Paraguay Human Rights
Human Rights Concerns
Excessive use of police and military force, impunity, poor prison conditions, and violence against women continue to be key concerns. Conflicts over land, both agricultural and urban, often lead to excessive use of force. The Truth and Justice Commission is investigating past violations of human rights, but impunity for past and current abuses and an illegal delay in compensation for past abuses remain problems. Prisons continue to be sites of new abuses, and the vast majority of prisoners have never been convicted of any crime. Domestic violence is widespread. Thousands of children work in the streets, and women and children are vulnerable to trafficking and other forms of abuse. Judicial protection for vulnerable populations is limited.
Paraguay Dignity Campaign Launches March 31
Amnesty International launched its Dignity Campaign "We're Only Asking For What Is Ours" Indigenous Peoples In Paraguay Yakye Axa and Sawhoyamaxa on March 31 in an encounter at the National Congress in Asunción. (Go to http://livewire.amnesty.org/category/paraguay/ for blogs on LiveWire.) Amnesty International activists joined indigenous people from some 30 communities to deliver 3,175 signatures on petitions collected from around the world calling on the Paraguayan government to abide by separate rulings in 2005 and 2006 by the Inter-American Court on Human Rights to grant land, free of charge, to the Enxet communities of Yakye Axa and Sawhoyamaxa. Both communities currently live on the roadside in deplorable conditions near the ancestral lands they seek.
International Day of the Disappeared, August 30
The Truth and Justice Commission (http://www.verdadyjusticia.gov.py/) is scheduled to release its final report on August 28, 2008, after five years of hearing testimony and conducting research on the abuses committed by the state during the regime of Alfredo Stroessner (1954-1989) and in the period of transition to democracy to 2002. The report is expected to significantly increase the known number of “disappeared” during the Stroessner dictatorship.
Paraguay is signatory to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, but has yet to ratify Convention. State parties to the Convention are required to investigate acts of enforced disappearance and bring those responsible to justice. The Truth and Justice Commission report would obligate Paraguay to begin prosecutions of those involved in enforced disappearances in the past, once the Convention is ratified by Paraguay and comes into force internationally.
Latest News
Indigenous teacher missing in Brazil after violence over ancestral landsNovember 13, 2009
Paraguay indigenous community threatened by illegal eviction and pesticide attack
November 10, 2009
Paraguayan indigenous families left homeless after bill rejected
October 16, 2009
Paraguayan Congress leaves 90 indigenous families homeless
October 16, 2009
Paraguayuan Congress risks lives of 90 indigenous families
June 28, 2009
Paraguay's Indigenous Peoples in peril
March 31, 2009
Latest Reports
Paraguay: "We're Only Asking For What Is Ours"March 31, 2009
Paraguay: Dignity action postcard 4 - for the World Social Forum
January 27, 2009
Paraguay: Support The Yakye Axa Indigenous Community In Paraguay To Recover Its Ancestral Land
January 27, 2009
Paraguay: Dignity action postcard 1 - for the World Social Forum
January 27, 2009
