THE FBA SDNY CHAPTER HUMAN RIGHTS REPORTER SERIES
By Margaux D’Orlando-Dubois[1]
FBA Human Rights Reporter
December 6, 2019
The Human Rights Foundation (HRF)[2], founded in 2005 by Venezuelan film producer and human rights advocate, Thor Halvorssen Mendoza is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that promotes and protects human rights globally. Since 2008, HRF has organized annual regional conferences, including the Oslo Freedom Forum (OFF) in countries around the world, with the aim of giving a voice to democracy and human rights activists so that they can tell their stories and express their views about human rights in the world.
For the first time, the 2019 OFF conference took place in New York, on October 23rd. Garry Kasparov, a world renowned chess player and Russian human rights activist, who has held the position of HRF chairman since May 2012, welcomed the participants by sharing the theme of this year’s event: UNITE. As he said, it is not enough to just stand by, everyone at every level must fight against totalitarianism to achieve justice and human dignity. “Let’s be united and feel no danger.” Following is a brief overview of the participants’ statements by region.
Central America and South America
Wuilly Arteaga is a Venezuelan violonist and pro-democracy activist who was tortured for using his music in protest in Caracas against Bolivarian authority. He uses his music as a weapon to give strength to the country’s democratic opposition.
Gustavo Tovar-Arroyo is a filmmaker, poet, author, and nonviolence activist from Venezuela., who won an award for his documentary “Chavismo: The plague of the 21st century”. Convinced that art must be used against evil, he has denounced the first institutionalized narco state that Venezuela has become and the ensuing health issues that have developed in the population due to lack of access to medicine in the country.
Lisa Sanchez is the director of Mexico United against Crime (MUCD, a Mexican non-governmental organization that defends citizen security and justice in the drug war policies. While the Mexican government has declared a war on drug cartels using prohibition, even torture, including sexual crimes, she advocates for the decriminalization of cannabis, demilitarization of the war drug and the end of prohibition. She emphasized the global effect of this war against drug cartel which is not helping people. Rather than prohibition, a compassionate and comprehensive strategy is preferable.
Africa
Evan Mawarire is a civil rights activist, pastor and leader of the #ThisFlag movement in Zimbabwe. He launched this movement in April 2016 with a video to express his frustration and call for a boycott against Robert Mugabe’s dictatorship. A series of peaceful protests against corruption, poverty and the rising cost of living were organized. New elections were organized but led to a massive shooting in response from the government, Evan Mawarire and million people in Zimbabwe are still fighting authoritarianism of the regime while enduring threats upon their families and multiple incarcerations. As he calls for new constitutional rights like freedom of speech, he still has hope under the slogan “We are freedom“.
Vanessa Tsehaye is a human rights activist protesting against Eritrea’s abuses since she is 16 years old. After her uncle, Seyoum, a journalist, was imprisoned on September, 18th, 2001, she campaigned to free him and others Eritrea’s critical voices, with the organization “One Day Seyoum”. Due to a war with another country, the government of Eritrea, also called “The North Korea of Africa” has suspended the constitution, shut down media, imprisoned journalists and others opposed to this authoritarian regime. Under “national security” issues, people, including children, who try to leave are shot or put in jail and no one in the country is able to speak for those crimes while the diaspora continues. Vanessa Tsehaye created the #yiakl, meaning “enough” to give a voice to Ertitreans.
Russia and the Middle East
Bryan Fogel is an Academy Award-winning director, producer, author and playwright, with his 2018 documentary, “Icarus”. He exposed the major international doping scandal of Russia, host-state of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games, with the precious help of the whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov, leader of the Russian anti-doping laboratory. There were more than 20 whistleblowers in the Russian Olympics doping affair but Bryan Fogel remembers the price of whistleblowing: “Telling the truth is not so noble as he is gonna pay this for the rest of his life“.
Aric Toler leads research and training activities for investigative journalism website Bellingcat, on Eastern Europe and Eurasia. Among other things, he is involved in ongoing investigations into the downing of the Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 (MH17). Using online shared pictures from people on media like Facebook, he was able to identify the itinerary of the bomb shooting the Malaysian plane from Russia to Ukraine. Russia blames Ukraine for falsification of videos. This crime of 2014 will be trialed in 2020.
Masih Alinejad is an Iranian journalist and activist. In 2014, she led the Facebook page “My Stealthy Freedom” to protest Iran’s compulsory public hijab law for women and girls. She was incarcerated for advocating against the government but finally released as she was pregnant. In December 2017, the campaign led activists to remove their scarves in public as a sign of protest. Protesters were arrested and their rights in custody violated. Masih Alinejad, now Iranian expulsed from her country, calls women of the world to not respect this discriminatory law and get united as “together we are stronger“.
Asia
Pete Pattisson in an award-winning investigative journalist based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He has spent over ten years exposing labor exploitation and modern forms of slavery around the world. In 2013, he has revealed the unbearable conditions, leading to multiple deaths, of the migrant construction workers in Qatar, the host of the 2022 World Cup. People from Nepal, including children, are used as cheap workforce by Qatar for $9/day. The state imposes on them a recrutement fee to create a debt under which they cannot get their passport back until it is paid or their employer let them leave the country. While Qatar is one of the richest countries in the world, when a Nepal worker dies, no autopsy is made and no compensation for families is planned. Qatar has made an policy announcement of a minimum wages and new rights for migrant workers building the 2020 World Cup stadium.
Thae Yong-Ho is one of the highest-ranked North-Korean officials to defect from his position while working as deputy ambassador to the United Kingdom. He gave insights on North Korea’s authoritarian government and elite class in South Korea and overseas. He disclosed the class system, the totalitarian regime, enslaved population, gulags and the propaganda in his education which conflicted with other regimes is experienced with his position. Today, Thae Yong-Ho is a free democracy activist working for Korean reunification.
Christopher Balding is a leading expert on the Chinese economy and financial markets. He co-authored a paper untitled “Who owns Huawei?” which shed light on the Chinese regime’s control over that multinational company. In the US trade war between China and the US, Huawei allegedly spy US phones for China’s government. He highlights some facts that are threats to human rights such as one surveillance camera per person in Guiyang, a Chinese city, or the fact that all data must be available for Chinese officials at all times, recalcitrants facing jail time. As a result, in China, domestic security costs are higher than international ones. Christopher Balding conclude: “That’s the kind of image that should scare everyone”.
Denise Ho is an award-winning Hong Kong based artist and activist. Leading figure of the LGBTQ rights movement since 2012, while she was arrested during the Umbrella Movement in 2014, she also became a representative of the Honk-Kong pro-democracy movement. She fights for the freedom of the 7 millions people living in this financial place, struggling for independence. The government, supported by China, has shown more violence while around a third of the protesters are young students or children under 18. Denise Ho denounced companies, like Apple, or celebrities, like LeBron James, that support China for profits. Rather she highlights the fact that people can create changes with small actions, with this call: “Please fight for freedom, justice, love and others“.
Conclusion
All these thoughtful testimonies and multiple backgrounds of their speakers are meant to remind the audience of the fact that the human rights fight does not stop at our borders, but are the responsibility of all. Those stories emphasize the ability of everyone to do a little thing that will have an impact, when replicated by other individuals. To defeat oppression and tyranny, being united is imperative. An Oslo Freedom Forum will be organized in Mexico in February 2020 and another one in Oslo, Norway from May 25 – 27, 2019.
[1] Margaux D’Orlando-Dubois is an LLM Student studying International Dispute Resolution at Fordham Law School. She anticipates graduating in Spring, 2020.