Tears and Smiles in the Fight for Justice

              This post is about how important is the fight against human rights violations and the fight for justice. The people must understand that this fight is not only for the victims, but for all citizens, for democracy, for a free future, for the belief in the citizenship's empowerment, in short for the most basic principles the humankind has fought in the last centuries. And this fight should be fought for all, because the consequencies of a unpunished serious human rights violation could become tragic, the violations could rapidly to spread and together with other kinds of violations become a dystopian society for the people.  In this fight for justice, some victims has had only reasons for tears, they are still, after of several years, waiting for some reason to smile. They are waiting for justice and while it have not been delivered, there is not reason to smile. The injustice can not last forever. This post is a summary of two articles. The first with the title above was published at ttps://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/sep/21/humanrights1. The second was published at http://www.theadvocatesforhumanrights.org/human_rights_basics

             Sixty years ago, in the wake of the Holocaust, the United Nations ( U.N.) issued its Universal Declaration of Human Rights (U.D.H.R.) proclaiming 'the basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled. In this review special to mark the 60th anniversary, we look at the progress made since 1948, and detail the tragic cost of failure. Here, we talk to five people fighting for human rights. 1) Marjorie Ojule, 32, Ugandan refugee, now a trustee of Women for Refugee Women in the U.K. - In Uganda I was active in opposition politics at a grassroots level: working in my village, helping women to know their rights and teaching them reading and writing. I was detained twice. The horror that I experienced in there, you would not wish that on anyone, not even your enemy. I was tortured, I was raped, I was burnt with cigarettes, I was cut with razors, eletric shocks: all the horrible things you think you can think of to get information from someone. Eventually I escaped and came to England. It was scary but I would be in this tortured for some time, and I just wanted to be able to breathe fresh air again. The child I have now is out of rape and at first I did not want to keep her, I wanted to put her for adoption. When I arrived in 2002, they took me to the hospital: I was malnourished, I was dehydrated. After six months I was going to counseling and it made me a strong person, I was feeling myself and I realised this child was part of me. I got tired of sitting at home so I started looking for charities and it was through Women for Refugee Women that I met Natasha. I've been public speaker ever since, telling my story and telling the stories of other women who can not speak English. It felt like therapy as well: when there is a place where you can explode with anger and say 'why the government do this?' It feels good afterwards. Everyone ask me, 'oh Marjorie, how did you manage to deal with all these things?' I would say the work I do with you keeps me busy. I've been to the House of Commons. I stood up and spoke. Natasha tells me I am amazing and I say, 'I am amazing because of you'. That makes me cry because if it was not for people like that I could not have had that power. I am so grateful to them. 2) Hollman Morris, 40, Colombian journalist, winner of the 2007 human rights watch defender prize - My seven-year-old daughter asked me 'Daddy, why do you only interview sad people?' She had just seen one of my shows where I talked to victims of Colombia 's conflict but I explained to her they are not just sad, they also have dreams, hope and dignity. The people I interview are the voice of the 'other' Colombia, a Colombia that you do not see in most media, a Colombia that some people wish did not exist. I knew from when I set out to be a journalist that my job was to show their stories. I defined my role as a journalist because I decided that I had to find out how people were being slaughtered and nothing happened in this country. That has always meant problems for me with all the armed actors in the Colombian Conflict. Since 1997 there have always been death threats from one group or another. Around the same time my wife Patty told me she was pregnant. We fled to Spain with the help of an Amnesty International programme for human rights defenders. After a year we came back to Colombia. Our job as journalists is to look after people's rights. In a way we are guardians of human rights. We may not be the activists who put out urgent action notices every day. But our work as journalists is to write, publish and denounce when there is a violation of any fundamental right. My generation has never seen a day of peace in Colombia. What I want is through journalism is to try to build a better country for my children so that they can live in peace. 3) Zmitser Dashkevich, leader of Youth Front, Belarus - I was arrested in September 2006 and charged with 'organising and participating in the activity of an unregistered NGO'. After six weeks in detention and on trial I was sentenced to one-and-a-half years in prison. At the time I was leader of Youth Front, which is a Christian organisation of young people in Belarus. It is an independent political and social force which is in stark opposition to President Alexander Lukashenko, the last dictator in Europe. Lukashenko has openly praised Stalin and we believe his politics are leading to the moral degeneration of Belarussian society. On six occasions we have tried register our organisation but every time our application was refused. In 2006 lukashenko understood that he was losing power, because the younger generation, despite all the ideology and repression did not support him. We were holding protests against falsification of the vote. So he introduced a law making it illegal to participate in the activities of an unregistered organisation. I was the first to be prosecuted. So I was sent to prison. very soon I started receiving hundreds of letters of support every day. They came from Belarussians, and from members of human rights groups from all over the world. Activists also sent thousands of letters to the government. The government had paint us oppositionists as marginal group on the payroll of the CIA. But when the prison guards saw all my letters, they said:' Wow, the people are really behind this guy.' They started to understand the gap between the propaganda and the reality.  As a direct result of the huge campaign of public solidarity I was released two months early and returned to lead Youth Front. 4) Odette Mupenzi, victim of Rwanda genocide -  I realised being a Tutsi was not considered good by some people when I was 11, because I had a teacher who picked on us, saying we had funny faces. Then in 1990, the majority Hutus killed many Tutsi intellectuals in a stadium near where I lived. After that, I knew we were in danger, but I did not expect what was coming. In January 1994, my family stopped sleeping at home because we thought we would be taken away during the night. When the genocide began in April, we fled to a religious seminary. The next day, lots of people turned up with machetes, guns and axes. Many of us hid in a classroom. They put a gun to my face and shot me. I could hear people praying, then there was silence, everyone was dead. The next thing I remember was waking up in hospital. I've been fighting for life ever since. An ONG helped me get treatment in Switzerland. I first met human rights group Aegis Trust when it set up a genocide memorial in Kigali in 2004. I was very ill at the time, my bones were iinfected and i was living in morphine. In 2006, I came to England. I've had metal bones put in my jaw, and skin taken from my side and put in my face. I can eat with a spoon and fork. Now, I feel alive again. I do not want to go back to Rwanda. I want to live in a country where I do not have to look over my shoulder all the time. 5) Ignatius Warghana, 25, Indonesian activist - I was imprisoned when I was 20 years old, due to my involvement in the National Student League for Democracy. In January 2003, the President increase fuel and eletricity prices, so mass demonstrations took place across Indonesia. We held a demonstration in Jakarta and it ended with a performance n which we burnt pictures of the President. the police surrounded us and one of my friends was captured. He was blindfolded and they threatened him, saying they would shot him and throw his body in the sea. When we went to the police station to find him, they arrested met too. They put me in a cell that they called 'the tiger cage', it is like when you are in the zoo and you see animals in a cage. Every trial the president's supporter came and threatened me and my lawyer. In April 2003, I was sentenced to three years. I was put in a cell they called the dry cell because there is no water. There was a prisoner, a member of the President's party, who fought me every week. It was not really a fight because they were so many and I am only one. Amnesty International is familiar with the Indonesian movement and it made a greeting-card campaign, sending cards to me and to the Indonesian President. I counted more than 4,000 letters. they made me feel better and gave me hope but, they meant that the prison officer was careful with me. I was there for two years and seven months. The most significant factor in keeping my spirits up was the campaign. When I got letters from children in the U.K. I could not believe that they were aware of me and were doing something about it. The first thing I did when I was released was demonstrate outside the prison because even though we got a new president, he has continued repressive policies against activists. Prison is a bad memory but I got a lot of lessons from it. I'm going to study human rights and politics at York University. This is what I live for, this struggle.

               human rights are standards that allow all people to live with dignity, freedom, equality, justice and peace. Every person has these rights simply because they are human beings. Human rights are essential to the full development of individuals and communities. Many people view human rights as a set of moral principles that apply to everyone. Human rights are also part of international law, contained in treaties and declarations that spell out specific rights that countries are required to uphold. Human rights reflect the minimum standards necessary for people to live with dignity. Human rights give the people the freedom to choose how to live, how they express themselves, what kind of government they want to support, among other things. Human rights also guarantee people the means necessary to satisfy their basic needs, such as food, housing, and education, so they can take full advantage of all oportunities. Finally, by guaranteeing life, libert, equality, and security, human rights protect people against abuse by those who are more powerful.

100th Anniversary of Ireland's Independence

              Almost two months ago, the independence of the Irish Republic completed its 100th anniversary. This post is a tribute to this country. The recent Ireland's history is remarkable for the transformative power of the investment in education, in just few decades, this country that was once one of the poorest of Europe is now one of the richest. An example of good governance and capacity of its workforce to the world. This post is a summary three articles. The first with the incomplete title above, was published at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-singer/100th-anniversary-of-irel_b_9718596.html, The second was published at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland. The third was published at http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2006/06/how-ireland-became-the-celtic-tiger

    

               April 24, is the 100th anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin, the start of revolutionary activity that finally secured independence for Ireland. New York City commemoration includes a mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral followed by a piped procession to the office of the Irish Consul General on Park Avenue. A formal dinner will be held at the American Irish Historical Society located on the New York University campus also opens a four-month exhibit, "Her Exiled Children", based on its 1916 archives. On Easter Sunday 1916 nationalist leader Padraig Pearse, a local teacher, read a Proclamation, on the steps of the Dublin General Post Office declaring Irish independence from Great Britain. Pearse and the rebels demanded, "the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible" and pledged "our lives and the lives of our comrades in arms to the cause of its freedom, of its exaltation among the nations." After six days of fighting on Dublin streets and hundreds of civilian casualties, the rebellion was crushed by British troops and local police. Leaders who survived were summarily executed by the British military. But instead of ending the independence movement, the defeat stimulated a much broader campaign. In 1918, the Irish Sinn Fein political party which demanded an independent Ireland, won a majority of the Irish seats in the British Parliament and the next year the Irish Republican Army launched a guerrilla war against the British government. A 1921 treaty established the Irish Free State as a self-governing nation that eventually became the fully independent Republic of Ireland. New York City has always had close ties to the Irish nationalist movement. On August 20, 1916, The New York Times published an interview with Moira Regan, a young woman who participated in the Easter Rising. She was in New York raising support and funds for the rebel cause. This is from her accounts about the consequencies of events."The greatest result of the rising, the thing that will justify it even if it were the only good result, is the complete and amazing revival of Irish nationality. We have been awakened to the knowledge that there is a great difference between Ireland and England, that we are really a separate nation. Even the people that were not in sympathy with the rebels, feel this now. This feeling has spread all over Ireland. We were a province, and now we are a nation; we were British subjects, and now we are Irish. This is what the rising has done to Ireland".

           Éire, also known as the Republic of Ireland is a sovereign state in north-western Europe occupying about five-sixths of the island of Ireland. The capital and largest city is Dublin and whose metropolitan area is home to around a third of the country's 4.7 million inhabitants. The head of government is the Prime Minister, who is elected by the congress and appointed by the elected President. Ireland became a member of the U.N. in 1955. After joining the E.E.C. in 1973, Ireland enacted a series of economic policies that resulted in rapid economic growth. The country achieved considerable prosperity from 1995 to 2007, during which it became known as the Celtic Tiger. This was halted by the global financial crisis that began in 2008. However, as the Irish economy was the fastest growing in the E.U. in 2015, Ireland is again quickly ascending leagues tables comparing wealth and prosperity internationally. For example, in 2015, Ireland was ranked the sixth most developed country in the world by the U.N. Human Development Index. The state extends over an area of 70,273 km2. The highest point is Carrauntoohill with 1,038 m, located in the southwest. The river Shannon, which traverses the central lowlands, is the longest at 386 km. The Irish economy has transformed since the 1980s from being predominantly agricultural to a modern knowledge economy focused on high technology industries and services. Ireland adopted the Euro currency in 2002. The country is heavily reliant on Foreign Direct Investment and has attract several multinational corporations due to a highly educated workforce and a low corporation tax rate. Companies as Intel invested in Ireland during the late 1980s, followed by Microsoft and Google. Ireland has three levels of education: primary, secondary and higher education. Education is compulsory between the ages of six and fifteen years. There are around 3,300 primary schools and the vast majority, 90%, are under the patronage of the Catholic Church, but receiving public money, and can not discriminate pupils based upon religion or lack thereof. The PISA currently ranks Ireland as having the fourth highest reading score, ninth highest science score and thirteenth highest math score, among OECD countries. The country ranks in 8th place as world's top universities. Primary, secondary and higher education are all free. However, there are charges to cover some services and examinations. In addition, currently, 37% of Ireland population has a university degree. Ireland's culture was for centuries predominantly Gaelic, and it remains one of the six principal Celtic nations. Following the Anglo-Norman invasion in 12th century, and gradual British conquest and colonisation,  beginning in the 16th century, Ireland became unfluenced by English culture. Ireland has made significant contribution to world literature. Modern Irish fiction began with the publishing of the 1726 novel Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift, another well known writer is Bram Stoker author of the 1897 novel Dracula. James Joyce published his famous work Ulysses in 1922, which is an interpretation of the Odyssey set in Dublin. Ireland has two Nobel Prize in Literature laureates William Butler Yeats and Seamus Heaney. Ireland ranks fifth in the world in terms of gender equality and 2011, was ranked the second most charitable country in the world. Ireland became one of the first country to introduce a public smoking ban in 2004, and Ireland has the second highest rate of recycling in the E.U. 

              In just over a generation, Ireland has evolved from one of the poorest countries in Europe to one of the most successful. It has reversed the persistent emigration of its best and brightest and achieved an enviable reputation as a thriving, knowledge-driven economy. As a result of sustained efforts over many years, the past of declining population, poor living standards, and economic stagnation has been left behind. Ireland now has the second highest GDP per capita within E.U. (after Luxemboutg). One of the biggest successes of the Irish economy has been new job creation. In one year alone (2005) employment increased by 5%. Ireland is now seen as the land of opportunity by many workers. Its unemployment rate of 4% is less than half the E.U. average. Public budgets are in balance. Ireland achieved this success through a combination of sensible policies and pragmatism. At the heart of these policies was a belief in economic openness to global markets, low tax rates, and investment in education. Ireland's transformation was national in scope, with individuals, businesses, institutions, and government sharing the same ambition. It envolved parents deciding that their children would have choices that they did not have and would not be forced to leace their home because of economic necessity. The OECD sponsored an influential report on education, Investment in Education, which was published in 1965. This report emphasized that education was key to the future of Ireland's society and economy. Attempts were made to adjust to the new openness. The National Industrial and Economic Council, comprising government, business, and other interests, discussed the challenges of restructuring industry now faced with free-trade competition. Underlying the extensive processes of consultation and engagement was aclear commitment to change, even if that change had inevitable problems and costs. Industrial Development Authority (IDA) played a central role in the new drive for success. While still funded by the state, the IDA was established with its own board, staff, and operating freedoms, separate from government. It was the first dedicated state agency in the world to undertaken a massive and sustained campaign to establish a modern manufacturing base by attracting large-scale foreign investment. The IDA adopted pragmatic, business-like methods. The key decision was to focus on industries that represented the future-high technology, high output, and high skills. The main target included the computer industry, pharmaceuticals, and medical technology, followed by international services. Soon investments were won from leading companies. All of these companies were persuaded of using Ireland as an export platform to serve Europe and other markets. All of this happened against a backdrop of high inflation, which averaged 13.6% per year in the 1970s and was driven partly by international factors and partly by an expansionary fiscal policy. Unsolved, the economic problems of the 1970s rolled over into the 1980s, producing disappointment. The consequencies were the return of high unemployment, emigration, steady worsening of the public finances, and the seeming inability of any government to find a solution to the situation. Between 1980 and 1986, total government expenditure grew from 54% to 62% of GDP, and public debt increased from 87% to 120% of GDP, while annual budget deficits exceeded 10% of GDP. In 1987 a new government started a program of cuts in expenditure accompained for development measures. Within a few years, these steps began to show dividends, helped by a coincidence of other factors. Developments steps in financial services and other sectors were assisted by a series of investments in telecommunications from the 1980s onward, although the sector remained largely state-owned until the late 1990s. Late entry to heavy investment in this sector ultimately served Ireland well in that it provided the most advanced and comprehensive digital nerwork in Europe ( much as the relevance of the education system was also greater as a result of its late expansion).

Quality of Democracy and Parliamentary Reform in Latin America

             This post is a summary of a book with the incomplete title above and published in 2009 at  http://www.idea.int/resources/analysis/loader.cfm?csmodule=security/getfile&pageid=37959

              When observing the democratic consolidation process of Latin America ( L.A.), legislatures are often understudied and neglected. A vital aspect of the quality of democracy is the increase of the performance of parliamentary institutions, in order to foster social-economic development. Parliaments are the primary institutions where oversight, representation and legislative functions should take place. L.A. legislatures tend to be viewed as ineffective for several reasons: institutional imbalance with the executive branch, high levels of fragmentation, technical and organizational deficiencies. These aspects hinder legislatures in performing their oversight function, and weaken the overall quality of democratic governance. Ongoing reforms have insufficiently addressed this issue. For this reason, the modernization of parliamentary institutions is key to the region's social and economic development, and is part of the challenges to improve the quality of democracy in the region. In order for the European Union ( E.U.) to become a better partner to L.A. democracy building, it should focus on strengthening parliaments, congress and national assemblies across the continent. Issues that should be considered include: parliamentary autonomy, technical capacity of parliamentary staff, and increased parliamentary transparency. Parliaments should be able to define their agenda and approve their own internal budgets without executive interference. Independent statistical and planning offices should be supported. L.A. should help strengthen parliaments' role in the budget process, not only in the adoption phase, but also in its elaboration and in monitoring spending. Improving the transparency and access to legislative information is therefore an important priority. A priority for L.A. parliaments is to rationalize their internal organization structures in order to monitor the executive. The committee system should be rationalized as possible, and at least one legislative committee should be assigned to every agency. Social and political dialogue is necessary so legislators can effectively take into account the needs of the population in a representative manner, but this should be channeled by formal institutional mechanisms. Participative and direct democracy mechanisms should also be institutionalized. O'Donnell defines democracy by several distinctive characteristics that include clean elections, the respect of civil liberties,the respect of human rights, and a legal system that establishes a rule of law. He argues that several levels of 'democracity' (quality of democracy) can be established when comparing countries, based on the degree of fulfillment of a set of initial conditions and criteria. Moreover, he argues there is strong connection between democracy, human rights and human development, affirming that a real democratic regime fosters a sequential extension of political and social rights. This minimalist and electoral approach of democracy makes it possible to analyze the necessary pre-conditions of democracy. However, from a more qualitative perspective, it does not answer the question of whether the political institutions effectively take into consideration the needs and demands of the population. Parliaments are vital institutions of the democratic systems of the region, since they are the marketplace of demands and interests of society that are channeled, represented, negotiated and trade off, and most important, where political decisions are made. Legislatures are expected to be reactive to the needs of citizens in their function of compiling interests, creating legislation to address societal problems, overseeing the implementation of these laws and controlling the government. Parliamentary effectiveness is therefore an essential aspect of the quality of democracy, since parliaments are the forum par excellence to translate social demands into public policy. The efficiency and stability of presidential democracies is greatly influenced by the manner in which the inherent tension between the executive and the legislature is resolved. Authoritarian governments and frequent situations of institutional deadlock have created the impression that legislatures in L.A. are irrelevant actors in the public-policy process, or even obstructionist. Critics have emphasized the relative lack of a capacity for positive action by the legislatures in the lawmaking and oversight process. The endowment of presidents with inordinate legislative powers has in some cases impaired developing the capacity of the legislature to engage itself effectively in policy making and executive oversight. Empirical research has shown that L.A. parliaments are generally constitutionally powerful and institutionally weak. Unilateral presidential measures have undermined the parliamentary institutions and their control capacity over the executive branch. Executive dominance is confirmed by every study but parliaments are still relevant actors, especially in situations of a divided government. Beyond the formal insitutional powers, central variables in explaining parliamentary effectiveness are the size of the president's contingent in parliament, the level of legislative fragmentation and the extent of party discipline. It affects the quality of the democratic system because it reduces the visibility of programmatic political parties. Low levels of parliamentary effectiveness can also be explained by a deficient internal organization structure and the lack of financial resources of parliaments to draft their own legislative proposals. No country abandoned presidential regimes in favor of parliamentarism or semi-presidencialism, but a few countries incorporated some semi-parliamentary or semi-presidential features, such as providing parliament with the power to  remove ministers, and establishing the position of chief of the cabinet being partly accountable to the legislature. However, these reforms did not solve the imbalance, overall, presidents still control the legislative agenda and have considerable budgetary powers. Apart from the necessary work on improving the technical capacity, there are some structural conditions that need to be improved to increase the quality of parliamentary oversight. These conditions have to do with the necessity to strengthen their access to independent information sources, mainly statistical information. Too often, parliaments rely on the information provided by executive agencies, but this dependence does not allow them to properly investigate and monitor the executive. The professionalization of the public sector and the limitation of its politicization are a necessity. Technical quality of the public services should prevail over political interests. An important thematic priority is the support of decentralization process. The articulation of coherent national and local development policies is an important task that legislatures have to fulfill, since they are both the  representatives. The concept of parliamentary autonomy concerns the ability of the parliament to operate free of interference from any other institutional power. Internal decision-making process in L.A. parliaments are not always democratic. The limited mechanisms for recording the votes within most parliaments makes it difficult to monitor their activity. Where technological instruments exist to record votes, they are not systematically used. Improving the transparency and access to legislative information is therefore an important priority. In many cases, systemized institutional information is not available. Therefore  the importance of modernizing communication technologies used by parliaments to increase transparency and exchange of information. A close look at Western democracies could reveal that the challenges that their parliaments face are in fact very similar to L.A. parliaments. Therefore, exchanges between parliamentarians of regions could be mutually beneficial.