In 2012, Amnesty International gathered information and conducted research on human rights abuses committed in 159 countries and territories around the world: Acts of torture, unlawful killings, forced evictions, enforced disappearances, and violence against women.
This report was presented and commented on by the local leaders of this association ° Catherine Lipsczick (Regional Manager), Colette Febvre and spokesman Jacques-Noël Bouttefeux-Leclercq in the presence of a few activists. Its reading sheds light on an unacceptable situation that deserves a collective awareness.
It would be desirable for these themes to be known to the youth, and it would be greatly appreciated if a program in this sense could be implemented, for example, with the University of Nice. Because, as Martin Luther King wrote in a letter from Birmingham jail (Alabama, USA) on April 18, 1963, “whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
Below, we present the highlights of the report as well as the situation in France, whose reading is more than instructive in many respects.
“Despite all the obstacles placed in its path, the human rights movement continues to grow and strengthen. The hope it inspires in millions of people remains a powerful force for change,” concluded Amnesty International Secretary General Salil Shetty.
Facts and figures:
112 countries tortured their citizens
101 countries repressed their people’s right to freedom of expression (36% of prisoners of conscience were detained in 57 countries)
80 countries conducted unfair trials
140 countries have abolished the death penalty in their legislation or in practice (21 countries carried out executions in 2012)
in 50 countries, security forces were responsible for unlawful killings committed in peacetime
in 36 countries, men, women, and children faced forced evictions
in 31 countries, people were victims of enforced disappearance
12 million people were stateless in 2012
15 million people are currently registered as refugees
In April 2013, 155 states voted in favor of a treaty on the arms trade at the United Nations General Assembly. Only 3 countries voted against this treaty.
The situation in France
Investigations into allegations of torture, ill-treatment, and deaths at the hands of the police remain ineffective and insufficient. (1)
Thousands of Roma were left homeless after being forcibly evicted from unauthorized camps (2)
The priority procedure for examining asylum applications still does not meet international standards (3)
