“It’s a shame that the House of Representatives has turned its back on our nation’s security and the rule of law,” said Human Rights First’s Raha Wala.  “Last year, Americans of all political persuasions were dismayed when politicians approved indefinite detention that could extend here in the United States.  Today, the House missed an opportunity to change course and realign counterterrorism policy with American values.”

The defense authorization bill will be considered in the Senate Armed Services Committee next week and is expected on the floor of the full Senate shortly thereafter.

For more information about today’s vote or to speak with Wala, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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“By taking the issue to the floor of the U.S. Congress, Representatives DeLauro, Ellison, and Granger sent a strong message to the Department of Defense that the United States will not stand for U.S. tax dollars indirectly subsidizing attacks in Syria,” said Human Rights First’s Sadia Hameed. “They were right to be outraged by the Defense Department’s nearly $1 billion contract with Rosoboronexport, a company that’s arming Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s military and enables his forces to continually carry out attacks on civilians.”

Representatives DeLauro, Ellison, and Granger sponsored a bipartisan amendment prohibiting future contracts between the Defense Department and any company arming the Assad regime. Russia remains the biggest supplier of weapons to the Assad regime, selling nearly $1 billion worth of arms in 2011. Rosoboronexport handles about 80 percent of Russia’s arms exports.

The amendment aims to prevent future no-bid contracts with companies like Rosoboronexport.  The language was approved by voice vote  as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization bill that was passed through the House yesterday.

To speak with Hameed or for more information about this amendment, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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In his remarks before the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, Dooley acknowledged that often human rights defenders find support from the U.S. government in their work.  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, as well as Assistant Secretary for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Michael Posner frequently meet with defenders and civil society leaders in their travels, which offers a degree of support and recognition of non-governmental work in repressive societies.  Pointing to positive examples of U.S. support for civil society groups and defenders, Dooley praised Ambassador Robert Ford’s work in Syria last year, as well as the role the U.S. embassy played in Uganda in opposition to the anti-homosexuality bill.

Despite these signals of support, at other times, engagement with defenders has been mixed, which often leads to ambiguity over the goal of U.S. policy.  For example in Egypt, Dooley recommended that U.S. embassy staff visit offices of civil society groups, in order to public show support for their work, or to call the families of those unjustly detained, to show that they do not stand alone against the Egyptian army.

“While U.S. leaders have now acknowledged the false choice between stability and human rights, they have yet to match policies to rhetoric,” Dooley stated.  “The administration’s recent decision in issuing a waiver to deliver unconditionally $1.3 billion of assistance to the Egyptian military despite ongoing human rights violations, including the prosecution of Egyptian human rights activists working alongside American NGO personnel who were subsequently able to leave Egypt with U.S. government assistance, has left many human rights defenders doubting the U.S. government’s stated support for human rights and consequently feeling isolated.”

Today’s hearing focused on ongoing threats to civil society groups and human rights defenders, as well as restrictive legislation placed on NGOs and the criminalization of human rights work in various countries.  While there is much the United States can do to increase its support for this work, Dooley also testified that there is lack of clarity as to what defenders can expect from the embassy.  For this reason, he reiterated support for a set of public guidelines that human rights defenders can use to engage with embassies.  Such recommendations include:

• Establish and maintain regular contact with human rights defenders – including inviting them to the U.S. Embassy and visiting them at their offices.
• Appoint liaison officers to develop and maintain relationships with human rights defenders in local communities;
• Observe trials of human rights defenders, where appropriate;
• Coordinate with other like-minded governments on their analysis and monitoring of the situation of human rights defenders, especially those at risk;
• Assist in establishing networks of human rights defenders at an international level – including facilitating meetings;
• Use the media to increase public visibility and support for human rights defenders highlighting specific cases;
• Continue to address the situation of human rights defenders in their reporting to the U.S Department of State and other parts of the U.S. Government, particularly any threats or attacks against human rights defenders;
• Inform human rights defenders of available U.S. Government programs, grants, and resources for which they can apply, and assist in the application process, as appropriate;
• Monitor/ask about technological tools used by human rights defenders, ensuring their rights to free expression and association are not violated.

“As the Arab Spring and the bold escape of Chen Guangcheng prove, human rights is an enduring goal of people everywhere, ” Dooley concluded.  “Human rights defenders looking to the United States for moral and material support are entitled to a clear and consistent message from the U.S. government, just as the U.S. diplomats working to advance human rights overseas deserve guidance on what is expected of them and what tools they can use to achieve it.”

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“DOJ’s PREA regulations should apply to all facilities holding individuals in federal custody, including immigration detainees. Unfortunately, they don’t. Instead, they permit the Department of Homeland Security to develop an entirely separate set of regulations to protect immigration detainees from sexual abuse. It’s a redundant effort and a tremendous waste of government resources,” noted Human Rights First’s Ruthie Epstein. “But we hope that DHS will move forward immediately to ensure that individuals in its custody are safe from sexual abuse by developing enforceable regulations, rather than relying on its current insufficient standards.”

The administration has consistently promised to prioritize the safety of immigration detainees – which should include protection from sexual abuse – through an ambitious reform effort announced in 2009. In 2011, Human Rights First released a report, “Jails and Jumpsuits: Transforming the U.S. Detention System – A Two-Year Review,” that was the first comprehensive assessment of the administration’s progress toward meeting its detention reform commitments. The report found that asylum seekers and other civil immigration law detainees continue to be held overwhelmingly in jails and jail-like facilities, with a full 50 percent held in actual jails. Following consultation with prison professional and other experts, the report concluded that a normalized environment – one that replicates as much as possible life on the outside – can help to ensure the safety and security of any detention facility. It also found that DHS and ICE continue to rely on detention standards modeled on correctional detention standards, and had failed to adopt sexual abuse prevention standards as required by PREA.

Human Rights First continues to urge the administration to redouble its commitment to immigration detention reform by:

• Ensuring that all facilities holding immigration detainees are covered by the PREA standards, including the supplemental immigration detention standards developed by the bipartisan federal National Prison Rape Elimination Commission, as clearly intended by Congress and the Commission it created;

• Ending the use of prisons, jails, and jail-like facilities to detain civil immigration law detainees;

• After an individualized assessment of the need to detain, using facilities that provide a more appropriate normalized environment for immigration law detainees;

• Developing and implementing new standards not modeled on corrections standards to specify conditions appropriate for civil immigration detention; and

• Creating an effective nationwide system of less costly Alternatives to Detention for those who cannot be released without additional supervision, and ensuring that cost savings are realized in the program’s expansion by reallocating part of the detention budget to an increase in the ATD budget.

For more information about today’s announcement or to speak with Epstein, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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“It reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of our military justice system to suggest that by providing terrorism suspects with Article III civilian court trials, they would be getting ‘better rights’ than our own military. Our courts-martial system under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) has a special, constitutionally recognized role in maintaining good order and discipline in the military. It is not designed for anyone other than members of the U.S. armed forces or those accompanying them in the field. The Smith-Amash amendment is a modest, bi-partisan approach to protecting constitutional values that ought to draw support from all members of Congress, including those who support our military justice system.”

For more information about the Smith-Amash amendment or to speak with Admirals Hutson or Guter, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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“LGBTI refugees are often among the most vulnerable refugees,” said Human Rights First’s Duncan Breen, author of The Road to Safety: Strengthening Protection of LGBTI Refugees in Uganda and Kenya. “After fleeing persecution in their home countries, they are sometimes attacked, threatened and face other serious risks in the nations to which they flee. The Presidential Memorandum committed the United States to implement policies that can help these refugees find safety and access basic life-saving services. This report is a roadmap for the administration to use as it works to fulfill that commitment.”

Breen, who will speak today at a Human Rights First, Council for Global Equality, and Human Rights Campaign “Equality Talks” event highlighting the report, based his findings and recommendations on in-field research that included interviews with more than 70 LGBTI refugees, UNHCR and NGO staff, government officials and other experts working with refugees or LGBTI persons. The research revealed that in Uganda and Kenya LGBTI refugees and those associated with them have been abducted, beaten and raped. Some have been forced to relocate their homes frequently in order to avoid the scrutiny and potential hostility of landlords, neighbors or other refugees who would harass, threaten or evict them if their sexual orientation or gender identity were discovered.

Based on its research, Human Rights First urges the United States to take the following steps:

• Protect LGBTI refugees from violence and assist victims of violence by supporting and encouraging the U.N. Refugee Agency (UNHCR), NGOs and others to document and report incidents of bias-motivated attacks against LGBTI refugees and provide assistance to victims as well as urge host states to protect LGBTI and other persons from bias-motivated violence.
• Develop a formal Expedited Resettlement Program or System to resettle refugees facing imminent risks of harm and urgent protection risksby dedicating specific staff to focus on expedited resettlement as their priority; expediting security checks in “emergency and “urgent” resettlement cases; providing refugee interviews and pre-screening rapidly in expedited cases; and issuing expedited resettlement guidelines for Resettlement Support Centers in each region.
• Enhance other emergency protection mechanisms by supporting scattered, safer shelter options for highly vulnerable refugees at risk and access to Emergency Transit Facilities located in other countries for LGBTI refugees facing imminent risks of harm.
• Improve general access to assistance and protection for LGBTI refugees by financially supporting and urging the U.N. Refugee Agency to prioritize improving access to protection and assistance mechanisms including:
  • Work together with local NGOs to provide protection against violence, access to support such as health care for survivors of violence, access to safe shelter, as well as durable solutions and measures to stop discrimination from preventing LGBTI refugees accessing other existing services;
  • Continue to revise and roll out key protection tools and guidance such as the Heightened Risk Identification Tool in order to identify and assist LGBTI refugees who face high risks; and issue guidance on working in countries with laws criminalizing same-sex conduct;
  • Further the development and provision of ongoing training to address negative UNHCR and NGO staff attitudes towards LGBTI refugees and support training for UNHCR staff, government officials and adjudicators on sexual orientation and gender identity as grounds for asylum; and
  • Reform registration procedures and implement measures to reach out to LGBTI refugees to inform them of how and where to seek assistance.

In addition to the report’s recommendations for the United States, it also details recommendations for other governments, UNHCR and non-governmental organizations. Those recommendations seek to protect LGBTI refugees from violence and assist victims of violence, ensure at-risk LGBTI refugees have access to safe shelter, improve access to timely resettlement and expedited resettlement and improve general access to protection for LGBTI refugees.

“Today is International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia.  We are pleased to be joining with leading LGBTI advocates to help the Administration realize in practice what it knows to be true: It’s a time for us all to recognize that no one should be discriminated against or subjected to violence because of who they are,” concluded Breen. “The steps outlined in this report take us closer to that reality.”

To speak with Breen or for more information about today’s report, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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As Prosecutor Dermott Groome describes, Mladic’s troops were “well-rehearsed in the craft of murder” at the time of Srebrenica. Human Rights First notes that this is an important reminder that mass atrocities are premeditated and systematic acts of violence that are designed and executed to unleash maximum damage and intimidation on civilian populations. They are also enabled by countries, companies and actors who provide perpetrators with the material resources- such as weapons and money- necessary to execute and sustain these crimes.

Human Rights First’s Sadia Hameed notes, “This trial will not only hold Mladic and those under his command responsible for their pre-meditated crimes in Srebrenica and Sarajevo, but it will also be a beacon for survivors of mass atrocities elsewhere. It will demonstrate that there must not be impunity granted for those who commit and enable mass atrocities and crimes against humanity.”

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In a public letter sent to Representatives today, the retired military leaders strongly endorsed the amendment, noting that it would strengthen national security and realign American policy with the Constitution.

“As retired general and flag officers, we do not make this request lightly,” wrote the retired generals and admirals.  “However, we strongly believe that sound national security policy depends on faithful adherence to the rule of law.  Though it is lawful for the military to detain those engaged in hostilities in an armed conflict, the armed forces should not supplant our law enforcement and intelligence agencies at home.”

Among those signing today’s letter are members of a non-partisan group of retired generals and admirals that works with Human Rights First. Members of the group stood behind President Obama on his second day in office when he signed the Executive Order to end torture and close CIA secret sites, and they continue to advocate for these goals, meeting with politicians across the political spectrum to educate them on these important subjects.

Last year, members of that group were engaged in the House and Senate debates that proceeded passage of a 2012 NDAA that contained a series of troubling amendments the group noted would undermine national security. In November, they wrote to an open letter to the Senate urging members to defeat an amendment that would have repealed President Obama’s Executive Order banning torture.  The measure was not included in the final bill.

“We appreciate that our leaders are constantly striving to make America more secure, but the indefinite detention and mandatory military custody provisions passed into law in the Fiscal Year 2012 NDAA will do more harm than good,” the letter concluded.  “The Smith-Amash Amendment, if passed into law, would be an important first step towards reversing this damage.”

For more information about the letter or to speak with one of the retired military leaders signing it, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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“Publicity surrounding this incident has rightly centered on the discriminatory nature of the materials,” stated Human Rights First’s Gabor Rona in the letter.  “But we are equally distressed by an aspect that has received less attention: the cavalier and ignorant dismissal of the principles and rules of distinction and proportionality reflected in the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols.  In a nation committed to equality under the rule of law, this aspect of the materials is as disturbing as their anti-Islamic nature. Military personnel are supposed to be well trained in the applicability of the law of armed conflict, even if the military cannot train away their personal prejudices. The military must also reinforce the point that law trumps any personal religious beliefs of members of the military.”

Human Rights First  asks that the investigation into the materials, led by Major General Rudesheim, address rule of law violations presented by the publications as well as their discriminatory nature.  The investigation should confirm the U.S. military’s commitment to train its personnel to comply with humanitarian law. It should identify and lead to the removal of materials and courses in which adherence to the fundamental principles and rules of international humanitarian law is questioned and assure appropriate measures of accountability for individuals who are found to be responsible.

“Particularly in light of President Obama’s assertion that we should ‘look forward not backwards’ on the issue of torture, it is imperative that the military not create yet another example of impunity in this matter,” Rona concluded.

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“This sale is completely out of step with the United States’ stated commitment to reform in Bahrain,” said Human Rights First’s Brian Dooley, who recently returned from the Kingdom and authored a new report released this week, Bahrain’s Reforms: No Backdown on Crackdown.

The arms sale – the full details of which have yet to be made public, but which supersedes a $53 million announced last year – is now to proceed despite the lack of human rights reform in Bahrain. The previous $53 million sale was halted last October when members of Congress expressed concern about rewarding the dictatorship with weapons. At that time, the State Department assured Congress that it would take into account progress of human rights reforms in Bahrain before proceeding with the sale. Dooley’s new report reveals how attacks on human rights activists are continuing and the regime’s commitment to reform is superficial at best.

“The U.S. can be in no doubt about the reality of the repression in Bahrain,” said Dooley. “Prominent human rights defenders are being harassed and jailed. Trials of medics convicted for treating injured protestors continue after tortured confessions. The police are still beating and tear gassing people. Where is the progress that warrants the reward of arms? This new sale will only damage U.S. credibility among those working for democracy in Bahrain and across the Middle East.”

To speak with Dooley about today’s sale, please contact Brenda Bowser Soder at bowsersoderb@humanrightsfirst.org or 202-370-3323.

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