Latest news with #UNSpecialProcedures
The Independent
13 hours ago
- Politics
- The Independent
As a former judge, I used to defend Britain's rights – mine are now at risk
Before being a judge, I represented a rape victim who was deaf and unable to speak. She was so badly traumatised that, in a cry for help, she took a kitchen knife out in public and tried to kill herself. She was arrested and brought to court. She did not get bail. The probation officer – before even meeting me – told me she had decided to oppose bail. A cruel pre-judgment: custody would immediately end her job and change her life. Law has no feeling; it embodied the passive-aggression of society to disabled people and women: it processed her, like meat for dogs. Two weeks ago, the UN Special Procedures group – 19 specialists in fields including freedom of peaceful assembly and association, freedom of opinion and expression, and violence against women and girls – issued a statement of human rights concern about the UK, towards transsexual and other trans people. It came in response to the infamous, deeply confused decision of the UK Supreme Court in April in For Women Scotland, where trans people and the vast bulk of women and lesbians were not heard. We were judged by a court packed with non-trans pressure groups, and human rights were scarcely mentioned. In my opinion, the Supreme Court's decision forced on women the notion that they are inescapably defined by biology, presumably basic urges and wandering wombs, for sexual relationships, free association and equal rights. It reversed more than 20 years of peaceful co-existence between the trans community and others. The UK is beyond crisis: the economy is down, inflation is up; electricity and gas are unaffordable. Violence against women is up. Men are discarded, angry. Such a country becomes vulnerable to extremism and minority-blaming. In 2021, European parliament research revealed how foreign actors use media to stir LGBT+ hate. It is in Russia's interest to damage our social fabric, rendering us dysfunctional and divided, as there is evidence it did, too, with Brexit. This LGBT+ emergency is ripping apart tolerant British values. It follows the rise of the Gender Critical Ideology Movement (GCIM). I need not go into suggestions that GCIM is sometimes used as cover for people seeking LGBT+ conversion practices – or that some groups oppose banning conversion therapy towards trans people. Let us note, however, that GCIM did not seem to exist until around 2016, when UK-US movements arose preaching traditional sex roles. Let me concentrate on the immediate UK human crisis. The government ruled that people like me, previously legally female and (still!) having female anatomy, at risk of assault as with all women, must henceforth change in men's changing rooms, use men's loos in pubs and be excluded from female rape services. Despite my female birth certificate, I am apparently a 'man'. The EHRC followed suit. The police confirmed that people who are (or seem to be, one assumes) 'trans' shall be strip searched only by men, anatomy be damned. Such sexual assault of 'unfeminine' women may now be the law on the ground. Women with mastectomies are confronted, accused of 'transness'. Trans people not 'out' at work face disclosure of pariah status. Non-feminine women are confronted by other women in loos. A database has been proposed to enforce segregation. A fund has been created support civil legal enforcement of the new 'sex-based' rights. Wes Streeting, the health secretary, wants to segregate trans people in hospitals. Bridget Phillipson, our equalities minister, is MIA. I formed the Trans Exile Network for those leaving the UK now. Heterosexual families with kids, where, say, the husband is trans, have been re-designated as 'lesbian' because the court redefined 'lesbians' as well as 'women'. Nobody asked them, of course – unlike the 2004 Act, which was with national consent and consultation. Trans people are now two sexes at once: one for equalities law (I am now unable to claim equal pay rights as a woman) and one for everything else. Nobody at the top cares: it is 'clarification', says Keir Starmer, ignorantly. Now the GCIM want this rolled out across Europe. Next stop: Ireland. I've been contacted by suicidal people and the parents of kids who have been denied medical treatment. Parents fear for the future of their kids: if not helped now, they face forced puberty against their medical best interests and a harder life. Puberty delaying hormones are reversible and have been used upwards of 20 years to 'buy time' until kids are adults and can make decisions. The court must have assumed that the EHRC is neutral. More fool the court. But the biggest victim is our country – which I served as a judge for more than 18 years – and truth and humanity in public life.
Scoop
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Scoop
‘Assault On Children': UN Experts Condemn Renewed Attacks On UNRWA Schools In Gaza And East Jerusalem
Press Release – UN Special Procedures – Human Rights These attacks are also an assault on the right to safe education and a blatant violation of international law, all the more in the context of an unlawful occupation, the experts says. Geneva, 20 May 2025 Attacks on schools are an assault on children, UN experts said today, condemning the latest attacks on UNRWA schools in Gaza and the storming and forcible closure of UN schools in Jerusalem by Israeli occupation forces. 'These attacks are also an assault on the right to safe education and a blatant violation of international law, all the more in the context of an unlawful occupation,' the experts said. On 7 May, Israeli forces reportedly struck an UNRWA school sheltering 2,000 displaced Palestinians in Gaza twice in a single day, killing at least 30 civilians, including women and children. Nearly three-quarters of all school buildings in Gaza have been directly hit since October 2023, with around one third of UNRWA schools among them. According to UN satellite-based assessments, 95 per cent of Gaza's schools have sustained damage, rendering the vast majority unusable. 'This destruction demonstrates the devastating, lasting impact on a generation of Palestinian children's learning,' the experts said. Their learning has already been cut-off for more than 19 months and once hostilities cease, they will have no schools to return to. Girls are disproportionately affected by such actions and the long-term consequences for girls' education, health, and empowerment are especially dire. In addition, leaving all the children exposed to armed eviction with irreversible trauma, that takes years of mental and psychosocial support and is inaccessible to them. At least 300 UN personnel, mostly UNRWA aid workers, have been killed since the escalation began in October 2023. In East Jerusalem, on 8 May, heavily armed Israeli forces stormed three UNRWA schools in Shu'fat refugee camp while classes were in session, violently evicting over 550 Palestinian children, some as young as six, from their classrooms. One UNRWA staff member was detained, and by the end of the day all six UNRWA schools in East Jerusalem had been evacuated. 'Israel has no authority to carry out these actions, when the International Court of Justice has determined that Israel is under an obligation to dismantle its occupation,' the experts said. 'In the meantime, it is bound by international humanitarian law, which protects schools against direct attacks, especially as there were no hostilities in the area that would justify an evacuation.' 'As the schools stormed were UN premises, the harassment of staff and forcible removal of children from schools by Israeli soldiers also constitute a breach of the inviolability of UN facilities and violate the right to education,' they said. 'Targeted attacks against civilians and civilian objects are strictly prohibited under international humanitarian law and constitute war crimes. In the current context, such actions may also amount to collective punishment.' The experts emphasised that Israel's obligation to end its occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, is mandatory under international law, rooted in non-derogable norms like the right to self-determination and the ban on acquiring territory by force. Israel is required to withdraw its troops, dismantle its settlements, provide full reparations to Palestinian victims and facilitate the return of displaced people and humanitarian aid and rehabilitation. 'As a UN Member State, Israel must respect international humanitarian and human rights law,' the experts said. 'Education is never a target. The international community must act to ensure respect and protection of the right to life and to education of Palestinian children living under occupation and accountability for violations.'
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
UN slams 'adult crime, adult time' expansion
International human rights experts have slammed one state, accusing its government of causing undue harm to children as it bolsters controversial youth crime laws. The Queensland government is set to add 20 more offences to its landmark "adult crime, adult time" laws, meaning children will face lengthy sentences for committing a raft of crimes. New offences include sexual assault and rape, attempt to murder, kidnapping, arson and attempted robbery. UN experts are concerned about state & territory youth justice systems in #Australia, where disproportionately large numbers of #indigenous children continue to be jailed: "The first goal should always be keeping children out of prison". — UN Special Procedures (@UN_SPExperts) May 19, 2025 The Liberal National government quickly passed the laws central to its 2024 election win to ensure children as young as 10 serve a life sentence for murder and manslaughter, while prison time for offences like grievous bodily harm doubled. The decision to expand the laws came in the wake of several serious crimes, including a teenager who was charged with attempted murder following the alleged stabbing attack on a supermarket worker in Ipswich. The "adult crime, adult time" laws have previously been slammed by youth advocates who say the scheme breaches the human rights of children. But the state government has again earned the ire of international human rights experts who say the laws disproportionately impact Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. "Children are suffering undue harm to their safety and well-being, as well as to their educational and life prospects as a result of short-sighted approaches to youth criminality and detention," the United Nations' Alice Jill Edwards and Albert K Barume said. The UN has previously criticised the Queensland government for its controversial laws. Chair of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, Ann Skelton, posted a video before the laws were passed in December, saying they were a "flagrant disregard" for children's human rights. Now the two UN human rights experts have written a letter to Australian authorities expressing concerns about the expansion of Queensland's "adult crime, adult time" laws. They said the amended laws would harm the lives of Aboriginal children and urged members of the state parliament to vote against the bill. "The first goal should always be keeping children out of prison," the experts said. "We are extremely concerned that present approaches are creating a future underclass of Australians." Queensland parliament is set to continue debating the amended laws which are expected to pass late on Wednesday. It is not the only state pursuing tough youth crime laws after Victoria recently passed an amendment to bail laws that included removing the principle of remand as a last resort for children. In NSW, controversial youth bail laws passed in 2024 make it harder for 14 to 18-year-olds to be released on serious charges while out on bail for similar offences. Bail laws in the Northern Territory were strengthened after a teenager was charged following a 71-year-old Darwin store owner's fatal stabbing. The UN experts said Australia may be violating its international obligations to children with Queensland's harsh criminal laws and the country's criminal age of responsibility, which is 10 in the Sunshine State and the Northern Territory and 14 in other states.
