Oleksandra Matvitxuk (Kiv, 1983) is a Ukrainian lawyer and one of the most prominent voices in the defense of human rights in Eastern Europe. She leads the Center for Civil Liberties, a key organization in documenting war crimes committed by Russia. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022, she has become an international figure in the fight against impunity. She visited Barcelona at the invitation of CIDOB.

In its latest report, Human Rights Watch issues an unprecedented warning: for the first time, the United States is considered a threat to human rights, on par with China and Russia. The organization paints a picture in which the disinterest of traditional powers and the rise of personalistic leadership have left civil society more vulnerable than ever. We discussed this and other findings of the report with Federico Borello, the organization's program director.

The news that the Milan prosecutor's office is investigating the involvement of Italian citizens in a form of [unspecified activity] has caused consternation. macabre tourism in the besieged city of Sarajevo —during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, between 1992 and 1996—exposed by an investigation by the writer and journalist Ezio Gavazzeni. Wealthy, far-right individuals They paid fortunes To go and act as snipers in Sarajevo and have fun shooting with impunity, from a window or rooftop, at civilians passing through the streets. Like shooting clay pigeons or rubber ducks, but with precision weapons and with human targets, paid a certain price per kill. Women and children were more expensive. Obviously, the Public Prosecutor's Office is investigating the Italian citizens involved in this atrocity, but there were people of many nationalities involved. There were hundreds. Sarajevo was, in those years, a city besieged by the troops of Serbian General Radovan Karadzic, convicted years later for crimes against humanity.

If peace education has roots and a long history anywhere, it's in Catalonia. Historically, education professionals have been one of the most committed groups to international cooperation, both as field workers and in our country. Evidence of this is the work carried out in schools during the conflicts in Bosnia and Iraq, which connects with the work currently being done in Palestine.

Donald Trump's arrival at the White House has had devastating effects on human rights and freedoms around the world, according to Amnesty International's (AI) annual report, which warns of an acceleration of the repressive drift. The report, published Tuesday, which analyzes the state of human rights in more than 150 countries around the world, points out that Trump's emergence on the international scene has generated impunity among world leaders., has fueled authoritarian tendencies and has emptied international safeguards of content. "Year after year, we have warned of the danger of human rights regression. But the events of the last twelve months—especially The genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, broadcast live but ignored—have highlighted how hellish the world can be for so many people when the most powerful states ignore international law and dispense with multilateral institutions,” warns Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International. Callamard believes that Trump has shown “absolute contempt for human rights” in his first 100 days in office. we are in the midst of a historic transition that has been brewing for some time. The current situation is the consequence of “systematic, deliberate and targeted” decisions taken over the past ten years, which are now converging into nothing less than “an epochal change.”

The arrival of Donald Trump to the White House has had devastating effects on human rights and freedoms around the world, according to Amnesty International's (AI) annual report, which warns of an acceleration of the repressive drift. "He is wasting decades of painstaking work to build and promote universal human rights," the organization laments.

With the drama in Afghanistan, the refugees issue has returned to the headlines. And perhaps it is time to remember that, with their gradual arrival, and in a changing context, the member states of the European Union have been applying integration policies with unequal results in which one can see a large gap between what the law says and what is applied afterwards. This is, in fact, the main conclusion of the latest NIEM (National Integration Evaluation Mechanism) report, a European project developed by think tanks in several countries that evaluates integration systems for refugees. Despite the fact that the 14 EU countries analysed have legal frameworks comparable to international standards in terms of the protection of migrants and refugees' rights, administrative barriers and the lack of resources, coordination and actions tailored to the needs of this group make it impossible for them to exercise the rights recognised by law. The gap between the legal framework and integration policies is especially marked in key areas such as housing. The Spanish and Greek cases are paradigmatic in this sense. Let's take a look at it.

These days I take the opportunity to hang some pictures and I am thankful that my flat is not a town hall because I would not find any suitable corner to hang the portrait of King Felipe VI. Nothing is Bourbon to me, at home. I have placed, and prominently, the couple of the Queen of England and Angela Merkel in a magnificent image smiling at Windsor Castle, on the farewell tour that the chancellor is beginning to make. It is a question of taste and contradictions. As we can still choose our private decoration for the time being, I make the most of the freedom, like when I'm scrubbing a jar of Nutella. Let's be free up to the bottom of the jar, because it's getting rough.

"We get up at five in the morning and we have to make the bed, it has to be perfect. Then you do the ceremony of raising the flag and the oath. Then you go to the canteen to have breakfast and go to class. Then lunch and back to class. Then dinner. And another class. Then to bed. Every night two people have to be on duty for two hours [watching the rest of the classmates]. There's not a minute for you. It's exhausting". This is the story of a Uighur woman in one of the "re-education" camps, as the Chinese government defines these internment centers for the Uighur Muslim minority. In fact, all the journeys the woman describes to class or to the canteen are escorted by armed guards, who apply physical punishments if they disobey or if they speak in their language instead of Mandarin Chinese. This woman was detained and taken to the internment camp because she was found to have downloaded the WhatsApp application on her mobile phone.

Although the Spanish government had insisted that there were no minors among the migrants returned immediately at the border of Morocco with Ceuta, the Public Prosecutor's Office has opened an investigation following the complaint of the Fundació Arrels for the case of a 16-year-old boy who swam -helped by a float made of bottles- to the beach of the autonomous city and shortly after the police accompanied him to the border to expel him. Spanish law and international law prohibit the expulsion of minors because they are part of a group with special protection that cannot be left without guardianship and, for this reason, when they arrive in a country it is the public administrations that take charge of them while their family is not located. Although the proceedings are being opened as a result of a specific case, the Public Prosecutor's Office has clarified that if other expulsions can be documented, they will also be investigated.

Melilla has experienced the fourth consecutive night of migratory pressure on its border perimeter, the first with the Spanish army deployed to reinforce surveillance and control, reports Efe. Unlike the last two nights, in which attempts to enter could be thwarted, this Thursday night part of those who have managed to approach the border perimeter at different points have been able to access the city. There is no official data on how many people have participated, but the Home Affairs Minister, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, has mentioned that around thirty have succeeded. Marlaska has assured that all of them will be "located" and "returned" to Morocco.

There is concern among NGOs about whether vaccination will be given to groups that do not have a health card (TSI), the tool that gives access to the vaccine against covid. For months, organizations that defend the rights of vulnerable groups excluded from the municipal rolls - migrants in an irregular situation, those living on the street or without a fixed address - demand to know if the Department of Health plans to offer an exceptional way to administer the doses, because although -in theory- health has a universal coverage, in practice it is not the case. The Secretary of Public Health, Josep Maria Argimon, has assured this Tuesday that "a priori" there will be "no problem", but has ignored that by law there are still groups of population outside the public coverage, and has remarked that his team is already in talks with city councils, which is the administration that has the duty to register anyone living in the municipality, regardless of the type of housing and administrative status. There are many councils that do not do so, but the Generalitat's Office of Civil and Political Rights insists that the Catalan vaccination programme is linked to the IST.