recently asked what keeps him up at night, António Guterres, the United Nations secretary-general, gave a straight answer: bureaucracy as well as “fragmented structures, byzantine procedures, endless red tape.” Such flaws also apply to UN human-rights mechanisms, and Guterres should ensure that his UN-wide reform agenda prioritizes strengthening such tools, which can be …

Human Rights, Secretary-General, WORLDVIEWS

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WORLDVIEWS

Four Easy Steps to Reform the UN Human Rights Council

Bertrand G. Ramcharan

• October 15, 2017

Problems encircling the United Nations Human Rights Council are verging toward a major crisis. The same crisis had engulfed its predecessor, the Commission on Human Rights, leading the secretary-general at the time, Kofi Annan, to call to replace it with the Council. But the same problems affecting the former Commission now affect its successor, …

Human Rights, US-UN Relations, WORLDVIEWS

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GEOPOLITICS

Janet Benshoof, Legal Activist, Seeks Help for Burma Through the Global Court

Barbara Crossette

• October 8, 2017

Burma has long been a unique country not only for its otherworldly landscape of pagodas and gold-topped stupas but also, paradoxically, as an isolated country where a nationalistic military has given itself extraordinary constitutional powers. Generals, who have warped the country’s Buddhist heritage over half a century, can now attack the Muslim-majority Rohingya people …

Asia, Geopolitics, Human Rights, International Justice

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NIKKI HALEY WATCH

US Ambassador’s Ultimatum to the UN: Agree With Us or We Go It Alone

Barbara Crossette

• September 16, 2017

When Nikki Haley, now the United States ambassador to the United Nations, was questioned by senators at her confirmation hearing in January about how she would deal with Donald Trump’s dismissive view of internationalism, she said confidently, “I will show him that the UN matters.” She also said that she would show the world …

Human Rights, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Middle East, Nikki Haley Watch, Security Council, US Foreign Relations, US-UN Relations

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WORLDVIEWS

Has Anyone Seen the UN Secretary-General’s Human Rights Agenda?

Bertrand G. Ramcharan

• August 22, 2017

Secretary-General António Guterres has set about modernizing some sectors of the United Nations and made impassioned statements about the need to protect human rights. But beyond rhetoric, so far there has been no indication of his modernizing the human-rights sector. We have seen this before. Dag Hammarskjold, a previous secretary-general, undoubtedly believed in human …

Human Rights, Secretary-General, WORLDVIEWS

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$5 Million Grant From Microsoft Will Help UN Track Human-Rights Abuses

Julie Vanderperre

• July 20, 2017

As political instability, conflicts and migration proliferate across the world, technology has become a potential solution for identifying and predicting human-rights violations, which play a major role instigating upheavals. Smartphones enable instant updates and eyewitness accounts of events happening around the globe, and the use of cloud computing and big-data analysis allows large amounts …

Human Rights

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NIKKI HALEY WATCH

For the US, a Tale of Two Human-Rights Violations

Kacie Candela

• July 14, 2017

Nikki Haley, the American ambassador to the United Nations, is positioning herself as a champion of human rights. But she appears to be highly selective about which countries or regimes she accuses of committing human-rights abuses. At the same time, she has been pushing hard for cuts to UN peacekeeping missions, which could hurt …

Human Rights, Nikki Haley Watch, US Foreign Relations, US-UN Relations

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NIKKI HALEY WATCH

A New Duet for Nikki Haley and Trump

Barbara Crossette

• July 10, 2017

Nearly six months into her United Nations assignment, Ambassador Nikki Haley is aligning herself more decisively with President Donald Trump, defending some of his most controversial and unpopular moves. It is a critical diplomatic time for the White House and for Haley, who is viewed around the UN mostly as a politician with big …

Human Rights, Nikki Haley Watch, US-UN Relations

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WORLDVIEWS

US Supreme Court Bars Discrimination Against Unwed Fathers, Rejecting Stereotypes

Antonia Kirkland

• June 21, 2017

Unwed fathers and mothers may not be treated differently in determining whether their children born overseas can claim American citizenship, the United States Supreme Court has recently ruled. This means that all children born to an unmarried American parent, whether it is a father or a mother, must now be treated the same. The …

Human Rights, Sustainable Development Goals, WORLDVIEWS

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TOPIC: WOMEN

Mass Tourism: Bad for Culture but Good for Women?

Ariel Sophia Bardi

• June 13, 2017

FLORENCE, Italy — This month, Italy’s tourism season kicks into high gear. Florence, which receives more than 16 million tourists a year, is one of many cities to be marred by mass travel. In the famously picturesque Piazza della Signoria, groups plod through the cobblestoned square, shepherded by flag-waving guides. Vendors peddle selfie-sticks in …

Africa, Asia, Development, Human Rights, Unesco, Women

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NIKKI HALEY WATCH

In Geneva, Nikki Haley Dodges Questions of US Future in UN Rights Council

Barbara Crossette

• June 6, 2017

In a much-anticipated series of speeches in Geneva on June 6, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, would not say whether a decision had been made by the Trump administration about US membership in the UN Human Rights Council. But she warned that if the Council, widely criticized by conservative …