I AM THE REAL VICTIM SEZ FASCIST HOMOPHOBE
Far-right writer in Swiss court claims facing LGBTQ 'harassment'

Issued on: 14/12/2022 - 

The French Swiss far-right writer Alain Bonnet writes under the name Alain Soral. 

© Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP

Lausanne (AFP) – Far-right essayist Alain Soral, who appeared in court in Switzerland on Wednesday over homophobic remarks, told the hearing that he was himself the victim of "harassment" by the LGBTQ community.

The writer, a 64-year-old French-Swiss citizen now living in the western Swiss city of Lausanne, was sentenced in April by the regional attorney general to three months behind bars for "defamation, discrimination and incitement to hatred."

That ruling came after Alain Soral -- a pen name for the controversial writer whose real name is Alain Bonnet -- appeared in an online video attacking Swiss journalist Cathy Macherel of the Tribune de Geneve newspaper, who had written an article about him in 2021.

Macherel had filed a complaint over the video, where Soral described her as a "fat lesbian activist for migrants" and as "queer" -- a word he said was synonymous with "degenerate".

The attorney general, who under Swiss law has the power to unilaterally impose sentences of up to six months in prison, ruled at the time that Soral's comments were "profoundly homophobic" and amounted to an "incitement to discrimination".

Soral, who has already faced around 20 convictions in France, mainly over charges of incitement to hatred and defamation, opposed the Swiss sentence, and the case was pushed to a Lausanne court for Wednesday's one-day hearing.

Dressed in jeans and sneakers, Soral provided lengthy responses to questions, with the judge repeatedly asking him to slow down.

"I have been the target of a smear campaign, of harassment, especially by the Tribune de Geneve and the LGBTQ community" in Switzerland, he charged.

He acknowledged his comments in the video had been made in a somewhat agitated state, but said he did not believe they were "injurious".

Soral said Macherel's article had been the last in a series "attacking me ever since I arrived in Lausanne" in 2019, and stressed the video should be seen as his "right to reply".

He insisted that he had moved to Switzerland three years ago not to conduct a political battle but to write "in peace".

Soral's lawyer Pascal Junod told AFP it was a matter of freedom of expression and said the defence will request "an acquittal".

Among his most recent convictions, the author was ordered by a French court in September to pay 15,000 euros ($15,750) in damages to anti-racism organisations over a rap video deemed anti-Semitic.

And last February, he saw the European Court of Human Rights reject his appeal of a 2016 conviction over a Holocaust-denying drawing on his website.

© 2022 AFP

Young Iranians Facing Death Penalty Over Protests

December 14, 2022 
Agence France-Presse
FILE - In this photo taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran shows students at a protest over the death of Mahsa Amini, 22, in the custody of the country's morality police, in Tehran, Oct. 7, 2022.
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PARIS —

A doctor, rap artists and a footballer are among around two dozen Iranians who risk being hanged as Tehran uses capital punishment as an intimidation tactic to quell protests, rights groups say.

The executions in the past week of Mohsen Shekari and Majidreza Rahnavard, both 23 years of age and the first people put to death over the protests, sparked an outcry, especially as Rahnavard was hanged from a crane in public rather than in prison.

SEE ALSO:
Iran Executes Second Man Linked to Protests

But campaigners warn that more executions will inevitably follow without tougher international action, with a dozen more people already sentenced to death over the protests and a similar number charged with crimes that could see them hanged.

"Unless the political cost of the executions is increased significantly, we will be facing mass executions," said Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of the Norway-based Iran Human Rights group.

He accused Iran's leaders of using executions to "spread fear among people and save the regime from the nationwide protests."

SEE ALSO:
Iran Judiciary: 400 Protesters Jailed Over Tehran Protests

The largely peaceful protests sparked by the death in September of Mahsa Amini, who had been arrested for allegedly violating Iran's strict dress code for women, are posing the biggest challenge to the Islamic republic since the 1979 revolution.

There have been no reports of a slackening in protest activity in recent days, including after the executions, but the movement has been marked by phases of more and less intense demonstrations.

Authorities describe those facing death sentences as "rioters" who are being judged in full accordance with the country's Sharia law.

But activists express alarm over the use of vaguely worded Sharia legal charges against protesters, such as "enmity against God," "corruption on earth" and "armed rebellion," all of which are capital crimes in Iran.

SEE ALSO:
Iran Protest Crackdown Targets Lawyers

'Unfair trial, torture'

The international human rights group Amnesty International currently confirms 11 cases of death sentences issued against individuals over the protests, and another nine cases where individuals have been charged with crimes that could see them given the death penalty.

One young protester, Sahand Nourmohammad-Zadeh, was sentenced to death over charges — which he denied — that he did no more than tear down highway railings and set fire to trash cans and tires, Amnesty said.

The group said it was concerned another young man, Mahan Sadrat, 22, could be executed "imminently" after being sentenced to death in a "grossly unfair trial" over accusations of using a knife to attack an individual.

Mohammad Ghobadlou, aged 22, was sentenced to death on charges of running over police officials with a car, killing one and injuring several others, Amnesty said, adding it had "serious concerns" he was subjected to torture and other abuse in jail.

Saman Seydi, a young Kurdish rapper, was sentenced to death on charges of firing a pistol three times into the air during protests, adding it had received information he had also been subjected to torture to extract forced confessions.

Before his arrest, Seydi had posted material on Instagram in support of the protests, while his rap songs had also been critical of the authorities.

Hamid Ghare-Hasanlou, a doctor, and his wife, Farzaneh Ghare-Hasanlou, were on their way to the funeral of a killed protester when they were "caught up in the chaos" of a fatal assault on a member of the Basij militia, Amnesty said.

Hamid Ghare-Hasanlou was sentenced to death and his wife to 25 years in prison, with the court relying on incriminating statements from his wife which Amnesty said were coerced and later retracted by her in court.

Her husband was tortured in custody and hospitalized with broken ribs, it said.

Those who face the death penalty after being charged with capital crimes include Toomaj Salehi, 32, a prominent rapper who was charged "solely in connection with critical music and social media posts," Amnesty said, adding that he had been tortured in detention.

The professional footballer Amir Nasr-Azadani, 26, is in a similar position after being charged over the deaths of three security officials in November in the city of Isfahan, it said.

The world union of professional footballers, FIFPRO, said it was "shocked and sickened" by the reports he faces death.

Executed 'at any moment'

Campaigners are seeking to highlight all individuals facing the death penalty in the hope that increased scrutiny on specific cases can help spare lives.

But they warn the executions are often sudden.

Rahnavard was hanged just 23 days after his arrest and shortly after a last meeting with his mother, who was given no inkling her son was about to be put to death.

Activists were also unaware of Shekari's case until his execution was announced by state media.

SEE ALSO:
More Iranians at Imminent Risk of Execution, Rights Groups Say

Amnesty said Iranian authorities are issuing, upholding and carrying out death sentences in a "speedy manner" and there is a "serious risk" that people whose death sentences have not been made public could be executed "at any moment."

"The executions of two people connected to the protests in Iran are appalling, and we are extremely worried for the lives of others who have been similarly sentenced to death," the office of the U.N. high commissioner for human rights told AFP.

It added that Iran had "ignored" its pleas not to carry out the executions.

UN removes Iran from women's rights body over protest crackdown

The Economic and Social Council at the United Nations voted to remove Iran from the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women on December 14, 2022 

United Nations (United States) (AFP) – The United Nations on Wednesday voted to remove Iran from a women's rights body over Tehran's brutal crackdown of women-led protests.

Following a campaign led by the United States, 29 members of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) voted to expel the Islamic republic from the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (UNCSW) for the remainder of its 2022-2026 term.

Eight countries voted against and 16 abstained. A simple majority was needed to adopt the move, which had been proposed by the United States.

The resolution says it strips Iran of its membership of the commission with immediate effect.

The text says the Iranian leadership "continuously undermine and increasingly suppress the human rights of women and girls, including the right to freedom of expression and opinion, often with the use of excessive force."

It adds that Iran's government does so "by administering policies flagrantly contrary to the human rights of women and girls" and the commission's mandate "as well as through the use of lethal force resulting in the deaths of peaceful protestors, including women and girls."

The commission is the principal global intergovernmental body exclusively dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women.

In early November, Vice President Kamala Harris said the United States would work with other nations to oust Iran from the commission.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had also campaigned for the move.

Opponents, including Russia and China, noted that Iran had been elected to the body and that expelling it set "a dangerous precedent."

Nations on the women's commission are elected by the UN Economic and Social Council, whose members in turn are voted on by the General Assembly.

Iran has been gripped by demonstrations since the September 16 death in custody of Masha Amini, a young Iranian Kurd who had been arrested for allegedly violating the country's strict dress code for women.

Authorities have since made thousands of arrests in a crackdown on what they regard as riots.

Iran's judiciary has said it has handed down 11 death sentences in connection with the protests.

Iran had accused Washington of pressuring countries ahead of the vote.

© 2022 AFP

Iran likely to be ousted from UN women's body

Story by By REUTERS • Yesterday 

Iran appears set to be ousted from a UN women's body on Wednesday for policies contrary to the rights of women and girls, but several countries are expected to abstain from the vote requested by the United States, diplomats said.

A woman walks after the morality police shut down in a street in Tehran, Iran December 6, 2022.

© (photo credit: MAJID ASGARIPOUR/WANA/REUTERS)

The 54-member UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) will vote on a US-drafted resolution to "remove with immediate effect the Islamic Republic of Iran from the Commission on the Status of Women for the remainder of its 2022-2026 term."

The 45-member Commission on the Status of Women meets annually every March and aims to promote gender equality and the empowerment of women. A US official told Reuters they had "consistently seen growing support" to remove Iran.

Iran, 17 other states and the Palestinians argued in a letter to ECOSOC on Monday that a vote "will undoubtedly create an unwelcome precedent that will ultimately prevent other Member States with different cultures, customs and traditions ... from contributing to the activities of such Commissions."

The letter urged members to vote against the US move to avoid a "new trend for expelling sovereign and rightfully-elected States from any given body of the international system if ever perceived as inconvenient and a circumstantial majority could be secured for imposing such maneuvers."


Iran's riot police forces stand in Tehran Bazaar, in Tehran, Iran December 5, 2022.

 (credit: MAJID ASGARIPOUR/WANA/REUTERS)

Only five of the signatories to the letter are currently ECOSOC members and able to vote on Wednesday.

Related video: Iran protests: 400 protesters sentenced to jail, says judiciary (WION)
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The Islamic Republic on Monday hanged a man in public who state media said had been convicted of killing two members of the security forces, the second execution in less than a week of people involved in protests against Iran's ruling theocracy.

Nationwide unrest erupted three months ago after the death while in detention of 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman Mahsa Amini, who was arrested by morality police enforcing the Islamic Republic's mandatory dress code laws.

The demonstrations have turned into a popular revolt by furious Iranians from all layers of society, posing one of the most significant legitimacy challenges to the Shi'ite clerical elite since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Iran has blamed its foreign enemies and their agents for the unrest.

The Geneva-based UN Rights Council voted last month to appoint an independent investigation into Iran's deadly repression of protests, passing the motion to cheers of activists. Tehran accused Western states of using the council to target Iran in an "appalling and disgraceful" move.

Football player Amir Nasr-Azadani to face execution for supporting women's rights in Iran: Reports

Story by dnawebdesk@gmail.com (DNA Web Desk) • Yesterday 

Iranian football player Amir Nasr-Azadani may face execution for his role in the recent demonstrations in Iran, as per reports of local media. Nasr-Azadani was a former player for teams such as Rah-Ahan, Tractor, and Gol-e Rayhan. The Islamic Republic's legal system intends to hang him for a crime known as "moharebeh." Protests erupted across Iran following the death of a 22-year-old woman in police custody.


Football player Amir Nasr-Azadani to face execution for supporting women's rights in Iran: Reports© Provided by DNA

Mahsa Amini, 22, died while in the custody of the nation's morality police for violating the country's dress code. Protests by Iranian citizens for greater freedom have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of citizens, especially during protests.

Footballers' union FIFPRO, which represents 65,000 professional football players worldwide, also addressed the incident in a tweet. FIFPRO expressed outrage at the news concerning Amir Nasr-Azadani and urged that his sentence be commuted.

“FIFPRO is shocked and sickened by reports that professional footballer Amir Nasr-Azadani faces execution in Iran after campaigning for women’s rights and basic freedom in his country. We stand in solidarity with Amir and call for the immediate removal of his punishment,” the tweet read.

According to IranWire, Nasr-Azadani and two other people accused of the crime appeared on state television on November 20 and read a "forced" confession. Nasr-Azadani was also present at the protests, according to IranWire. However, according to sources, he was never near the area where Cheraghi and the two Basij members were killed. The insider further claimed that his participation in the protests was restricted to yelling slogans for a few hours.

Apart from the international community, Iran's football community has also expressed support for Nasr-Azadani. Former Iran national team player Mehdi Mahdavikia claimed to have seen the 26-year-old during the youth squad's camp in Germany and conveyed his worries about any prospective trial.

Other renowned Iranian footballers who have requested a stay of execution include Ali Karimi, Masoud Shojaei, Mohammed Reza Akhbari, and Siamak Nemati.

How Canadian doctors are helping Iranian colleagues document brutality of regime

Story by Chris Brown • CBC

As the Iranian government continues to crack down on its opponents — even executing two protesters in the past week — doctors inside and outside of the country are joining together to document horrific injuries inflicted by the regime.

"The number of people who oppose the regime is very big — perhaps more than 80 per cent or 90 per cent of my colleagues," said a trauma doctor in Iran who has been treating ghastly injuries inflicted on protesters by the regime's security forces.

CBC News has agreed not to identify him or reveal any other details about his work, as doing so could compromise his safety.

"I have seen injuries on the legs, hips and face resulting from shotgun pellets," he said in an interview.

"There have been several cases where they hit them in the forehead — and there was one case in our hospital where a young child was shot in the face and lost both of his eyes."


In this photo taken by an individual not employed by The Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran, Iranians protest the Sept. 16 death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after she was detained by the morality police, in Tehran on Oct. 1, 2022.© The Associated Press

The country's Islamic regime has been shaken by three months of street demonstrations and protests ignited by the Sept. 16 death of Mahsa Amini.

The 22-year-old woman died in custody in Tehran after she was arrested by the country's morality police for not properly wearing a hijab, which is mandatory under Iran's Islamic law.

'Yes, we are at risk'

Amini's death — attributed to police brutality based on leaked medical scans — has triggered widespread street demonstrations and other acts of protest that are ongoing.

Two protesters have been executed by the regime in the past week after widely discredited trials where the young men were denied proper legal representation and executed without the chance of an appeal.

Amnesty International says it identified a further 20 people at risk of execution because of their links to the protests.

"I think it will turn into a revolution," said the doctor, who believes despite the horrendous consequences of challenging the regime, people will continue to bravely resist.



A mobile phone in Cyprus displays a Twitter post on Monday about the execution announced by Iranian authorities of Majidreza Rahnavard, the second person linked to nearly three months of protests who has been executed.© AFP/Getty Images

But for Iranian doctors, treating government opponents injured by security forces is dangerous by itself.

"I treated patients who were injured and shot and needed to have the bullets removed in my clinic — and that caused my office to receive a call from a 'private' or 'unknown' number — that means it's a call from the intelligence services," he told CBC News.

"So yes, we are at risk."

In late October, hundreds of medical professionals who were protesting outside the medical council of Iran were shot in their backs and legs after security services opened fire on them with shotguns.

Doctors in Iran share details of injuries

Getting even basic information out of the country has been difficult, as authorities have attempted to disrupt messaging service platforms such as WhatsApp and Telegram.

Despite that, doctors who have treated patients have still managed to share details of the injuries they've been seeing with colleagues outside of the country, including doctors in Canada.

"We try to be their voice," said Dr. Saeed Zavareh, a Vancouver internal medicine specialist, who tries to stay in contact with colleagues inside Iran.

Zavareh, 53, trained in Iran as a doctor and immigrated to Canada just over 20 years ago.

In the last few months, he said, doctors in Iran have sent him hundreds of scans of patients, many showing ghastly injuries inflicted by the country's security forces.

"I have seen eye injuries — more than 50 — and that's only me. In the United States, they have a big database that has around 1,000 cases reported," Zavareh told CBC News.

During previous uprisings in Iran, such as in 2019, security services killed more than 1,500 people, but this time the tactics are different, Zavareh said.

He believes the aim is to leave people grossly disfigured to dissuade others from taking to the streets.

"Imagine a teenager losing both eyes and walking in your neighbourhood every day — it's part of the traumatization, part of creating horror for the whole neighbourhood that this is your future if you come to protest."

Zavareh said that in some cases, he has been able to offer diagnostic or treatment advice based on the photos or body scans of those injured.

On other occasions, he said, Canadian and overseas doctors have been able to send packages through the mail containing supplies, medicine and surgical instruments so that doctors in Iran can set up treatment centres in their own homes rather than work in their clinics.

"They try to make it such a scary place so no one even goes outside — that's the horror — terrorizing people who don't want [anything] more than freedom."

But more often than not, Zavareh said, the most important thing that foreign doctors can do is catalogue the injuries inflicted on regime opponents and collect evidence.

"Every piece of information that comes from Iran is priceless for us. We need more evidence when we want to go ahead and file a case in [an] international court for crimes against humanity," he said.

Concerns for Iranian doctor sentenced to death

The challenges and dangers facing Iranian doctors have been recognized by medical associations across Europe and in North America.

In mid-November, the Canadian Medical Association released a statement calling on Iranian authorities to let doctors do their jobs without interference.

The British Medical Association released a similar statement last week, calling on authorities to "cease persecution of health professionals" who treat those injured by security forces.

"We have had examples of doctors in Iran who have treated protesters and been rushed away to be interrogated themselves and actually punished," Dr. Raanan Gillon, past-president of the BMA, told CBC News in London.

One of the highest-profile and most worrying cases involves Dr. Hamid Ghareh Hassanlou, an Iranian radiologist who was tortured by police and sentenced to death.

Iranian authorities accuse him of being part of a mob that attacked and killed two members of a government militia, but his colleagues say the alleged confessions are fraudulent and were obtained under duress.

"We are now working to save his life," said Zavareh, the Vancouver internal medicine specialist, explaining that he has reached out to medical groups around the world and key figures at the United Nations.

"We heard that they are planning to execute him faster than we can [help] him."

The international networks helping Iranian doctors have grown quickly. In some cases, medical professionals are working through their medical associations or physician colleges, while other associations are more informal.

Iranian regime appears unmoved

British dentist Dr. Nader Fallah, who lives just outside London, has been organizing demonstrations and travelling across Europe to pressure governments to impose even harsher international penalties on the Iranian regime.

"The frustration is that we live outside Iran. Initially we felt powerless to help, but in a very quick period of time we have organized multiple associations and groups that hold rallies throughout the world," Fallah said in an interview near Watford, England, where he was seeing patients.


A picture obtained by AFP outside Iran shows a demonstrator raising his arms and making the victory sign during a protest over the death of Amini, in Tehran on Sept. 19.

© AFP/Getty Images

While Fallah said he accepts that the support the outside medical community can provide to Iranian doctors is limited, he believes by documenting the abuses and acting as a conduit for doctors inside the country, pressure on the Iranian regime can be sustained.

"The more we become the voice of Iran — and with the atrocities against humanity — we find there is more action from European allies [governments] and friends."

The Iranian regime, however, appears unmoved by the foreign support for the protesters and has brushed aside the widespread condemnation.

Earlier this week, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi vowed to continue cracking down on protesters.

"The identification, trial and punishment of the perpetrators of the martyrdom [killing] of security forces will be pursued with determination," he was quoted as saying by Reuters.

Still, the doctor interviewed by CBC News in Iran said he believes the support from Canada, Britain and beyond is vital and will continue to be going forward.

"The fear to voice your opposition has resulted in this regime remaining in power for too long. I think this fear is dissipating," he said.

"Every day, the number of people expressing their opposition — and who are brave enough to do so — is increasing."

WAIT, WHAT?

Hong Kong police wrong to ban Tiananmen vigil, court rules

The court overturned the conviction of jailed democracy activist Chow Hang-tung, who led a group that used to organise Hong Kong's annual Tiananmen vigil.

File photo of a Tiananmen vigil in Hong Kong in 2019. 

(Photo: AFP/File/ISAAC LAWRENCE)

14 Dec 2022 

HONG KONG: Hong Kong police's decision to ban a Tiananmen vigil last year was unlawful, a court ruled on Wednesday (Dec 14), as it overturned the conviction of jailed democracy activist Chow Hang-tung.

The ruling is a rare rebuke of authorities in a city where the public commemoration of the deadly 1989 incident in Beijing has been virtually wiped out in recent years.

Chow, a 37-year-old lawyer and one of Hong Kong's most prominent democracy activists, led a now-disbanded group that used to organise the city's annual candlelight vigils to mourn those killed in Tiananmen Square.

Police have banned the last three vigils citing the coronavirus and security fears and the courts have already jailed multiple activists who defied those bans, including Chow.

Pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai is also among those behind bars for defying the various bans on the vigils, in his case for the 2020 event.

Chow was jailed for 15 months in January for writing articles urging the public to "light candles to seek justice for the dead", which a lower court said amounted to inciting others to defy the ban.

But High Court judge Judianna Barnes on Wednesday said police wrongly banned the vigil in 2021 as they did not "proactively and seriously consider" ways to facilitate a public gathering, as was required by law.

As the government failed to prove the ban was legally valid, Chow's articles would no longer constitute a crime and her conviction was scrapped on appeal.

A Hong Kong court has overturned the conviction of political activist and barrister Chow Hang-tung (pictured after her arrest in June 2021) who was jailed over a Tiananmen vigil (Photo: AFP/File/Peter PARKS)

Despite her court victory, Chow remains in custody as she faces further prosecutions including for national security charges which carry up to a decade in jail.

Chow was arrested on the morning of Jun 4, 2021, when her articles appeared on social media and in a newspaper calling on residents to mourn Tiananmen victims.

At the time, police warned that the vigil was banned due to the pandemic and that thousands of officers would be on standby to halt any "unlawful assemblies".

But judge Barnes said on Wednesday that police failed to fulfil their duty under the law to take reasonable measures to facilitate public gatherings, such as imposing conditions on social distancing.

"Although the organisers expressed willingness to follow any reasonable demands by the police, the police only raised questions ... and did not propose measures or conditions that could obviously be considered," the judge said.

AFP has contacted the Department of Justice and Hong Kong police for comment.

In mainland China, censors have long scrubbed what happened at Tiananmen Square, both online and in the real world.

Commemoration of the Tiananmen incident in Hong Kong has largely been driven underground.

Last year, multiple statues marking the historical event were removed from university campuses while an activist-run museum was shut down

Lawsuit accuses social media giant Meta of inflaming Ethiopia’s civil war

NEWS WIRES
Tue, 13 December 2022

© France 24 screengrab

A new lawsuit has accused Meta Platforms META.O of enabling violent and hateful posts from Ethiopia to flourish on Facebook, inflaming the country's bloody civil war.

The lawsuit, filed in Kenya on Tuesday, was brought by two Ethiopian researchers and Kenyan rights group the Katiba Institute. It alleges Facebook's recommendations systems amplified violent posts in Ethiopia, including several that preceded the murder of the father of one of the researchers.

The lawsuit also said the company failed to exercise reasonable care in training its algorithms to identify dangerous posts and in hiring staff to police content for the languages covered by its regional moderation hub in Nairobi.

Meta spokesperson Erin McPike said that hate speech and incitement to violence were against the rules of Facebook and Instagram.

"We invest heavily in teams and technology to help us find and remove this content," McPike added. "We employ staff with local knowledge and expertise and continue to develop our capabilities to catch violating content in the most widely spoken languages in" Ethiopia.

Meta's independent Oversight Board last year recommended a review of how Facebook and Instagram have been used to spread content that heightens the risk of violence in Ethiopia.

The plaintiffs are asking the court to order Meta to take emergency steps to demote violent content, increase moderation staff in Nairobi and create restitution funds of about $2 billion for victims of violence incited on Facebook.

(REUTERS)

Iran drives number of imprisoned journalists worldwide to record high

NEWS WIRES
Tue, 13 December 2022 

© Tolga Akmen, AFP

Iran's protest crackdown has helped push the number of journalists imprisoned worldwide to a record high of 533 in 2022, according to a report by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) published Wednesday.

The figure is up from 488 in 2021, already a record, according to the France-based NGO.

More than half are detained in just five countries: China, which remains "the world's biggest jailer of journalists" with 110, followed by Myanmar (62), Iran (47), Vietnam (39) and Belarus (31).

"Dictatorial and authoritarian regimes are filling their prisons faster than ever by jailing journalists," said Christophe Deloire, RSF Secretary-General, in a statement.

"This new record in the number of detained journalists confirms the pressing and urgent need to resist these unscrupulous governments and to extend our active solidarity to all those who embody the ideal of journalistic freedom, independence and pluralism."

Iran is the only country that was not part of the list last year, said RSF, which has been publishing the annual tally since 1995.

It is "indicative of the Iranian authorities' desire to systematically reduce women to silence," RSF said.

(AFP)

DR Congo Tutsis face threats, prejudice amid rebel crisis

Story by AFP • Yesterday 

Sitting in a small courtyard in Goma, eastern DR Congo, a 55-year-old Tutsi woman joked darkly that she would be killed if she spoke under her real name.


Tens of thousands of people who fled clashes between the M23 and the Congolese army are now camped along the roadside in makeshift tents on the outskirts of Goma

© Guerchom Ndebo

She fled to the city last week after a militia leader known as General Janvier, an opponent of the Tutsi-led M23 rebel group, arrived in her town of Kitschanga.



The M23 has fought its way across North Kivu province, forcing hundreds of thousands to flee

© Guerchom Ndebo

"We saw children with machetes and guns saying they'd come to kill the Tutsis," said the woman, in a poor Goma neighbourhood of clapboard houses on the Rwandan border.


Map showing the location of Kishishe and Bambo in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, where at least 131 people were killed in a massacre by M23 rebels on November 29-30, according to preliminary findings by a UN mission© Valentin RAKOVSKY

The M23 has advanced across North Kivu province in recent weeks, winning victories over the army as well as other militias and forcing hundreds of thousands to flee in its wake.

The Democratic Republic of Congo accuses its smaller neighbour Rwanda of backing the M23, something UN experts and US officials agree with -- although Kigali denies it.

Knife-edge tensions have escalated pressure on Congolese Tutsis, whose history is contested in the central African nation.

Many assume that Tutsis support the M23, for example, or perceive them as Rwandan implants rather than native Congolese.

The government in Kinshasa has repeatedly argued against tribalism and stressed that the Rwandan government alone is to blame for the M23 crisis.

But the reality in the east of the country, about a thousand miles (1,600 kilometres) from the capital, is often different.

AFP interviewed six Congolese Tutsis who had recently arrived in Goma, mostly from Kitschanga in North Kivu's Masisi territory.

Five said they had fled death threats from militias.

"It hurts me," said the 55-year-old Tutsi woman, who explained that all her relatives were Congolese but her children were accused of being Rwandans at school.



DR Congo Tutsis face threats, prejudice amid rebel crisis

© Guerchom Ndebo

"Our children ask us: What's Rwanda?"

- Cut off your nose -

The sense of injustice is widely shared. A 36-year-old Tutsi mother of two, who'd also recently fled to Goma, told AFP she wanted the same rights as everyone else.

She fiddled nervously with her wedding ring as she described why she left Kitschanga. "Militiamen notice your nose and threaten to cut it off with a knife," she said.

Tutsis are often stereotyped as having straight noses.

The woman -- speaking in the Kinyarwanda language native to Rwandans as well as many Congolese Tutsis and Hutus -- said militiamen also looted her home after she fled.

"They say every Tutsi is an M23," she said. "It's terrible."

The M23 first leapt to international prominence in 2012 when it captured Goma, before being driven out and going to ground.

But the rebels took up arms again late last year, claiming the DRC had failed to honour a pledge to integrate them into the army.

They've since seized swaths of territory and come within about 20 miles (12 kilometres) of Goma, a key hub of over a million people.

The M23 advance has also driven a wave of virulent anti-Tutsi hate speech on social media, with calls for them to depart for Rwanda and worse.

Emmanuel Runigi Kamanzi, the president of a North Kivu livestock farmers' association, said his Tutsi ancestors arrived in the region in the middle ages.

"This is our home," he added, decrying extremist attitudes fanned by Mai-Mai militias and so-called Nyatura armed groups that claim to represent Congolese Hutus.

Nyatura means "those who strike mercilessly" in Kinyarwanda.

- 'Uproot us' -

In public statements, the M23 has frequently accused other armed groups as well as government forces of targeting Tutsis.

But Lieutenant-Colonel Guillaume Ndjike, the Congolese army spokesman in North Kivu, said soldiers have not attacked Tutsis and that the allegations are "excuses put forward by the Rwandan army".

M23 fighters have themselves committed alleged atrocities.

The rebels killed 131 civilians and raped 27 women and girls in two neighbouring villages in late November, according to a preliminary UN probe.

Congolese Tutsi leaders have also condemned the M23.

David Karambi, the president of a North Kivu Tutsi association, told reporters in December that recent massacres could not even be "committed by animals," for example.

Many Congolese Tutsis interviewed by AFP said they felt unfairly blamed, and in danger.

In a Goma district where many Tutsis recently fled, a 27-year-old woman said Mai-Mai and Nyatura members had threatened "to kill us as they did to Tutsis in Rwanda".

"This war, it's to uproot us," she said, eyes downcast.

eml/bp

INDIA
Fear persists 10 years after Delhi gang rape and murder

Women travel on a Delhi Transport Corporation bus in New Delhi on Dec 8, 2022. 

(Photo: AFP/Money Sharma)

14 Dec 2022 

NEW DELHI: Ten years ago, the brutal gang rape and murder of a young woman on a Delhi bus horrified the world and shone a spotlight on high rates of sexual violence in India.

Jyoti Singh, 23, and a male friend boarded a bus on the evening of Dec 16, 2012.

Savagely attacked, tortured with an iron rod and dumped at the roadside, Singh survived long enough to identify her attackers, earning herself the nickname "Nirbhaya" - "fearless".

But the student died from her injuries in a Singapore hospital 13 days later.

It sparked huge protests that forced authorities to promise to do more to protect women. In 2020 four of the six attackers - one died in jail, another was a juvenile - were hanged.

But a decade after the assault, many women are still scared to travel at night in India's capital, a sprawling metropolis of 20 million people.

AFP spoke to the victim's mother, the chief police investigator at the time, an activist and a young woman commuter.

Asha Devi, the mother of 2012 Delhi gang rape victim Jyoti Singh, poses for a picture during an interview with AFP at her residence in New Delhi on Nov 30, 2022. (Photo: AFP/Money Sharma)

THE MOTHER

"Obviously the pain doesn't go," Singh's mother Asha Devi told AFP.

"She was in so much pain during the 12 to 13 days that she was alive," she said in her modest two-bedroom Delhi home.

"How can anybody do this to another human being? Because my daughter struggled to even breathe."

Since the attack, Devi has become a prominent campaigner on women's safety, counselling survivors' families, helping their legal battles and protesting for justice.

The 57-year-old, who with her husband has set up a fund for rape survivors, sat next to a glass cabinet full of mementos of their daughter and awards for their efforts.

"My daughter's suffering gave me the strength to fight this battle," she said.

The case led to tougher punishments for rapists, more closed-circuit television cameras and street lights, and safety marshals on some buses.

There are now also centres for rape survivors for legal and medical help.

But Devi said that sexual assaults remain all too common and that "nothing has changed" when it comes to seeking justice.

"If any incident happens, either the parents are blamed or the girl. No one questions the boy or talks about his mistake. 'Why was the girl out at night?' they ask.

"There are still so many cases, such horrific cases," Devi said. "I don't think anyone is afraid of the law."

India registered 31,677 rape cases last year, an average of 86 a day, according to the latest official criminal statistics - an increase of about 13 per cent from 2020.

In a patriarchal society, daughters are often considered a burden thanks to the persistence of the dowry tradition.

In rural areas, where 70 per cent of Indians live, the problem is deeper.

Girls who wear jeans, use mobile phones or go out with boyfriends are often seen as sexually permissive. Life for lower-caste girls and women is particularly dangerous.

"The change has to come first in society and families so that daughters are considered as daughters and not a burden," Devi said.

Chhaya Sharma, joint commissioner of police for Delhi's eastern district, speaks during an interview with AFP at her office in New Delhi on Dec 6, 2022.

 (Photo: AFP/Sajjad Hussain)

THE COP

The chief police investigator in the case - herself a woman - interviewed Singh in her hospital bed.

"She understood that she had been hurt and that she would have a limited time to survive," said Chhaya Sharma, now 50.

"Don't spare them," Singh, whose attackers had left 13 bite marks on her body, told her.

"The way she was interacting with me was very confident, despite the pain and trauma she was going through," Sharma said.

"She was very determined about the fact that she wanted these persons caught."

The policewoman, who has gone on to become joint commissioner of police for Delhi's eastern district, hugged her mother and promised her she would get justice for her daughter.

Often, rapists and victims are known to each other. In this case, "you're looking for a needle in the haystack".

"Out of 370 buses, we had to find the correct bus," Sharma told AFP. "We were walking a very tight rope and a very thin line."

Sharma said that when the attackers were arrested, they showed no remorse.

"I felt that they did it without even feeling anything. That was the sickest part."

The case was a watershed moment, she said, insisting Delhi should not be seen as a "rape capital".

But sexual violence has remained a major issue, she said, and women still need to take precautions.

Sharma's own daughter is now studying in college, and she "knows what she has to do" to try to protect herself from danger.

Women passengers travel in the women-only compartment of a Delhi Metro train on Dec 9, 2022. (Photo: AFP/Money Sharma)

THE ACTIVIST

Hopes were high in 2012 that women's safety would improve, said Yogita Bhayana, an activist with the People Against Rapes in India (PARI) organisation.

"I really thought this might be the last case, that Nirbhaya might be the last case," Bhayana told AFP.

"But unfortunately this did not happen and we kept getting cases and things were very slow, (legal) procedures were very slow. Even till today, every single day our helpline gets five or six similar cases," she said.
THE PASSENGER

Lashita is a 19-year-old student who declined to give her full name. About to get the metro home after dark from central Delhi, she said that she does not feel safe on the train and uses the women-only carriage.

"Groping is the new 'good afternoon' in the metro," she told AFP. Women have to be careful "because men are not going to stop", she added.

Travelling late "really bothers my parents because they obviously have safety concerns in mind", she said.

"Maybe I am delusional enough to believe that nothing bad could happen to me, but it's a sad reality that everyone has to be careful."
Source: AFP/kg