crimes against humanity – Page 2

North Korea: We cannot look away

Posted on 03/10/202403/10/2024 by cswpress in Asia, North Korea

‘Our vision remains one of a North Korea in which everyone is free to exercise their rights and freedoms, including the right to freedom of religion or belief, and today we reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that this vision becomes a reality.’

– CSW’s CEO Scot Bower

A CSW delegation recently travelled to Seoul, South Korea to launch a report summarising the condition of freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) in North Korea over the past ten years. The report – titled North Korea: We Cannot Look Away was commissioned to commemorate the 10^th anniversary of the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights Commission of Inquiry (COI) into crimes against humanity in the country.

In 2014, when the initial report of the COI was published it concluded that the situation in North Korea was one ‘without parallel’ in the world. The COI found evidence of ‘unspeakable atrocities’ against the North Korean people. They found evidence of ‘widespread, systematic and gross’ violations of human rights occurring across the country. And they found these state actions qualified as crimes against humanity – among them execution, enslavement, starvation, rape, re-education, forced labour and forced abortion.

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The Episcopal/Evangelical Church in Omdurman, which was shelled on 1 November 2023.

No se debe permitir que Sudán quede fuera de la agenda internacional

Posted on 14/11/2023 by cswpress in español, Sub-Saharan Africa ES, Sudan ES

“La tierra es valiosa y será más fácil apoderarse de ella si los edificios han sido destruidos por la guerra”.

Esta fue la reacción de una fuente de CSW ante el bombardeo de iglesias y propiedades en Omdurman y Jartum El-Shajara en Sudán a principios de mes.

El 1 de noviembre, las Fuerzas Armadas Sudanesas bombardearon y destruyeron por completo una iglesia utilizada por las denominaciones episcopal y evangélica en Omdurman. Era la iglesia más grande y la segunda más antigua de la zona, y su destrucción se produjo apenas tres semanas después de que también fueran bombardeadas la Escuela Comercial Evangélica y la Escuela Secundaria Evangélica.

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Sudan must not be allowed to slip off the international agenda

Posted on 07/11/2023 by cswpress in Sub-Saharan Africa, Sudan

‘The land is valuable, and it will be easier to seize it if the buildings have been destroyed by war.’

This was the reaction of a CSW source to the bombing of churches and properties in Omdurman and Khartoum El-Shajara in Sudan at the start of the month.

On 1 November the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) shelled and completely destroyed a church that was used by the Episcopal and Evangelical denominations in Omdurman. It was the largest and second oldest church in the area, and its destruction came just three weeks after the Evangelical Commercial School and the Evangelical Secondary School were also bombed.

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European External Action Service Headquarters in Brussels.

The Myanmar junta should have no place at the ASEAN-EU Human Rights Dialogue

Posted on 03/10/2023 by cswpress in Asia, Burma, European Union, International Arenas

Last week, soldiers of the Myanmar/Burma military reportedly beheaded three men in Pale Township in the Sagaing Region of Myanmar. Two of them were civilians, and the third a member of a People’s Defense Force in Nyaunggon Village.

A witness told The Irrawaddy news website that the men had been killed as they returned to their village on 27 September, thinking that the junta troops who had occupied it for the past two and half weeks had left. One man’s head was hung on a fence, another placed on a chair, and the third ‘had his abdomen cut open, intestines taken out, limbs cut off and [then] put into his abdomen.’

The same day, at least 19 children and their teacher were injured when the regime shelled a monastic school in Wuntho Towsnhip, also in the Sagaing Region. Most were aged between five and eight, and seven of them were critically wounded.

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Ruins of Nan Lan Village in Myanmar. Credit: Free Burma Rangers.

The brutal ‘Four Cuts’ strategy is causing untold suffering in Myanmar, yet the international community remains slow to react

Posted on 04/09/2023 by cswpress in Asia, Burma

The ‘Four Cuts’ strategy, designed to sever insurgents’ supplies of food, funds, information and recruits, is an approach that has been used for decades by a series of military dictatorships in Myanmar/Burma. This devastating tactic is once again being employed, but in one of its bloodiest forms yet.

Breaking society

In a remarkable piece of reporting, in a country where foreign journalists have no official access to the true story of Myanmar’s civil war, Sky News recently released details of an undercover mission deep into southeastern Myanmar. Chief correspondent Stuart Ramsay encountered first-hand the Myanmar military regime’s devastating campaign of violence.

Ramsay and his team discovered shocking evidence of sustained attacks on civilian homes and infrastructure, including daily artillery and aerial bombardment as well as arson attacks, which are forcing people from their homes with over 1.5 million people currently displaced and in desperate need of humanitarian assistance.

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