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Around 500 Roma people, including around 150 children, pregnant women and older people have been left homeless after being forcibly evicted by the authorities from their settlement in municipality of Giugliano in Campania, in southern Italy, on 10 May. The Roma families have been made homeless and are living in inhuman conditions as the authorities have failed to provide them with alternative housing.
Asia Bibi is a Christian farm worker, who was sentenced to death for blasphemy in 2010. After an eight-year ordeal, Pakistan’s Supreme Court acquitted her of all charges and released her in October 2018. Following the decision by the Supreme Court to uphold her acquittal on 29 January 2019, it was confirmed by the Pakistani Foreign Office on 9 May that she had left Pakistan and safely arrived in Canada to be reunited with her family.
Rosalina Dominguez, her four sons and two members of the community of Río Blanco, Intibucá, in Honduras were threatened last 30 April and 1 May 2019. The community members are afraid that this might be the beginning of a new wave of attacks against them after previous threats for protesting the Agua Zarca Dam together with the Civic Council of Popular Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH). We urge the Minister of Human Rights to immediately guarantee the safety of Rosalina Domínguez, her family, members of Río Blanco and COPINH and to investigate any attacks against them.
Quelvin Jimenez received death threats and continues to be targeted with smear campaigns, intimidations, and surveillance due to his activities defending the rights to land and territory of the Xinca People in the context of mining activities in the South of Guatemala. Latest threats include phone calls, the presence of an armed man near his home and an attempt of intimidation while he was going to his house on 6 May. We urge the public prosecutor’s office to carry out investigation into all the attacks and provide protection for Quelvin Jimenez.
Puerto Rico authorities responded violently to demonstrations on 1 May 2018 by repressing protesters and violating their rights to freedom of expression and assembly. With more demonstrations planned, peaceful protesters are at risk of further human rights violations.
On 4 May 2019, Alia Abdelnoor Mohamed Abdelnoor, who was in the terminal stages of cancer, died while chained to a bed in the Tawam hospital in the Al-Ain Emirate, after her health deteriorated. Alia was serving a 10-year sentence on vague and unsubstantiated “terrorism” charges, and which were based on forced confessions. During her detention, Alia was subjected to enforced disappearance, solitary confinement and torture.
A judge at the Cabinda Court ordered the provisional release of 40 more protesters on 19 April. Ten other protesters remain arbitrarily detained without charge, arrested for their involvement in peaceful protests. One female is detained at Yabi prison and nine males are detained at Cabinda civil prison. Several of the protesters have alleged that police officers subjected them to ill-treatment.
On 6 May 2019, the Bahraini Court of Cassation upheld the convictions and death sentences of Ali Mohamed Hakeem al-Arab and Ahmed Issa Ahmed al-Malali. The two men were convicted of offenses which include “forming and joining a ‘terrorist’ group”, following an unfair mass trial. Both men were tortured. The death sentences will now go to the King for ratification.
On 6 May at around 6am the police raided the home of prominent human rights defender Elżbieta Podleśna, arrested her and kept her in detention for several hours. The police claimed to have found in her home copies of posters depicting the Virgin Mary with a halo around head and shoulders in the colours of the LGBTI flag and she is being investigated for “offending religious believes”, a criminal offence that carries up to two years’ imprisonment. Elżbieta Podleśna is being targeted for her human rights activism and this absurd investigation must be stopped.
The fate and whereabouts of Venezuelan opposition member of parliament Gilber Caro are unknown since 26 April 2019, when intelligence officers took him at a restaurant in Caracas, according to reports. Gilber Caro was arbitrarily detained from January 2017 until June 2018, under unfounded accusations of treason and stealing military equipment. His detention and disappearance in April 2019 is arbitrary since it reverses the freedom he was granted in June under political motives. We call on the Director of the Bolivian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN) to swiftly provide information on Gilber Caro’s fate and whereabouts and to release him immediately.