Human Rights Facts (43): Genocide

(photo showing the excavation of mass graves in Srebrenica)
Genocide is the deliberate, systematic and violent destruction of a group (an ethnic, racial, religious, national or political group). This destruction can take many forms:

the outright murder of (the majority of) the members of the group
inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about destruction
measures intended to prevent [...]

Human Rights Quote (64): Infant Mortality

“The child mortality rate—the number of under-fives dying per thousand live births—dropped by almost a quarter worldwide between 1990 and 2006. … Progress in sub-Saharan Africa, where the death rate is highest, has been slower. Around one in six children in the region still die before the age of five and the rate is rising [...]

Human Rights Facts (38): Millennium Development Goals

I’ve mentioned the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) before. This post gives some more data.
The United Nations agreed the 8 MDGs in 2000, to be reached in 2015. Now, half-way to that deadline, there is progress, but not all regions in the world are doing equally well. However, even in the poorest region - sub-Saharan Africa [...]

Human Rights Quote (54): Refugees

In countries where people have to flee their homes because of persecution and violence, political solutions must be found, peace and tolerance restored, so that refugees can return home. In my experience, going home is the deepest wish of most refugees. Angelina Jolie
In a previous post, I talked a bit on the problem of migration [...]

Human Rights Cartoon (82): Overpopulation?

A few cartoons about overpopulation. I’ll try to show in this post how this is related to human rights.

(copyright http://www.claybennett.com/)

(copyright http://www.greenberg-art.com/)

(copyright unknown)
Some blame overpopulation for many of the world’s problems such as poverty, famine and war (which are obviously rights violations). There are supposed to be too many people for peaceful coexistence and sustainable food [...]

Human Rights Facts (8): Famine

Here are some of the worst famines in the 20th century. In China between 1958 and 1962, an estimated 10 to 30 million people died as a result of Mao’s Great Leap Forward. The government was unaware of the problems and continued to export food and cut imports several years into the famine. Farmers were [...]

Human Rights Quote (43): Famine

No substantial famine has ever occurred in any independent and democratic country with a relatively free press. Amartya Sen
If there are no free flows of information, no accountable government that needs to justify its actions in order to be re-elected, and no free press, then you are likely to have more corruption, more embezzlement of [...]

Human Rights Cartoon (69): Health

Bad health and suffering create the same problems as poverty. You have to be healthy and without pain, in order to have a cultural and political life and to be able to use freedom rights and political rights. A sick, suffering or toiling person is thrown back upon himself and unable to relate to the [...]

Human Rights Quote (21): Human Rights and Democracy

Even if he can vote to choose his rulers, a young man with AIDS who cannot read or write and lives on the brink of starvation is not truly free. Equally, even if she earns enough to live, a woman who lives in the shadow of daily violence and has no say in how her [...]