Human Rights | WPN World People News

Greece’s Education Ministry should move quickly to implement positive new plans for the education of asylum-seeking children on the Aegean islands and make schools accessible to all of them, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 17. When the school year began on September 11, 2017, hundreds of asylum-seeking children who are being prevented from leaving the islands due to a European Union deal with Turkey remained out of school.

The United Nations Security Council and concerned countries should impose targeted sanctions and an arms embargo on the Burmese military to end its ethnic cleansing campaign against Rohingya Muslims, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 17. Since August 25, 2017, after attacks by the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), Burmese military forces have carried out mass arson, killing, and looting, destroying hundreds of villages and forcing nearly half a million Rohingya to flee to neighboring Bangladesh.

The Afghan government should reject proposals to create a new militia with inadequate training and oversight, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 15. Western diplomatic sources in Kabul told Human Rights Watch that President Ashraf Ghani is considering establishing a defense unit modelled on the Indian Territorial Army, an auxiliary force comprising personnel who serve on a short-term contract basis with the regular armed forces. The NATO Resolute Support Mission is believed to support such a local security force in Afghanistan.

Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) arbitrarily detained a Ukrainian woman, held her incommunicado, and tortured her, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 15. The authorities charged the woman, Daria Mastikasheva, with treason, and a court in Dnipro has ordered her pretrial detention pending investigation.

Participants of the Forum for Security Co-operation’s session on United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 on Women, Peace and Security on 13 September 2017 in Vienna.

The Burmese military is deliberately burning ethnic Rohingya villages near the Bangladesh border, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 15. Such acts of arson, after forcing residents to leave their villages, appear central to the Burmese military’s ethnic cleansing campaign against the Rohingya Muslim population in Burma’s Rakhine State.

A family living in an urban slum in Sonagachi, Kolkata, India.

Millions of dollars in aid money pledged to get Syrian refugee children in school last year did not reach them, arrived late, or could not be traced due to poor reporting practices, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 14.

Saudi Arabia’s school religious studies curriculum contains hateful and incendiary language toward religions and Islamic traditions that do not adhere to its interpretation of Sunni Islam, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 13. The texts disparage Sufi and Shia religious practices and label Jews and Christians “unbelievers” with whom Muslims should not associate.

The Cambodian government should not carry out its threats to imminently return a group of ethnic Montagnards to Vietnam, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 12. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) says they are refugees with a well-founded fear of persecution if sent back. Sending them back would violate Cambodia’s international and domestic legal obligations.