100 posts
Censorship, surveillance and ACTA in European Parliament
IT exports for web censorship, Internet surveillance and other trade matters will be discussed in the European Parliament. Thursday, 8 February 2012, the Committee on International Trade (INTA) of the European Parliament arranges a workshop on Intern...
Twitter to add age rating to Profile – VP Kroes rated +18
Following their controversial announcement about local censorship in order to comply with national legislation, Twitter have decided to go one step further by giving an age rating to profiles. Though the initiative is only at pilot stage, the roll ou...
EFD Rights Watch: Turkey, the country with most convictions at the European Court of Human Rights in 2011
Country with the most Convictions: Turkey from Bianet :: English The majority of judgements delivered by the European Court of Human Rights in 2011 concerned Turkey. Most of these decisions were related to violations of the right to a fair trial and...
The Council of Europe: UK Diplomatic and Parliamentary Excellence
Sam Kelly, political officer at the UK Delegation in Strasbourg, reports on a busy week for post which included a visit by the Prime Minister to argue the UK’s case for reforming the European Court of Human Rights: Reform of the European Court of H...
A European Public Health Care
When I read news like this:#Greek doctor on current situation in Greek hospitals:'jobs get done,only due to basic good will in some,to help people.Nothing really works— Nina-Maria Potts (@NinaMariaPotts) January 27, 2012... I always wonder why we c...
Blogging from Davos – I meet Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary-General of the Council of Europe
On Wednesday I promised to keep you updated on my meeting today in Davos with Mr Thorbjørn Jagland, the Secretary-General of the Council of Europe. As I expected, it was a very fruitful meeting. We discussed the developments regarding media freedom...
A striking coincidence for Monday’s EU summit
Monday’s meeting of EU leaders is meant to focus on growth and jobs, which makes it all the more ironic that it will likely be heavily disrupted by a general strike called by Belgian unions on the same day. The …Continue reading: "A striking...
The Court's Annual Report 2011
Today, at the opening of the judicial year in Strasbourg, the Annual Report and an overview of facts and figures for 2011 were presented. This includes a table of violations (by country). It reveals that the top five of countries against which judgme...
Human Rights Court under fire
For many British politicians and for much of the UK press, the European Court of Human Rights is the very embodiment of foreign meddling in British life. Two particular findings of the Court have stirred passions in Britain: a 2005 ruling that anyone...
Human Rights Court under fire
For many British politicians and for much of the UK press, the European Court of Human Rights is the very embodiment of foreign meddling in British life. Two particular findings of the Court have stirred passions in Britain: a 2005 ruling that anyone...
Human rights: Cameron's message to Europe | Francesca Klug
The European court of human rights is not all David Cameron has his sights onTory backbenchers hoping for sabre-rattling by David Cameron at Strasbourg on Wednesday, when he delivered his speech on reform of the European court of human rights, will h...
Latest developments on media freedom in Hungary
I am on my way to the World Economic Forum in Davos where I will present my plans for setting up the European Cloud Partnership – but more on that in the coming days. I first wanted to share the latest news with you regarding the situation of media...
David Cameron’s stance on the European Court of Human Rights would make Winston Churchill turn in his grave
In what seems like a follow-up to his stupidly short-sighted refusal to join all 26 other EU leaders in signing up to treaty change at the summit in Brussels on 9 December last year, David Cameron is again displaying his … Continue reading U...
PACE Resolution on Authority and Effectiveness of ECHR
Yesterday, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) adopted the report 'Guaranteeing the authority and effectiveness of the European Convention on Human Rights', on which I earlier blogged here in November. The accompanying resoluti...
Femen: ‘come, get topless and win’
How does one imagine a feminist movement? Traditionally feminist movements have been about campaigning for reproductive rights, equal pay, women’s suffrage, protesting to increase awareness of sexual harassment, domestic violence and many other iss...
Making the European Court of Human Rights work better
This week is a big week for the UK in Strasbourg. We are 11 weeks into our 6 month Chairmanship of the Council of Europe. We are pressing ahead with our wide-ranging Chairmanship priorities, in particular our ambitious package of reforms for the Euro...
Human rights violations continue in China
China´s communist government continues its shameful crackdown on human rights in 2012:The Chinese government recently sentenced three prominent activists to lengthy prison sentences, confirming that human rights standards in the count...
No, we don't need to lose an other brilliant woman, open letter to Ms.Wallis
Dear Ms.Wallis,I know, there a lot of brilliant and skillful women on this planet in general and in Europe in particular. Nevertheless something happens that we lose them by the way, without any apparent reason. Well, I am not talking about stat...
Articles in EHRLR
Three issues of the European Human Rights Law Review of 2011 (on which issues I did not yet report) include a number of articles on the European Convention on Human Rights. Here is an overview. In issue 3:* Sophie Briant, Dialogue, diplomacy and defi...
What has the ECtHR done for the UK lately?
A detailed report, written by veteran Parliamentary legal researcher Robert Broardhurst, and commissioned by a group of backbench Conservative MPs including Chris Heaton-Harris MP and Andrea Leadsom MP, has called for action on the European Court of...
Door Gevaarlijke Gekken Omringd III
The world has gone mad once again. In a 6-1 ruling, the second chamber of the European Court for Human Rights held yesterday that the 1994-2009 garbage collection mess in Campania, Italy was a violation of citizens' rights under art. 8 ECHR. I can se...
New Academic ECHR Publications
At the start of the new year a very wide range of articles and publications on the European Convention and the European Court (see the overview below). A very good year to all readers!* Yonatan Lupu and Erik Voeten, 'Precedent in International Courts...
A MedTech map for bypassing market-access roadblocks
Medical device manufacturers routinely design products that, even a few short years ago, were the stuff of science fiction. And letâs not even mention the amazing research underway today that will animate tomorrowâs medical products, from T...
"Let’s Mobilize for Prosperity!" by David Lizoain
Clement Attlee’s Labour Party established the NHS in a country devastated by war. Leon Blum’s Popular Front government managed to institute the 40-hour week and paid holidays during the Great...
Honeyball’s New Year Round Up
Welcome back and happy New Year to you all. Having a little break gave me some time to reflect on the news, both the headlines and those stories that get buried for one reason and another. As the Christmas hype … Continue reading →...
Amnesty International Report: Year of Rebellion – The State of Human Rights in the Middle East and North Africa
Amnesty International this morning released a report entitled “Year of Rebellion – The State of Human Rights in the Middle East and North Africa” focusing on the events of 2011 in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Bahrain, and Iraq. Additi...
In Belarus, the freedom of the internet is at stake | Mike Harris
Europe's last dictatorship is clamping down on online activism, with a new law effectively requiring everyone to be a state spyAs of this morning, the internet in Belarus got smaller. A draconian new law is in force that allows the authorities to pro...
Human Rights in the Context of Changes in the World Order
In the end of the year people tend to reflect on the passed year. I chose to reflect the main ideas expressed by me at a lecture about human rights that I read to my students on the 18th of November 2011 at the University of Tartu which lecture partl...
Indignados camp out in Rome during Xmas
ITALY Indignados camped out since November in central Rome remain for Xmas. Although some have left to be with friends and family, 20 tents remain a short distance from the Terme di Caracalla. The ‘Indignati’ include youths and middle age...
Amnesty International – is discrimination against some victims apparent?
Amnesty International (AI) mission statement: “to undertake research and action focused on preventing and ending grave abuses of the rights to physical and mental integrity, freedom of conscience and expression, and freedom from discrimination&...
in the mean time, deputy PM, under whose government thousands of Kurdish activists are imprisoned, vows more rights for Kurds… A politics roundup…
Deputy PM vows more rights for Turkey’s Kurds from Hurriyet Daily News Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç promises more rights to the country’s citizens of Kurdish origin in a speech… Journalists detained in KCK raids Police detai...
Op-Ed on European Court
Emma Bonino (member of the Italian Senate and former European commissioner) and James Goldston (executive director of Open Society Justice Initiative) have added their voices to the debate about the European Court of Human Rights. In an Op-Ed publish...
Murat Eliboz, latest victim of Turkish State’s assault against Kurds… EFD Rights Watch
Murat Eliboz, 21, a university student and survivor of Van earthquake has been shot dead behind by police forces at the pro Kurdish BDP rally in Diyarbakır…. No news in English or an image of Murat Eliboz, I could find… May his soul rest...
Anders Breivik: cold and calculating, yes – but insane? | Simon Baron-Cohen
Breivik probably has a pyschopath's lack of affective empathy. But that alone cannot explain his terrible crueltyWe can all remember where we were when we heard that Anders Breivik had gone to a summer camp on Utoya island in Norway, dressed as...
Shortlist for new Council of Europe Human Rights Commissioner announced
Strasbourg, 25.11.2011 - The Council of Europe Committee of Ministers has submitted a shortlist of three candidates for the post of Council of Europe Human Rights Commissioner to the Organisation’s Parliamentary Assembly. The candidates are:- Pi...
Is it any wonder that the people of Europe hold Eurocrats in contempt
This self serving rubbish is what gets up people's noses.Letter to the College from the Commission Staff.Subject: The new Staff RegulationsWe, the co-workers of the European Commission, are deeply worried by the risk of reducing the dynamic of the Eu...
Comment is free readers on … long working hours | the people's panel
The people's panel: The working time directive, which restricts our job hours, may be reviewed. Readers share their thoughts on working long hoursRob, posts on Cif as OneInTen I'm fortunate enough to work at a company where working more than the pres...
Victory for the anti-EU campaign: UK to relax working time directive
A victory for the anti-EU campaign; the Guardian reports: “Britain looks set to be able to relax the EU’s controversial working time directive after David Cameron agreed a framework for negotiations with the German chancellor, Angela Mer...
Missing the target: The Commission and TUC respond to our report on EU social policy
This is a long post, but for anyone with an interest in growth and jobs, labour market laws, and/or the repatriation of certain EU powers, we recommend you bear with us. Following the publication of our report, "Repatriating EU social policy: the bes...
"Industrial Policy and Employees’ Participation" by Klaus Mehrens
Long-term sectoral economic development seems to follow a stable pattern: For most industrialised economies the dominant share of agricultural production begins declining early on until it reaches...
In His Very Own Saintly Words, Part II
"The Negro is indolent and lazy, and spends his money on frivolities, whereas the European is forward-looking, organized and intelligent."- Ernesto "Che" Guevara,erudite toleration promoter...
The truth about China
By Matthew (Workers Liberty website) A top Chinese government official has blamed Europe’s economic problems on welfare provision and labour laws. Jin Liqun, chair of China’s sovereign wealth fund (the body which manages the Chinese governme...
Fighting fascism in the XXI century
The human kind should never forget the suffering and pain associated with national socialism. From the numerous atrocities to the deep scars in the memories of many, the results of national socialism should never be overlooked. Condemnation of those...
More Europe Manifesto proposes fiscal and social harmonisation
A group of Spanish eurobloggers has launched an appeal for More Europe, in order to overcome the crises in the eurozone and the wider European Union. You can read and sign the appeal on the More Europe blog. You can participate in the Twitter discuss...
Guest Post on British ECHR Reform Plans
I am very happy to welcome another guest post of Ed Bates of the University of Southampton. This time it relates to the reform plans for the Court of the current British chairmanship of the Council of Europe: British plans for reform of the European...
Amnesty International and the White Tweeter's Burden
Want to free all humankind from bondage and usher in a new era of global liberty? There's an app for that. At least, according to Amnesty International there is. In a new advertising campaign, flagged up today in Ad Week magazine, Amnesty tells us we...
Women Given a Poor Deal by the Banks
Evidence has come to light today that women are being discriminated against by banks. The report, entitled ‘Women and Banks: Are Female Customers Facing Discrimination?’, by Noreena Hertz, looks at several cases where banks have discrim...
Paper on Draft EU to ECHR Accession Agreement
Three researchers, Xavier Groussot, Tobias Lock, and Laurent Pech, have published a commentary on the draft agreement on the Accession of the EU to the European Convention on Human Rights. The commentary is available as a policy paper on the website...
BBC Radio Four: Britain and the Human Rights Act
The Human Rights Act 1998, which transposes the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law, is controversal in British politics: the Liberal Democrats and Labour are for the HRA, while the Conservatives are against. The Conservatives want to bri...
"Back to the future": Privatisation as a solution to problems
"The world bank recommended liquidation or divestiture of state assets in twenty five of the thirty eight structural adjustment loans it made to developing countries between 1980 and 1986….and increased market orientation of state firms in thirty s...
The Daphne Programme is at risk
I was disappointed and incredibly concerned to hear that the Daphne Programme is once again at risk of being withdrawn. Daphne is one of the key tools in preventing violence against women at the European Level. I have talked about the … Cont...
S.H. and Others v Austria: margin of appreciation and IVF
In Austria, it is forbidden to use donated sperm or ova for in vitro fertilization (‘IVF’). Ovum donation is under all circumstances prohibited; sperm donation is only possible when the sperm is directly placed in the womb of a woman (in vivo art...
Book on ECHR and Fundamental Rights Interpretation
Yesterday, I attended the successful PhD defence of Hanneke Senden, a former colleague of mine (congratulations once again, Hanneke!), at Leiden University. Her book deals with the different principles and methods of fundamental rights interpretation...
Misogynistic abuse of female bloggers
On Blogging, Threats, and Silence Cross-posted from Tiger Beatdown Content note: This post includes excerpts of threats and abusive language. I got my first rape threat as a blogger when I was on Blogspot, so new that I still had the default theme up...
