Pakistan is once again engulfed in a summer of protests, facing significant social upheaval with ongoing anti-state demonstrations in many areas [...]

The state's response to the current unrest combines longstanding repressive tactics with new approaches [that seem to be] heavily influenced by its subservient and dependent relationship with Beijing. The Pakistani security agencies have adopted new repressive methods to suppress domestic dissent, especially in Balochistan and KPK, areas where Pakistan has upheld a quasi-imperial political structure since the mid-20th century [...]

Pakistan's tactics closely resemble China's longstanding approach to suppressing social unrest, political resistance, and minority groups. Beijing is a symbol of extending authoritarianism into the digital realm through mechanisms such as the 'Great Firewall' and the 'Great Digital Wall of China'.

The Chinese government has created one of the most restrictive media environments worldwide, implementing stringent censorship "to control information in the news, online, and on social media".

Additionally, it has established numerous concentration camps in Xinjiang for the ethno-religious Uyghur Muslim minority. These camps, termed "re-education camps" by the state, hold millions of Uyghurs.

The Chinese government also compels Uyghur women to marry Han Chinese men as part of its effort to suppress this ethnically and religiously distinct minority, which it views as a challenge to its homogenization agenda.

Similarly, cultural assimilation tactics have been employed against Tibetan Buddhists to integrate them into the dominant Han Chinese culture.

Drawing from China's methods to suppress minorities and stifle political dissent, Pakistan's military-dominated establishment [...] has recently sanctioned the creation of a national digital firewall.

This firewall, sourced from China, effectively grants the Pakistani state the authority to regulate social media platforms and restrict citizen access to crucial socio-political sites like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok [which] allows government agencies to trace individual IP addresses, which Pakistani officials label as primary sources of ongoing "anti-state propaganda" [...]

In addition to implementing a nationwide digital firewall, the Pakistani government has also pledged to regulate the use of virtual private networks (VPNs) within the country [...]

This scenario highlights how Pakistan is adopting the repressive tactics of the Chinese state, using them to target Baloch and Pashtun communities, and rendering their struggle invisible while continuing to suppress their calls for an end to ongoing state abuses.

Written by Kevin Sheives, Deputy Director of the International Forum for Democratic Studies at the National Endowment for Democracy, and Caitlin Dearing Scott, Director for Countering Foreign Authoritarian Influence at the International Republican Institute.

Beijing’s effort to undermine core democratic values and practices spans the globe and includes: a school in Tanzania where the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] trains members of African political parties; the muzzling of newspaper editors and journalists in Canada, South Africa, and Malaysia; secret pay-to-play deals for PRC-sponsored infrastructure and media projects in Ecuador, Sri Lanka, and the Solomon Islands; the manipulation of university life in Germany, New Zealand, and the United States to limit criticism of the CCP regime and push “positive” views of China; and the use of CCP-affiliated media concerns and business groups to support pro-Beijing political candidates in Australia, Taiwan, and the United States [...]

In this campaign [of the CCP], civil society and the broader nongovernmental sector has come under attack. To eliminate any opposition to CCP rule under Xi Jinping, the CCP has conducted a sustained assault on China’s own civil society. As the world saw in the A4 protest movement in November 2022, a single spark could ignite the underlying frustration that so many Chinese citizens face when denied their basic freedoms. At home, the CCP is bent on curbing social unrest by coopting or targeting civil society [...]

In South Asia, it financed an academic culture that lauded the Belt and Road Initiative and used fear of lost scholarships to make South Asian students in China avoid “controversial” topics. In Kenya, journalists have said that their reporting on a PRC-built railway brought their publications warnings of ad boycotts by PRC-based companies. And among Chinese dissidents abroad or even foreign citizens of Chinese heritage, Freedom House paints a picture of “the most sophisticated, global, and comprehensive campaign of transnational repression in the world.” [...]

In an era when public trust in government and other key institutions has declined, civil society can also speak locally and credibly. Civic organizations’ proximity to their constituents is a key component of their local legitimacy, which can make them effective at countering PRC narratives [...]

Advocacy and other civil society activities can also be particularly sensitive to the will of citizens. One Peruvian environmental-advocacy group exposed the negative impact of a PRC company on Amazonian and indigenous areas, activating Peruvian policymakers and even the PRC embassy to address these community vulnerabilities. In Ghana, a consortium of journalists, researchers, and activists exposed Chinese companies’ illegal mining activity. The revelations not only sparked new policy platforms for Ghanaian political parties, but the continued public pressure on Ghanaian law enforcement led to the prosecution of a Chinese national. A Sri Lankan media organization secured greater transparency and access to information for the public by holding public dialogues and conducting investigations of PRC infrastructure projects in the country [...]

The sprawling, full-spectrum influence and engagement campaign that the Chinese Communist party-state is waging around the world requires an equally comprehensive response from civil societies, governments, and economic actors that back democracy. Yet civil societies must not wait for governments to act. In this escalating contest of values across democratic societies, the CCP is clearly not waiting either.

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Summary

The International Court of Justice has found that Israel’s policies and practices in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, violate international law. The Court determined that Israel’s actions, such as its settlement policy, acts of annexation, and discriminatory legislation and measures, constitute a breach of international law, including the prohibition on the use of force and the non-acquisition of territory by force. Israel’s presence in the territory is deemed unlawful, and the Court has called for an end to settlement activities, evacuation of settlers, reparations for damages caused, and non-recognition of the illegal situation by states and international organizations.

Key Insights

• The International Court of Justice has determined that Israel’s presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, violates international law.
• Israel’s settlement policy, acts of annexation, discriminatory legislation, and measures were found to be in breach of international law.
• The Court has called for an end to settlement activities, evacuation of settlers, reparations for damages, and non-recognition of the illegal situation.
• The General Assembly and Security Council of the United Nations are tasked with considering further action to end Israel’s presence in the territory.
• The Court emphasizes the importance of achieving a just and lasting peace in the region for the benefit of all parties involved.

Frequently Asked Questions

Question

What actions were deemed unlawful by the International Court of Justice in the Occupied Palestinian Territory?

Answer

The Court found Israel’s settlement policy, acts of annexation, discriminatory legislation, and measures to be in violation of international law.

Question

What measures did the Court call for to address Israel’s presence in the territory?

Answer

The Court called for an end to settlement activities, evacuation of settlers, reparations for damages caused, and non-recognition of the illegal situation.

Question

Which international organizations are obligated not to recognize the illegal situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory? Answer All states and international organizations are obligated not to recognize the illegal situation in the territory.

Question

What role do the General Assembly and Security Council of the United Nations play in addressing Israel’s presence in the territory?

Answer

The General Assembly and Security Council are tasked with considering further action to end Israel’s presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

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In a historic ruling the International Court of Justice has found multiple and serious international law violations by Israel towards Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including, for the first time, finding Israel responsible for apartheid. The court has placed responsibility with all states and the United Nations to end these violations of international law. The ruling should be yet another wake up call for the United States to end its egregious policy of defending Israel’s oppression of Palestinians and prompt a thorough reassessment in other countries as well.

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Decarbonization of the energy, transportation and industrial sectors by 2050 is a formidable challenge, and getting there will require significant use of nuclear power. But whether nuclear power figures into a country’s future energy mix or not, rigorous planning is needed to determine the clean energy composition that will work best depending on country-specific factors.

The publication, entitled ‘From Knowledge to Action: IAEA Toolkit for Sustainable Energy Planning’, was presented during a side event held on the margins of a meeting of the G20’s Energy Transitions Working Group in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.

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This publication contains the "Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework", which were developed by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises. The Special Representative annexed the Guiding Principles to his final report to the Human Rights Council (A/HRC/17/31), which also includes an introduction to the Guiding Principles and an overview of the process that led to their development.

The Human Rights Council endorsed the Guiding Principles in its resolution 17/4 of 16 June 2011.

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We know too little about Black lives in rural and small-town New England, and the places Black residents were able to carve out for themselves in these communities. With this project, we hoped to uncover names, details of their lives, and some small sense of how people of color survived in the Connecticut River Valley before and after the abolition of slavery in Massachusetts in 1783. At the kickoff event for the project, UMass Amherst professor Gretchen Holbrook Gerzina mentioned challenging the assumptions of others (sometimes called Gatekeepers) who “might be quick to discourage a researcher interested in Black History, reporting that they don’t have much…or not thinking about ways that records of white families might be useful to this research” Gerzina remarked that researchers, curators, and librarians should ”start from the perspective of presence.”

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Now, I won’t claim that this system is perfect. Human nature being what it is, I expect power groups will form which might not agree with who else is guaranteed. This is where the fediseer being FOSS helps. If there’s a core disagreement between big groups of fediverse projects about who should be guaranteed in the first place, I expect other Fediseers to spawn with their own Chains of Trust which are more or less strict than other. An instance could very well be registered to multiple Overseers and thus be part of different whitelists. I am perfectly aware that I will not be able to satisfy everyone limits but I hope to provide a tool that can!

The main point here is to create the system which can start building Chains of Trust, which have a manual human control but are easy to adjust as the environment changes.

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According to Reuters, he is accusing the company of discrimination, wrongful termination and showing a pattern of bias against Palestinians. Hamad said he noted procedural irregularities on how the company handled restrictions on content from Palestinian Instagram personalities, which prevented them from appearing in feeds and searches.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/16422026

Not a surprise but man

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Credible Web Community Group

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Why would you want to delegate moderation:

Temporarily, while looking for new mods and admins. When an instance is under attack by trolls and the like, ask extra help When there is a large influx of new users

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The field of social development has seen three major approaches to dealing with problems:

the Charity Model

the Needs-Based Approach

the Rights-Based Approach

For half a century, developing nations were arguing at the United Nations sessions for the need to recognize the right to development as a human right. With a growing globalization process and several political changes around the world, and with increasing pressure from developing nations, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Right to Development.

“The right to development is an inalienable human right by virtue of which every human person and all peoples are entitled to participate in, contribute to, and enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development, in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realised.”

This declaration gave a strong boost to the Rights-Based Approach to development and marked a new era in social development.

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Federated Moderation: Towards Delegated Moderation?

What would an ideal fediverse organization do?

Fediverse, NetCommons and the blueprint for P2P society?

RIPE NCC Community Fund 2023

United Software Development: A new paradigm?

Federated Moderation: Towards Delegated Moderation?

EC - NGI0 Liaison -- Webinars and Workshop April 2021

Important: We need Your Input on the Future of the SocialHub

Hospitality exchange community considers moving to the fediverse ;)

Proposal: New top-level forum section for Domains

Working and thinking on "native" #openweb aproches to governance

Organizing for SocialHub Community Empowerment

RIPE NCC Community Fund 2023

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I see no reason why, after the Fediverse has found a solid moral ground, it shouldn’t put this up to the test against Meta and try to win over some terretory with it. Actually, it seems like the most sensible thing to do. Because we want to bring these digital rights to as many people as possible, and for that, we need to partially federate with Meta.

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This question is particularly relevant for non-profits working in the field of human rights – especially those who are familiar with the problems inherent in Facebook’s attention-based business model.

In other words, doing human rights advocacy through Facebook could be a case of “one step forward, two steps back”: Though awareness and even impact may be achieved on a particular progressive front, it comes at the cost of all the economic, social, and political problems associated with surveillance capitalism.

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A Victorian children’s court granted permanent stay of the case, and Magistrate Lesley Fleming made damning findings against police.

In the decision, Fleming found law enforcement used “the guise of a rehabilitation service to entice the parents of a troubled child to engage in a process that resulted in potential harm to the child.”

“The community would not expect law enforcement officers to encourage a 13-14 year old child towards racial hatred, distrust of police and violent extremism, encouraging the child’s fixation on ISIS,” Fleming said.

Fleming also found police had purposefully delayed charging Thomas until he turned 14, which would make it more difficult to use the doli incapax defence, which states children under a certain age cannot be held criminal responsible for their actions.

The AFP officer responsible for signing off on the operation, Deputy Commissioner McCartney, told Senate estimates he would do it again.

McCartney defended the operation on the grounds that the de-escalation techniques employed by Victoria Police’s Countering Violent Extremism team weren’t “being effective”.

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In terms of human rights, social media platforms have a huge impact on how an individual may express, search for, and encounter information. Individuals may be subjected to discrimination through or by the platforms, or have their personal data and privacy restricted. However, as private companies they are not bound by human rights law, unless human rights standards are translated into national regulation. Such translation has happened in many areas of life—workers’ rights, protection of children, environmental protection, protection of journalists and press freedom, for example—but there is still no regulation that stipulates the role and responsibility of tech giants that have reached such a size and volume that their impact on individual speech, public debate, discrimination, and privacy may in many contexts be more significant than that of the state itself.

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Great question.

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Earlier this month, the 47 member states of the United Nations Human Rights Council passed a landmark Resolution (A/HRC/20/L.13) to include the “promotion, protection, and enjoyment of human rights on the Internet.” The Resolution, which was presented by Sweden, was backed by more than 70 countries in all, both members and non-members of the HRC.

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"Our findings suggest age verification is generally supported, but participants think it likely would not work. Instead, they said more safety education, face-to-face dialogue, and accountability from social media companies would be better approaches to keeping young people safe online."

It will stop migrants who cross unlawfully from receiving asylum, but only takes effect when the southern border has been "overwhelmed"

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