NGO Watch®

Amnesty Shifts Global Policies on Abortion, Drug Control

July 13, 2018

Delegates to Amnesty International’s recent Global Assembly in Warsaw updated the activist organization’s positions on abortion and drug control, aiming to promote government policies that “guarantee access to safe and legal abortion in a broad way” and to end “heavy-handed criminalisation” in the enforcement of drug laws.
NGO: UN Compact Must Reduce Detention of Migrant Families

July 13, 2018

Amnesty International has published a press release calling on world leaders negotiating a Global Compact on Migration at the UN to agree a “zero-tolerance” approach toward detention of child migrants and a legal presumption against the detention of families on immigration-related grounds.
NGO Blames Creditors for Social, Economic Rights Impacts in Greece

July 12, 2018

An article from Amnesty International warns that creditors, including eurozone countries, have “side-lined Greece’s economic and social rights obligations” in imposing conditions on loans to the country and calls for them to perform a human rights impact assessment in the case of any future debt agreement reached with Greece.
NGO: UN Must Expand Rights Focus in Counter-terrorism Efforts

July 12, 2018

In a recent press release, Human Rights Watch laments that few of the discussions at a recent “counterterrorism week” at UN headquarters in New York explored the “core element” of human rights contained in the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, released in 2006, instead focusing on security and countering violent extremism.
NGO Seeks “International Accountability” for Israeli “War Crimes”

July 12, 2018

Human Rights Watch has praised the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) for investigating and providing “international accountability” for “war crimes” related both to Israeli forces’ opening fire on what the nongovernmental organization identifies as “demonstrators” in Gaza and to Israeli settlement activity.
NGO Council Aims to Build “Political Will” for Refugee Cooperation

July 11, 2018

The Centre for International Governance Innovation’s World Refugee Council has published a paper exploring how to mobilize “political will” in favor of accepting and protecting refugees to place pressure on national and international policymakers to cooperate on global refugee issues.
NGO Blasts El Salvador on "Reproductive Rights"

July 10, 2018

Reflecting the frustration of UN entities and nongovernmental organizations with the rejection by some countries of the "sexual and reproductive health rights" agenda, Amnesty International has published an article calling El Salvador's decision not to repeal criminal penalties on those seeking an abortion a "sickening step backwards for human rights."
Paper Calls for NHRI Promotion of UN Indigenous Declaration

July 09, 2018

A paper from the Centre for International Governance Innovation explores the "crucial role" national human rights institutions (NHRIs) should play in promoting and monitoring governments' implementation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
NGO Criticizes DC for Lack of Economic, Social "Rights"

June 27, 2018

A report from the American Friends Service Committee criticizing the District of Columbia for failing to comply with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted in 1948 shows the expansive, nontraditional view of human rights among modern NGOs that count income equality, affordable housing, and "environmental justice" among the basic rights of mankind.
NGO Investigates Opioid Guidelines as Rights Abuse

June 26, 2018

Columnist Charles Lane writes on an investigation by the nongovernmental organization Human Rights Watch regarding whether US opioid prescription guidelines violate the human right to appropriate health care, illustrating concerns that NGO activists are equating moderate health-policy choices with "deliberate human rights violations such as police brutality or torture."