The UK government signed the Istanbul Convention eight years ago, but has not yet ratified it. Using the government’s own reports on progress towards ratification, the post explains key areas in which the government is still not compliant with the Convention. The forthcoming Domestic Abuse Bill should bring the UK into compliance with Article 44, which relates to extra-territorial jurisdiction. However, the issue of support for migrant women leaves the UK still in non-compl

The article focuses on the significance of the judgement in light of the present day position of the LGBTQ community in the US. it discusses the main issues for consideration before the court, the reasoning applied by the court in giving this decision and the relevance of dissenting opinions

The 1.7 million homeless people in India have been disproportionately affected during the COVID-19 pandemic. The reported lack of emergency relief provisions for shelter, food, water, sanitation, and essential medical services have led to heightened social insecurity as well as the corrosion of the fundamental human right to safe and adequate housing. There has been transgression by the Indian government of domestic judicial rulings and International Human Rights obligation

Article 14 requires that all of the rights and freedoms must be protected and applied without discrimination. Lockdown has contributed to increased reporting of domestic abuse, mental health disorders, and limited access to relevant services. The state has not introduced sufficient safeguards to protect individuals with mental health disorders or women to escape an indirect discrimination infringement of Article 14.

On Thursday 11th June, Trump ordered to sanction the International Criminal Court (ICC)-an independent adjudicating body, almost two months after the Court decided to probe in the alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Afghanistan after the US troops entered the land in 2003. Established in 1998, after the Yugoslavian and Rwandan crisis, it started functioning after the Rome Statute (a multilateral treaty) came into force in 2002. Almost a year after 9/11

The policy of banning pregnant girls and adolescent mothers from schooling, or from returning to schools even after pregnancy in Tanzania finds place in the Education (Expulsion and Exclusion of Pupils from Schools) Regulations, 2002; and has continued since 1961. In addition to the ban, it entails the imposition of intrusive, routinely forced pregnancy testing on girls to continue with disciplinary actions and expulsions, putting an end to their education.

COVID19 cost a lot of people, a lot of things except their fundamental human rights. Urbane citizens have had no telling crises for the procurement of grain and food, rather India has seen a surge in tendencies to overstock rations in middle-class and upper-class households. India, in stark contrast has seen the migrant workers’ human rights in the blues. Grim scenes of apathetic conditions, lack of basic resources and no shelter have been etched in the conscience of a grievi

In 1918, the Spanish Flu infected nearly 500 million people. The Governments of the world took restrictive actions to contain the spread of the highly infectious disease resulting in the containment of the virus within two years. Now, 100 years later, we see similar trends emerging with the outbreak of COVID-19. The Coronavirus, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-Cov-2), was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization on March 11th,

In a chilling exemplification of a repressive regime, Egyptian security forces under President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi have been accused of arbitrarily arresting and torturing children aged as young as 12. A report documented by Human Rights Watch (HRW) underscores that prosecutors and judges have exacerbated these abuses through due process violations and unfair trials. The unnerving account details the use of varied modus operandi for torture. To enlist a few: seven children w

The internet shutdown imposed in the erstwhile state of Jammu & Kashmir on 5th August, 2019, which entered its 200th day beginning this March, is now officially the longest shutdown imposed in any democracy all over the world. It was enforced after the Parliament read down Article 370 of the Constitution of India, which previously granted autonomy to the state. While the Government of India staunchly believes that the blockade is necessary to curb unrest, it has led to grave

On August 5, 2019 the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, imposed Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure in Kashmir, suspending and imposing a blanket ban on mobile, broadband internet, cable TV services citing “maintenance of law and order” issues. This was followed by the abrogation of Article 370 that granted special status to the state of Jammu and Kashmir. The state suspended the internet in the valley for almost six months until the Supreme Court ruling in Anuradha B

Amidst the chaos of last month’s cabinet reshuffle, claims of the new Attorney General’s membership in a ‘Buddhist cult’ particularly caught the public eye. Yet this is far from the most problematic characteristic of Suella Braverman MP, a former barrister and Queens’ College graduate. Braverman has made some notable interventions in legal debates in recent months, particularly a conveniently timed Conservative Home article criticising a ‘chronic and steady encroachment by th

Z I Khan Panna v Bangladesh (‘Case’) is a landmark judgment in Bangladesh, wherein the Supreme Court interpreted the indemnity clause in the Constitution in a progressive and harmonious manner. This case relates to the infamous ‘Operation Clean Heart’ ordered by the then Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) – Jamaat alliance led government, during the period between October 2002 to January 2003, with a view to allegedly end countrywide violent crimes.

The “Q&A with…” series aims to tell the stories of practitioners in human rights and justice-related advocacy. Helen (Law, Pembroke College) was the Lead Convenor of the conference “The Development of Abortion Rights in a Changing Europe”, held in the Law Faculty in September 2018 and supported by the Cambridge University Centre for Law, Medicine and Life Sciences, and the Cambridge Centre for Public Law. Outside of Cambridge, she is the UK ambassador and Global Advisor for

As the clocks ticked forward into the new decade, UN officials could be forgiven for feeling burdened by the goals targeted in the upcoming years. Few human rights goals have been as ambitious as that to end statelessness by 2024, with 12 million people remaining without a legal nationality. Whilst instability in the Middle East and climate threats in the Sahel have been by now ‘factored in,’ it is in South Asia where such efforts appearing to be irrevocably floundering.

India is a nation fuelled by its belief in God. Many gap year students have ‘found themselves’ amongst the temples, mosques and churches that litter its every street – the land of Gandhian pacifism and so-called secularism. It is ironic then that every year, thousands of people shed blood in the name of religious violence. This violence finds its rhetoric in the concept of ‘religious rights’ and its victims mostly in minority religious groups.

A 19 year old British girl has been convicted of public mischief in the Famagusta District Court in Cyprus for allegedly falsely accusing 12 Israeli tourists of raping her.[1] The judge made this decision on the basis of a retracted criminal complaint, which she says she signed at the police station without receiving legal advice and after police intimidation. The UK Foreign Office has raised fair trial concerns, while domestic and international human rights groups have widel

In the wake of the horrific deaths of 39 Vietnamese nationals whose bodies were found in a lorry in Essex in October and the human trafficking charges pressed on the suspects, it is timely to consider the legal responses to human trafficking. Whilst trafficking has clearly been established as a crime domestically (s.2, Modern Slavery Act 2015) and internationally (UN Palermo Protocol, within the Organized Crime Convention), the human rights framework for human trafficking is

When representatives of the Yemeni government and the Houthi rebels agreed to a UN-brokered ceasefire for the port city of Hodeidah on 13 December, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres lauded the efforts as ‘real progress towards future talks to end the conflict.

Although it is all too easy to believe that slavery ended with the success of the abolitionist movement up to 200 years ago, a flurry of news stories in recent weeks has brought the issue of modern day slavery to our attention. Significant coverage stemmed from the high-profile Rooney case, where a UK family was convicted of numerous counts of modern slavery offences. This was swiftly followed by the first review of the UK legislation in a Backbench Business Committee debate