News in 2020
Former visiting fellow Johncation Muhindo receives funding to support human rights work in Uganda
Posted on Friday 18 December 2020
Human rights defender (HRD) Johncation Muhindo, CAHR visiting fellow 2018-2019, was recently awarded two funding bids for his organization Creations Forum Afrika to conduct human rights work in Uganda.
Blog Symposium on Norm-Compliance in Armed Conflict: New Avenues to Generate Respect for Humanitarian Norms
Posted on Monday 2 November 2020
As violations of international humanitarian law and human rights in times of armed conflict persist, generating respect for international law in conflict settings is at the top of humanitarian practitioners' agenda and at the heart of legal scholarship. This blog symposium responds to the necessity to reflect on novel avenues of compliance generation and aims to showcase innovative thinking in this field.
Egyptian human rights defender Mohamed El-Baqer spends one year in pre-trial detention
Posted on Tuesday 13 October 2020
The Centre for Applied Human Rights expresses its continued concern for Egyptian human rights defender Mohamed El-Baqer, who has spent a year in inhumane conditions in pre-trial detention at maximum security wing 2 of Tora Prison in Cairo, Egypt, where he is placed at high risk in the context of Covid-19.
Chevening Masters funding opportunity for Postgraduate taught overseas applicants to CAHR
Posted on Thursday 24 September 2020
We are excited to announce that York has recently signed a new Partnership agreement with Chevening.
CAHR and FGHR webinar on human rights defender security, protection and civic space in the time of COVID-19
Posted on Monday 7 September 2020
On 12 August 2020, CAHR and the Fund for Global Human Rights (FGHR) organised a webinar for human rights funders on the impact of Covid-19 on the work and security of HRDs. Speakers included four human rights defenders (HRDs) from CAHR’s Protective Fellowship Scheme for HRDs at Risk 2019/20 cohort. They came from Brazil, Niger, Nigeria and an Asian country.
York Human Rights City
Posted on Friday 5 June 2020
The York Human Rights City Network joins with others in our city who have expressed anger and distress at the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota on 25 May 2020. Racism is a de-humanising virus which is embedded in UK society, just as it is in the USA. It is a scourge which undermines the principles of the dignity and equality inherent in all human beings which underpin the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Former CAHR fellow HRD Ruth Mumbi threatened with death in Kenya
Posted on Wednesday 3 June 2020
The Centre for Applied Human Rights is concerned to hear that Kenyan human rights defender (HRD) Ruth Mumbi, CAHR visiting fellow in 2014/15, has been threatened with ‘disappearance’ after taking action against forced evictions in the Kariobangi informal settlement of Nairobi in early May.
Forced repatriation of migrant workers amid Covid-19
Posted on Friday 29 May 2020
The Covid-19 pandemic has brought an unprecedented toll on the economies across the globe. Like others, the Gulf states, such as Bahrain, Kuwait, KSA, Oman, Qatar and the UAE are also in strain as businesses and services have been shut down, oil price is plummeting, and tourism has come to a halt. As much as the globe is going to experience an apocalyptic economic downturn, a foreseeable 'migration crisis' is going to expose the long-standing vulnerability of 25 million migrants, stationed in the Gulf labour markets.
Safeguarding Rights and Wellbeing of Migrant Workers
Posted on Friday 29 May 2020
Ours is a country that profoundly depends on overseas employment to attain its economic progress. A look at the policy framework will suggest this impression. For instance, the ‘Seventh Five Year Plan (2016-2020)’ has seen overseas employment as an integral component of the development trajectory. Data shows that at least around one-third of the country’s new labour force take overseas employment each year- which has become a ‘safety valve’ for millions of Bangladeshi migrant workers and their families.
Systematic Police Brutality and Killings: an update from Kenya
Posted on Tuesday 19 May 2020
In a report from Kenya, Gacheke Gachihi asks if the state is fighting Covid-19 or the poor? He writes that since the curfew was enforced across the country the police continue to systematically brutalise and terrorise people living in informal settlements. Introducing a film on state violence and Covid-19 in Kenya, Gacheke argues the poor must demand the right to healthcare, water and livelihood enshrined in the country’s constitution.
CAHR Protective Fellowship Scheme call for nominations re-opened: Deadline 17 June
Posted on Wednesday 6 May 2020
The Centre for Applied Human Rights at the University of York launched a new Call for Nominations for the Protective Fellowship Scheme for Human Rights Defenders at Risk in February 2010. Due to the global Covid-19 pandemic and the changes it has brought to our operations at the University of York, we are re-opening the call and extending the deadline to 17 June 2020.
Campaigners issue human rights plea for York during coronavirus pandemic
Posted on Wednesday 6 May 2020
HUMAN rights matter more than ever during the coronavirus crisis, campaigners say. York Human Rights City Network says attention to human rights is crucial in three areas - protecting vulnerable groups and challenging discrimination, balancing priorities when difficult decisions have to be made and ensuring transparency and openness in government.
CAHR offers two scholarships for 2020/21
Posted on Monday 27 April 2020
Have you applied to study with us at the Centre for Applied Human Rights in the academic year 2020/21 and hold a conditional or unconditional offer?
Criminalisation of CAHR Human Rights Defender Ali Idrissa
Posted on Monday 20 April 2020
The Centre for Applied Human Rights (CAHR) is concerned to hear that its former fellow, Mr Ali Idrissa, is currently being criminalised in Niger as a result of his activism against corruption.
How to lobby your government to re-open the border and let you home during Covid-19
Posted on Monday 20 April 2020
CAHR’s Protective Fellowship Scheme for human rights defenders (HRDs) at risk normally runs from September to the end of March. In 2020, the fellowship was cut short due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the impact of which was starting to be felt in the UK in the middle of March. Instead of undertaking a scheduled advocacy and networking visit to London, the HRDs needed to return home on an expedited schedule – in most cases racing to book onto increasingly sold out flights in order to reach home before the borders closed. It was a time that showed how HRDs, even when they know they are returning to risky and outright dangerous situations, want to be working in their communities, particularly at a time when they know they are needed more urgently than ever.
York Human Rights City - COVID-19
Posted on Friday 17 April 2020
York Human Rights City Network plans to respond to the recently announced invitation to submit evidence to the Joint Committee on Human Rights Inquiry into the impact of the Government’s COVID-19 legislation.
Equality for Everyone
Posted on Thursday 16 April 2020
A group of four CAHR students, Louise Sloan, Tom Beetles, Mir Ali and Rebecca Byard, collaborated with the North Yorkshire Police on a research project aimed at identifying causes of under reporting of hate crime in the Selby district in North Yorkshire.
Art + Activism against repression during the COVID-19 crisis
Posted on Tuesday 14 April 2020
The Centre for Applied Human Rights (CAHR), through a grant from the Open Society Foundations, has set up a fund – Arctivists – to support activists and artists across the world responding to the outbreak of Covid-19 and its implications for human rights defenders, activism, and shrinking civic and political space. Paired activists and artists are able to apply for up to £3,000; it is envisaged that most grants will be for between £1,000 and £2,000.
White Rose Doctoral Training Partnership - York Studentship
Posted on Monday 17 February 2020
The Centre for Applied Human Rights at the University of York and the School of Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Leeds are pleased to offer one PhD studentship (UK / EU tuition fees + stipend at UK research council rates), funded by the White Rose Doctoral Training Partnership ESRC Network Awards, which is available to UK and EU applicants only.
Development Alternatives Research
Posted on Wednesday 22 January 2020
Pushing Back: Supporting Human Rights Defenders and Social Movements in Contexts of Shrinking Civic and Democratic Space.