Showing 1 - 7 of 7
Political exiles deserve better
News, Editorial, Published on 10/01/2025
» The beginning of 2025 should have provided a fresh start for Thailand. The country began its three-year term as a member of the prestigious United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) on Jan 1, and the Paetongtarn Shinawatra government is eyeing related events.
Justice for Chaiyaphum
Oped, Editorial, Published on 15/03/2024
» Just days before the relatives and friends of slain human rights activist Chaiyaphum Pasae mark the seventh anniversary of his death in Chiang Mai, they have learnt that prosecutors have decided not to press murder charges against the soldier who gunned him down.
Changing the record
Oped, Editorial, Published on 30/08/2023
» Today marks the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances. The annual event has become a global platform for relatives of victims and rights activists worldwide to pressure governments to improve their laws to end this dirty crime.
No country for dissidents
News, Editorial, Published on 14/09/2019
» Despite some restrictions on freedom of expression, Thailand was once a place where government dissent was tolerated. It was seen as a safe haven for dissidents in the region, many of whom arrived seeking asylum in a third country under UN Human Rights Commission rules. Od Sayavong, a 34-year-old Lao political activist, was one of them. But that hope was extinguished when he went missing in Bangkok on Aug 26.
No excuse for Mideast abuse
News, Editorial, Published on 19/03/2019
» The United Nations took a regrettable step on women's rights last week. The Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) picked the Tehran government to sit on its women's rights committee. While there are several countries that truly should not be on this committee, Iran is near or at the top. In the same week that the UNHRC felt Iran should represent women's and children's rights, the UN Special Rapporteur on Iran said that the country was in the midst of a crackdown that, in particular, sentences children to death.
UN tramples its own ideals
News, Editorial, Published on 16/10/2018
» The UN General Assembly has once again openly mocked some of the major principles it purports to champion. It has elected several of the world's worst human rights violators as full members of its Human Rights Commission. In the process, it employed a questionable procedure in which there was no competition. Member countries of the UNGA were presented with 18 candidate-nations for 18 pending vacancies on the UNHRC. In the event, as usual in such UN processes, none of the candidates failed to gain a majority vote, so the 48-member UNHRC will at least have all its seats filled when it meets in Geneva next year.
ICC's leap in the dark
Oped, Editorial, Published on 10/09/2018
» The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has issued a clear and compelling case against Myanmar -- both its armed forces and its leaders. A UN-ordered investigation of the Rohingya tragedy is described unequivocally and credibly as genocidal. The UNHRC says government and army then tried to cover up crimes by multiple fabrications. It specifically names Sen Gen Min Aung Hlaing, the commander of the armed forces (tatmadaw) and the national leader Aung San Suu Kyi.