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Human Rights Comments
Corruption undermines human rights and the rule of law
In recent years, in many European countries, including Romania, Malta, the Republic of Moldova, Bulgaria, the Slovak Republic and Ukraine, people have taken to the streets in protests against systemic corruption, demanding respect for the rule of law, accountability of corrupt politicians and a...
Human Rights Comment
Learning from the pandemic to better fulfil the right to health
The COVID-19 pandemic has concentrated minds about the resilience of our health care systems and it is challenging member states’ health policies and their effectiveness. In addition, doctors, medical staff and health care staff are under unprecedented pressure. Do we have sufficient medical...
Human Rights Comment
Time to deliver on commitments to protect people on the move from human trafficking and exploitation
Few human rights violations are so universally condemned by Council of Europe member states as the exploitation of the most vulnerable. As a result, year on year, the fight against trafficking in human beings or the eradication of what some call modern slavery is gaining in prominence on their...
Human Rights Comment
Open minds are needed to improve the protection of LGBTI asylum seekers in Europe
In many states around the world, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) persons face serious violations of their human rights on account of their sexual orientation, gender identity or sex characteristics. These include killings, violence, the criminalisation of same-sex...
Human Rights Comment
Ending restrictions on family reunification: good for refugees, good for host societies
Many refugees have to leave family members behind when they flee their homes. This adds more hardship to the trauma of exile. Once they have found safety in Europe, being reunited with their family members is often the first priority of refugees. It takes little imagination to realise how...
Human Rights Comment
High time for states to invest in alternatives to migrant detention
The use of migrant detention across Europe, whether for the purpose of stopping asylum seekers and other migrants entering a country or for removing them, has long been a serious human rights concern. I have repeatedly spoken out against the pan-European trend of criminalisation of asylum seekers...
Human Rights Comment
Migrants in limbo in Europe have the right to live in dignity
In some countries, they call them “invisible persons”, in others – “ghosts”. Throughout Europe there are many migrants, primarily rejected asylum seekers, who live in a state of protracted legal and social limbo without any long-term prospects. The authorities refuse to regularize them or to...
Human Rights Comment
Human rights of refugee and migrant women and girls need to be better protected
For the first time since the beginning of the refugee and migrant crisis in Europe, women and children on the move outnumber adult men. While in 2015 about 70 % of the population on the move were men, women and children now make up nearly 60% of refugees and other migrants crossing into Europe....
Human Rights Comment
Improving protection for victims of forced labour and human trafficking
Everyone in Europe - children, women and men - should be protected from forced labour and trafficking in human beings, two serious human rights violations. The latest International Labour Organisation (ILO) estimates indicate some 20.9 million people around the world still being subjected to...
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Human Rights Comment
For the rights of the living, for the dignity of the dead – Time to end the plight of missing migrants in Europe
Bereavement in their death to feel Whom we have never seen — A Vital Kinsmanship import Our Soul and theirs — between — For Stranger — Strangers do not mourn (Emily Dickinson) A few lines of poetry hang on the entrance of the graveyard of the island of Lampedusa, Italy’s southernmost point,...
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