I am trying to survive in Gaza with my children under extremely harsh conditions. The cold is unbearable, and we are living in torn tents that offer no protection from wind or rain. For more than a month now, the donations we’ve received have been very limited and not enough to cover even our most basic daily needs. My children are suffering the most — from hunger, cold, and constant fear. The prices of food and basic necessities have become insanely high. Even bread and clean water are difficult to obtain. Any donation, no matter how small, can help me provide food, blankets, and essential supplies for my children. Please consider donating and sharing our story — your solidarity truly makes a difference. Donation link: https://gofund.me/8e758692

Exactly a year ago today, I was abducted from a Zurich street by plainclothes police, bundled into an unmarked car and taken to prison.

I was walking with one of my hosts toward a venue where I was scheduled to speak at an event organized by Swiss activists about Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

During my detention, Swiss intelligence officers tried to question me without my lawyer present – an apparent attempt, I told Swiss academic Pascal Lottaz in a recent interview, to manufacture grounds for my arrest retroactively.

After three days in detention, I was handcuffed, caged in a police van, taken to the airport and expelled.

The operation achieved its purpose: preventing me from participating in public events about Israel’s crimes. But it failed to intimidate or silence me.

In December, Zurich’s Administrative Court ruled that my detention violated both the Swiss constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights.

I have filed additional cases, including a criminal complaint against Nicoletta della Valle, the Israel-linked police official later identified by a parliamentary investigation as having ordered the action against me.

As I told Lottaz, what happened to me is not exceptional. It is part of a widening campaign across the so-called West to silence journalists, students and activists who expose Israel’s crimes or advocate for Palestinian rights.

Among the most shocking cases is that of Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman and the last person still held in US federal detention in connection with protests at Columbia University.

On 13 March last year, Kordia attended what she believed was a routine, voluntary check-in at ICE headquarters in New Jersey.

Instead, she was transported to a detention facility in Texas, 1,500 miles away from her home, her mother and her brother with special needs who relied on her support.

🌙 In a place where safety is fragile, we take life one day at a time, trying to protect our children’s hope despite the hardship.

Any form of support, no matter how small, truly matters. Even sharing helps.

🔗 https://gofund.me/1d3ea05b6

Hello everyone,

We created and are developing an archive to document, archive, and expose the crimes of ICE.

It is on https://crimesofice.org/

TOR link: http://ice7fl7ycodmekhrch5wkclblrbbpjctvdniikzs5gfatnk6pgseilqd.onion/

Unfortunately, our abilities to find different videos and documents of ICE on the internet are still limited. We are a small team.

If you want join our team to help us find more material and show the crimes of ICE to the whole world, let us know :)

SimpleX Chat:

https://smp17.simplex.im/a#6B-MiQ-P7nUt5-xsf3iIfh6H-VS_LWBZoId9VqK4GMU

Matrix: @cardboardenjoyer:unredacted.org

Mail: basedbatman@airmail.cc

I am trying to survive in Gaza with my children under extremely harsh conditions. The cold is unbearable, and we are living in torn tents that offer no protection from wind or rain. For more than a month now, the donations we’ve received have been very limited and not enough to cover even our most basic daily needs. My children are suffering the most — from hunger, cold, and constant fear. The prices of food and basic necessities have become insanely high. Even bread and clean water are difficult to obtain. Any donation, no matter how small, can help me provide food, blankets, and essential supplies for my children. Please consider donating and sharing our story — your solidarity truly makes a difference. Donation link: https://gofund.me/8e758692

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/49395941

Archived

Here is the full report: “Save Our Mother Tongue”: Online Repression and Erasure of Mongolian Culture in China

The Chinese government is waging a systematic campaign to erase Mongolian language, music, and culture online, using surveillance and intimidation of activists, platform shutdowns, and content removal to silence users and digital spaces where Mongolian identity once thrived, PEN America and the Southern Mongolian Human Rights Information Center said in new report, released today.

“Save Our Mother Tongue”: Online Repression and Erasure of Mongolian Culture in China, documents how vibrant digital spaces that once enabled Mongolians to communicate in their own language, share their music and literature, and organize peaceful protests, have been dismantled. Based on 20 in-depth interviews, including with Mongolians in exile and some who recently left China, digital research, and public records, the report shows how the rapid growth of Mongolian-language internet use in the early 2000s triggered a wave of digital crackdowns. These crackdowns intensified after protests erupted in 2020 over a new policy imposing Mandarin Chinese as the language of instruction.

“This is not just about censorship – it is about erasing Mongolian culture and identity and leaving Mongolian people living in China isolated from their own identity,” said Erika Nguyen, senior manager at the PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Center at PEN America and co-author of the report.

“The Chinese government has made basic acts many of us take for granted, like speaking your language, listening to your music and participating in digital community spaces, not only almost impossible but something that is actively dangerous. This is also a chilling glimpse at what will happen if tech companies continue to give governments unfettered control over what can and cannot be available online.”

A new policy in 2020 that replaced Mongolian with Mandarin Chinese across all subjects in schools sparked protests that swept the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. This led to a swift and brutal suppression from the government during which 8,000 – 10,000 Mongolians were placed in police custody. This real-world repression was followed by an escalating crackdown on online posts protesting the policy. More than half of interviewees for this research, all of whom now live outside of the region, were banned from WeChat, a widely used mobile app in China, because they took part in the protests online and in real life.

A Mongolian who left the region after the protest explained, “I participated in the protests in Inner Mongolia in 2020, driven by my deep concern for the preservation of our language and culture. The atmosphere was charged with hope, but that quickly turned to fear as the government cracked down on dissent. …they implemented widespread censorship, shut down social media, and silenced anyone who dared to speak out.”

Following the protests, the Chinese government paid particular attention to suppressing the use of the Mongolian language: nearly 89% of the 169 cultural websites written in Mongolian – a vertical, left-to-right writing system unsupported by most digital platforms – reviewed by PEN America have been shut down, converted to Mandarin-only access or stripped of content related to Mongolian life and culture, including discussions of Chinggis Khan. Mongolian words, songs, and historical references are routinely censored or labeled “separatist.”

The report found that other ongoing attempts to eradicate the Mongolian language, expression, and community include: arresting and forcing “re-education” on Mongolian activists and educators who posted online; using digital platforms for forced “confessions” to publicly discipline and intimidate Mongolians; restricting language-specific messaging apps that were designed and coded to support Mongolian script; shutting down chat forums and online meeting spaces where people wrote in Mongolian and discuss Mongolian language and culture; and removing Mongolian music from music apps.

“To express ourselves online – that would mean telling our stories on our terms, in our own voice,” said one exiled Mongolian activist interviewed for the report. “It would mean Mongolian words, poems, and music thriving – not hidden in encrypted chats, not erased by algorithm or policy, not punishable. It would mean Mongolian children seeing their language in pixels as well as textbooks, feeling seen, alive, and proud.”

[...]

“Imagine waking up one day and not being allowed to communicate with your parents, grandparents, or siblings in a language they understand,” said Enghebatu Togochog, director of the Southern Mongolian Human Rights Information Center. “That is what has happened to Mongolian people living in China. Online cultural communities are not just nice to have but an essential part of allowing people to fully enjoy their cultural rights – that is what the Chinese government is taking away and what we must urgently fight to protect.”

These violations against Mongolian people are reflective of a wider crackdown by the Chinese government designed to stamp out any minority language and culture in the region, including Mongolian, Tibetan, and Uyghur.

[...]

The report concluded that governments, multilateral institutions, tech companies, cultural institutions, and donors must act collectively to hold the Chinese government accountable for violations of the cultural, linguistic, digital, and free expression rights of ethnic minorities. They must press for the release of detained Mongolians, the repeal of laws and practices that suppress minority identity and speech, support Mongolian cultural initiatives, and provide protection and support to Mongolians in exile at risk of transnational repression.

At the same time, the research found, China continues to publicly display a “sanitized” or touristic version of Mongolian culture through foreign influencers and international media in order to be able to claim to international audiences that it is supportive of Mongolians’ cultural rights.

“The Chinese government is willing to go to great lengths to tout the type of Mongolian culture it deems acceptable to an international audience while actively undermining Mongolians’ rights to determine and develop their own culture,” said Nguyen.

I am trying to survive in Gaza with my children under extremely harsh conditions. The cold is unbearable, and we are living in torn tents that offer no protection from wind or rain. For more than a month now, the donations we’ve received have been very limited and not enough to cover even our most basic daily needs. My children are suffering the most — from hunger, cold, and constant fear. The prices of food and basic necessities have become insanely high. Even bread and clean water are difficult to obtain. Any donation, no matter how small, can help me provide food, blankets, and essential supplies for my children. Please consider donating and sharing our story — your solidarity truly makes a difference. Donation link: https://gofund.me/8e758692

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/49097095

Archived

Kevin Slaten, research lead for the China Dissent Monitor (CDM), explains how the CDM team uncovers dissent activity in China, what this information tells us about economic, social, and political trends there, and why understanding dissent and protest in China is important for people living outside.

[...]

Slaten: CDM is currently the only public database of protest events in China. We have collected and analyzed nearly 14,000 such events since June 2022.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has for many years systematically censored information about protests in China’s media and internet, and it has arrested citizens who attempted to centralize this information into a database [...] Understanding patterns related to the frequency, topics, and locations of dissent provides insight into how China’s economic slowdown affects ordinary people, the efficacy of government policies, and public dissatisfaction with the conduct of government and other officials—as well as systemic injustices and potentially even regime stability.

[...]

The CDM team races every day to document protest activity on China’s social media sites before it is deleted. Depending on the topic and size of the event—and whether it goes viral—some posts may disappear in minutes. Online censorship makes this sort of documentation difficult. Searches for dissent-related terms don’t turn up many results, and protest posts are often restricted, for example.

[...]

Additionally, dissent by some social groups, such as ethnic and religious minorities or activists, is not well represented on Chinese social media because these groups face especially stringent restrictions like closer surveillance by state security.

[...]

Chinese citizens often have some understanding that protests happen, having seen them in internet posts or heard anecdotes through their social networks. But, they may not know the real prevalence or distribution of protests, including in their own cities, much less other regions. This can contribute to the perception that protest is an abnormal or illegitimate way to seek justice, a narrative that the CCP promotes and benefits from.

[...]

More generally, protest events across China have been increasing in the last year, according to CDM’s database. This upward trend is primarily associated with economic grievances, particularly protests by workers, home buyers, and other consumers or investors.

[...]

A lot of the things that prompt dissent in China—from widespread labor rights violations to repression of ethnic minority groups—reflect consequences of the CCP systematically restricting rights like free expression and free association. We can already see the influence of this system expanding beyond China’s borders. For example, the CCP manipulates media in other countries and is the world’s worst perpetrator of transnational repression, when governments reach across borders to intimidate or attack exiles they perceive as a threat. Chinese companies import poor labor practices into the foreign countries where they work. This puts pressure on American companies to compete by lowering their labor standards. Thus CCP abuses can undermine people’s rights everywhere, including in the United States.

[...]

Accurate information about developments in China is increasingly difficult to find as the CCP has restricted access to economic and social data, in addition to suppressing public criticism through its sprawling censorship apparatus. CDM is an alternative source of information which, by documenting protest actions, sheds light on the state of China’s economic, social, and political developments at the grassroots level.

[...]

The CDM is now back online thanks to a tranche of short-term funding. However, without further support, policymakers, businesses, investors, researchers, and others could once again lose access to this uniquely valuable public resource that exposes the social and political developments the CCP tries to hide. To help CDM continue its groundbreaking research, please donate to Freedom House today.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/48759609

Tentative data for the year 2025 from the UN’s High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) shows the mass exodus of asylum seekers from China continues unabated and is set to either rival last year’s record-breaking number or possibly exceed it. The tentative data, to be adjusted and finalized later in 2026, estimates some 178,725 asylum seekers from China. This is a far cry from the numbers seen during Hu Jintao’s reign, when it would stay between 7,000 and 21,000 annually.

The new data also shows some major swings in where Chinese people seek asylum, with Canada, Italy, and the United States seeing a continued and major surge.

With the new data, China has seen some ~1,330,000 Chinese asylum seekers under Xi Jiping’s years in power, compared with just ~162,000 during his predecessor Hu Jintao’s two mandate periods in power. The table below illustrates the dramatic shift in this regard since Xi took power and shows a continued strong upward movement after the lifting of the last COVID restrictions.

[...]

Italy now accounts for nearly ~2.2% of all Chinese asylum seekers worldwide, while the EU as a whole received 9,219 Chinese asylum seekers 2025, or ~5.2% of global total.

In other Europe-related developments, the number of people choosing Russia, 295 in 2019, has collapsed to only 5 people in 2025, and either at zero or in single-digits the entire COVID restriction period.

Other noteworthy figures show South Africa as the only South/East/West African country that received any Chinese asylum seekers, while in the MENA region, Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia are the only countries to receive them, though, except for Israel, in very limited numbers.

In the greater Asia-Pacific, Australia remains the only major destination for Chinese asylum seekers, but having seen a significant drop from 17,668 to 10,426, while New Zealand, still rare, grew from 74 to 555. Many, such as Japan, records zero asylum seekers for all the years between 2019 and 2025, South Korea being a very rare exception (2,606 in 2019 and 2,181 in 2025). The few others that have received any at all are all either in single or double digits, such as Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Nauro, and Vanuatu. Asia continues to be a very rare destination for Chinese asylum seekers, with no change in sight.

In the Americas, both Canada and the US have seen major growth. In Canada, it grew from 2,873 to 6,425, while in the US it went from 68,794 to 147,909. Other noteworthy developments are a near collapse in asylum seekers choosing Brazil (from 4,616 to 798), while Costa Rica is the only Central American country to receive significant numbers, rising sharply from 152 to 619. Most other countries in the Americas received either no asylum seekers at all, or very small numbers.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/47964660

Archived

The knocks came at 2am. Hiding out at a friend’s house in a Beijing suburb, Gao Yingjia and his wife, Geng Pengpeng, rushed downstairs to meet the group of plain-clothed men who said they were police officers. Their son, nearly six, was sleeping upstairs, and Gao and Geng wanted to minimise the ruckus. They knew their time was up.

Two months later, Gao is in a detention centre in Guangxi province, southern China, charged with “illegal use of information networks”. His arrest was part of the biggest crackdown on Christians in China since 2018. It has prompted alarm from the US government and human rights groups, with some analysts describing it as the death knell for unofficial churches in China.

“We both knew that as Christians in China, there were risks,” said Geng, who fled overseas for safety with her son. “But to be honest, you can never be fully prepared.”

Gao is a senior pastor in Zion Church, one of China’s most prominent underground “house churches” with thousands of members across the country. His arrest, and those of more than a dozen other church leaders, came after months of increasing pressure on the network. But the crackdown has not been limited to Zion, prompting fears of a nationwide assault on Chinese Christians.

[...]

Human Rights in China said more than 100 people had been detained in Wenzhou, a city in Zhejiang province, eastern China, in a raid on Christian groups last week. The US-based NGO said pressure had been mounting on Wenzhou’s Christians for months after a dispute about installing a Chinese national flag inside a local church.

Now Geng is grappling with a set of impossible choices: should she return to China to be nearer to her husband, but risk arrest herself? Should she stay in Thailand, a country that has relaxed visa policies for Chinese nationals but has a history of complying with deportation requests from Beijing? Should she go elsewhere? Earlier in her religious journey, she sometimes felt her prayers would hit the ceiling and come back down. Now her faith is steadfast, but she’s waiting for guidance: “Sometimes I wonder, is this real?”

[...]

China has five officially recognised religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Protestantism and Catholicism, but religious activities outside of officially sanctioned institutions are banned. Christians in particular have long gathered in unofficial house churches to worship away from the eyes of the state.

[...]

In September, China introduced new rules banning unlicensed religious groups from holding online sermons. Xi Jinping, China’s leader, chaired a senior Communist party meeting in which he urged for the “Sinicization of religions”.

But pressure has been increasing on Chinese Christians all year. In May, the pastor Gao Quanfu from the Light of Zion church (a separate organisation to Zion) and his wife were arrested. Around the same time, several members of the Golden Lampstand Church, an evangelical network, were reportedly given lengthy prison sentences on charges of fraud. And over the summer, more than 100 Zion members were questioned by police and several physical branches forced to close.

[...]

About 3% of China’s population identify as Christian, according to official estimates, a level that has remained stable for over a decade despite efforts by churches to grow their numbers. But that figure could be an underestimate, considering the increasing risks of publicly identifying as a Christian. Another survey from 2018 suggested 7% of Chinese people believed in some kind of Christian deity.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/47847537

Archived

China’s manipulation of the Interpol Red Notice system has reached a level of sophistication that poses a far-reaching danger to international law enforcement. Russia often remains the focus for many, as it is viewed as being the most prolific abuser of the system. But China is fast emerging as the more insidious threat.

As our readers will know, Red Notices are requests for provisional arrest pending extradition, circulated among police forces worldwide. The system works: thousands of dangerous fugitives are apprehended each year as a result. But authoritarian regimes have weaponised it. By issuing Red Notices through Interpol, states with poor human rights records can harness the police forces of democracies to pursue their opponents abroad.

China’s approach is different from Russia’s. Rather than relying primarily on extradition, Chinese authorities use Red Notices as one tool in a broader campaign of transnational repression. The notice locates the target. Then the pressure begins: threats against family members back home, asset freezes, surveillance, and relentless calls urging “voluntary” return. The so-called “persuasion to return” programme is profoundly misleadingly named.

The pretexts are revealing. Financial crime is the charge of choice – allegations of fraud, embezzlement, or money laundering that are difficult to verify and easy to fabricate. As one expert put it: if someone accuses you of murder, there needs to be a body; if someone accuses you of financial crimes, it is ones and zeros in the wrong ledger somewhere. China has used these charges to pursue businesspeople who have “Westernised,” political dissidents, Uyghur activists, followers of Falun Gong, and anyone else deemed a threat to the Chinese Communist Party.

[...]

The UK government’s recent overtures to Beijing make vigilance more pressing. Despite China’s well-documented human rights abuses – the persecution of Uyghurs, the crackdown in Hong Kong, the targeting of dissidents abroad – economic interests continue to drive policy. Those targeted by Chinese Red Notices often discover that economic relationships between states provide little protection when they find themselves detained at an airport or frozen out of the banking system.

Interpol has taken steps to address abuse. The Notices and Diffusion Task Force screens Red Notice requests before publication. But its review is limited – it cannot investigate the merits of every case, and as a result politically motivated requests can slip through.

[...]

China is not currently subject to Interpol’s corrective measures – enhanced scrutiny or suspension from the network – despite mounting evidence of systematic abuse. This makes vigilance all the more important. Those who find themselves in the crosshairs of a Chinese Red Notice must understand that the system offers them limited protection – and that experienced legal representation is essential from the outset.

[...]

Targeted by China Through Interpol? Your Options Explained -- (archived)

Red Notices are just one tool in a broader strategy of transnational repression that includes surveillance, asset freezes, and intense pressure on family members back home. If you find yourself in Beijing’s crosshairs, understanding the full picture is essential.

In 2025, incidents of transnational repression—efforts primarily by authoritarian governments to intimidate, harm, or even kill people they consider threats to their states, typically members of their diaspora, outside their borders—increased substantially worldwide.

Archived

[...]

Authoritarian states including China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and others have stepped up digital and in-person transnational repression worldwide, including in developed states in Asia, Europe, North America, and the United Kingdom.

[...]

The global spike in transnational repression has gained particular traction in Southeast Asia, among other parts of the world. According to UN experts, Southeast Asia has seen an “escalating wave of transnational repression [of activists, other dissidents, and refugees] by or linked to authorities in China and several Southeast Asian countries.” Thailand has become a hub of such acts this year. Human Rights Watch in 2025 called the kingdom “a ‘swap mart’ of dissidents from other regional states, who pay Bangkok back by targeting Thai critics living in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam.”

[...]

The biggest offenders driving the trend

[...]

The gruesome incidents involving Southeast Asian dissidents across borders [include] Thai activists who were found handcuffed and dead in the Mekong River, with their stomachs opened and concrete poured into their bodies in what appeared to be an assassination in Laos. The Human Rights Watch investigation found that other Thai anti-monarchy activists have disappeared or been detained in Vietnam, or secretly deported back to Thailand, while other activists have disappeared in Cambodia and Laos, their cases conspicuously unsolved. The report also shares instances of other nationals going missing, killed, or abducted in Thailand, such as the disappearance [PDF] of Laotian democracy and human rights advocates and a Malaysian transgender LGBT rights influencer who was repatriated.

[...]

A major reason that transnational repression across borders has increased is because of “a significant number of cases of Chinese transnational repression.” For instance, an April report by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) showed that Chinese transnational repression had recently become so omnipresent that it is effective in at least twenty-three countries, as well as at the United Nations. China is by far the biggest user of transnational repression in the world.

[...]

The United States, Europe, and many other developed states are devoting fewer resources to addressing the problem, despite warnings by some lawmakers and attempts to pass legislation about transnational repression as well as surveillance by major autocratic powers. (Congress introduced the Transnational Repression Policy Act in 2025, but it has not passed, and Canada has begun to take steps to combat transnational Chinese repression.)

In part, this decline in enforcement and highlighting of transnational repression is because, as mentioned above, many developed countries have refocused their human rights policies on other issues. While some states have pushed back against such repression in the past, many countries are now prioritizing closer ties to authoritarian economic powers and downplaying repressive and even fatal actions by their authoritarian counterparts.

[...]

In one of many examples of this trend, in June 2025 Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met on the sidelines of the G-7 summit in Canada. They agreed to a reset in relations, including re-establishing high commissions in Delhi and Ottawa. This reset came following two years of significant bilateral diplomatic tensions after Justin Trudeau, who was then Canada’s prime minister, publicly accused India of orchestrating the killing of Hardeep Singh Nijjar—a Canadian citizen and prominent Sikh separatist—outside Vancouver in 2023.

[...]

Other global leaders have taken the same approach as Carney toward China, India, Russia and other autocratic states. Germany and Vietnam have in recent years rapidly expanded their strategic and economic links, even though Germany accused Vietnam, one of the most authoritarian states in the world, of abducting a Vietnamese businessman from Berlin in 2017. French President Emanuel Macron recently visited China and held warm meetings with Xi, even though Beijing has stepped up intimidation of critics of the Chinese regime in France. China has even tried to use French laws to silence Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities living in France.

[...]

There will likely be more instances of these kinds of efforts in the future, especially since there appear to be fewer efforts to defend against human rights abuses. Having sent the message to China, India, Russia, and others that there are fewer safeguards against autocrats’ power beyond their borders, developed countries—and the world—will likely have to contend with these types of intimidation tactics and crimes occurring more often within their own.

This paper sets out a repertoire of repression operating to criminalise and repress recent climate and environmental protest globally. Deploying a novel mixed methods approach, involving a comparative quantitative and qualitative analysis of a sample of 14 countries, we identify that repression and criminalisation are global phenomena – spanning the Global South and North. The repertoire of repression includes: i) enactments of new anti-protest laws; ii) creative and strategic use of existing legislation and legal processes; iii) police action, such as arrests, surveillance, harassment and other forms of police violence; iv) disappearances and killings; and v) vilification. We argue that this repression is a complex eco-system involving state and non-state actors, laws and legal processes, social and media discourses which operate to deplete, deter and delegitimise protest, and distract attention from violent or harmful political structures.

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/43763604

Archive link

European and Ukrainian leaders have officially launched an International Claims Commission in The Hague, marking a significant step toward accountability and reparations for the damage caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The new body is tasked with processing and adjudicating claims related to losses suffered by the Ukrainian state, businesses, and individuals since the start of the war.

The establishment of the Commission reflects growing international consensus that victims of the conflict should have access to a structured, legal mechanism to seek compensation. According to European officials, more than 80,000 claims have already been submitted, highlighting the vast scale of destruction to infrastructure, housing, industry, and livelihoods across Ukraine.

...

The International Claims Commission is designed to operate as an independent and rules-based mechanism. Its mandate includes reviewing evidence, assessing damages, and determining the validity and value of claims arising from the conflict. While it does not itself enforce payments, the Commission represents a crucial institutional framework that could underpin future compensation arrangements.

Locating the Commission in The Hague — a city internationally recognized as a center for justice and international law — underscores the legal and symbolic weight of the initiative. European leaders emphasized that the Commission complements existing international justice efforts and reinforces the principle that violations of international law carry consequences.

...

For Ukraine, the launch of the Commission represents an important diplomatic achievement and a step toward long-term recovery and reconstruction ... For Europe, the Commission sends a broader message: accountability and reparations are integral to any durable peace. By creating a formal mechanism now, European states aim to ensure that compensation is not treated as an afterthought, but as a core element of post-war justice laying the groundwork for future reparations and reinforcing the international rules-based order.

...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/47329586

Archived

[...]

Despite legal prohibitions, the employment of minors persists, especially in less-developed regions like the Western and rural provinces. Children from these areas are often recruited into small workshops, informal sectors, and manufacturing supply chains, including electronics and toy production. A specific form of exploitation involves the student-worker system, where vocational schools place students, sometimes as young as 16, into factories for long hours of repetitive labor irrelevant to their studies. Refusal to participate in these mandatory “internships” often results in the student being threatened with the loss of funding or graduation status, creating a coercive labor condition.

A distinct and systemic issue is the state-sponsored coercive labor programs operating in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). This system compels Uyghur and other ethnic minority populations, including minors, into forced labor through mass internment and “labor transfer programs.” This exploitation is embedded in state policy, targeting industries like cotton and solar polysilicon for the goal of forced assimilation and social control. The coercive nature of this state-enforced labor represents a severe human rights abuse in the supply chain.

[...]

Effective enforcement is hampered by systemic challenges and a lack of resources. The number of labor inspectors is insufficient to monitor the vast number of workplaces, especially in the informal sector where violations are common. Enforcement relies on periodic, campaign-like factory investigations rather than routine supervision. A lack of transparency and accountability, coupled with local officials prioritizing economic interests, prevents the rigorous application of the law. Inadequate penalties and sporadic enforcement are often insufficient to deter employers from violating child labor prohibitions.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/43381608

EU warns of 'cultural erasure' in China as human rights situation in the country shows 'no substantive sign of improvement'

The EU criticizes China's "systemic and severe restrictions on the exercise of fundamental freedoms and on the right of minorities" to enjoy their own culture, and to use their own language, in private and public, including in the field of education, a statement by the EU Delegation in China reads.

"These restrictions risk leading to cultural erasure."

In spite of many engagements, "unfortunately, the overall human rights situation in China showed no substantive sign of improvement," the EU statement reads.

The situation in Xinjiang remains serious. Numerous credible reports, including the assessment issued by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), indicate serious human rights violations that “may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity”. The EU remains deeply troubled by continuing reports of forced labour and state‑imposed labour transfer schemes involving Uyghurs both within Xinjiang and to other provinces.

The human rights situation in Tibet remains equally alarming. This applies both to the Tibet Autonomous Region and to Tibetan areas of Qinghai, Sichuan and Gansu provinces, where similar patterns of restrictions have been reported. Reports continue to document far-reaching state control over religious life, intensified surveillance of monasteries, and the imposition of mandatory boarding schools, where Tibetan children are separated from their families and educated primarily in Mandarin. The closure of Tibetan-language schools, and the marginalisation of Tibetan-language instruction are deeply troubling.

...

The EU continues to criticize the enforced disappearance since 1995 of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the 11th Panchen Lama. No credible information is provided on his whereabouts or well-being. We continue to call on China to respect and protect the rights of persons belonging to religious groups to exercise their religious freedoms without interference. The selection of religious leaders should happen without government interference and in accordance with religious norms, including for the succession of the Dalai Lama.

...

The EU also remains concerned about the situation in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, where policy shifts have resulted in a marked reduction in the use of Mongolian as a language of instruction and a narrowing of space for cultural and linguistic expression. The move from Mongolian as a vehicle of instruction to its relegation as a stand‑alone subject stands in contrast with official commitments to ethnic harmony and cultural diversity, and risks accelerating the erosion of the Mongolian community’s cultural and linguistic identity.

...

The EU ... calls for the immediate and unconditional release of, among others, Gulshan Abbas, Anya Sengdra, Ekpar Asat, Chadrel Rinpoche, Rahile Dawut, Ding Jiaxi, Ding Yuande, Dong Yuyu, Pastor Mingri (Ezra) Jin, Gao Zhen, Gao Zhisheng, Go Sherab Gyatso, Golog Palden, He Fangmei, Huang Qi, Huang Xueqin, Hushtar Isa, Yalkun Isa, Ji Xiaolong, Li Yanhe, Peng Lifa, Qin Yongming, Ruan Xiaohuan, Tashi Dorje, Tashpolat Tiyip, Sakharov Prize winner Ilham Tohti, Wang Bingzhang, Pastor Wang Yi, Kamile Wayit, Xie Yang, Xu Na, Xu Zhiyong, Yang Hengjung, Yang Maodong, Yu Wensheng, Pastor Zhang Chunlei, Tara Zhang Yadi and Zhang Zhan, as well as EU citizen Gui Minhai whose right to consular access must be respected.

...

The EU underscores the essential role of freedom of expression, media independence and access to information in ensuring accountable and effective governance. In China, these freedoms remain severely constrained ... The EU strongly promotes global gender equality and women and girls full enjoyment of human rights [and] reaffirms its commitment to LGBTI persons’ full enjoyment of human rights.

"We are concerned about the rising challenges faced by China's LGBTI community, including the restriction on the freedom of association, online censorship, and intimidation of activists," the EU says.

...

In Hong Kong, fundamental rights and freedoms have further eroded.

...

China must also respect the principle of non-refoulement, and refrain from any extraterritorial activity, including transnational repression, that is not in line with international law.

...

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/43319573

Web archive link

Over 1,000 documented TNR [Transnational Repression] cases have occurred since 2014, affecting individuals across 100 countries and involving at least 44 perpetrator states. Europe has emerged as a critical venue for TNR, with a growing number of targeted journalists, human rights defenders, political opponents, and whistleblowers seeking safety and protection on European soil.

Despite the scope of the problem, there is currently no binding European or international legal instrument specifically addressing TNR. Existing human rights instruments, including the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), while applicable in principle, do not offer comprehensive safeguards tailored to the realities of TNR.

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/43231602

Web archive link

The regime of North Korea has continued to exploit the war in Ukraine to spread its propaganda. This week we learnt that Ukrainian children, abducted by Russia, are being sent to an infamous North Korean summer camp. The children have reportedly been taught to ‘destroy Japanese imperialists’ and heard from North Korean soldiers who destroyed the USS Pueblo, a spy ship captured and sank by North Korea in 1968.

This Ukrainian children have been at the Songdowon International Children’s Camp, located near the port city of Wonsan on the country’s east coast. Well known as a popular tourist hotspot for North Korean elites, Wonsan has recently gained infamy for the newly-opened Wonsan-Kalma tourist resort, which has been not-so-affectionately nicknamed ‘North Korea’s Benidorm’. Wonsan, too, has a significant place in North Korean history. It was where Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un spent much of his childhood.

The children’s camp is hardly a new creation. Established in 1960 amid the backdrop of the Cold War, the camp became one additional facet of North Korean cultural diplomacy, as Pyongyang sought to develop ties with communist and communist-friendly countries. Whether from North Korea’s Cold War patrons of Russia and China or communist-sympathising states further afield, such as Laos, Tanzania and even Syria, children would be sent to the camp to engage in a range of activities, including cooking, swimming, rock climbing, or marathon running. For the North Korean regime, the goal was simple: spread the virtues of socialism, North Korea-style, and become friends with like-minded states.

...

Although little is known about the Ukrainian abductees sent to North Korea, cooperation between Pyongyang and Moscow in areas beyond security looks to continue to grow, especially as peace in Ukraine looks evermore elusive. North Korea and Russia signed a mutual defence pact in June 2024, but these renewed ties were not limited to the domain of security. It was no coincidence that only a week after the ink was dry, Grigory Gurov, Head of the Russian Federal Agency for Youth Affairs, announced that around 250 Russian children, mainly from the Russian Far East, would visit Songdowon, making them one of the first groups to visit the camp following North Korea’s draconian three-year border closure, owing to coronavirus, in January 2021.

...

Russia and North Korea are yet to respond to the reports that Ukrainian abductees are being sent to Songdowon. Pyongyang will probably just say the children were participating in a cultural exchange – helping out an ally. We need only go back to February this year when Russia’s ambassador to North Korea, Alexander Matsegora, announced that how ‘hundreds of wounded [Russian] soldiers’ fighting against Ukraine were being treated in North Korean hospitals, epitomising the ‘brotherly attitude’ between the two Cold War allies.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/46747896

Archived

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has just received confirmation from local sources that Chinese journalist and photojournalist Du Bin has been held by the authorities at the Shunyi Detention Centre in Beijing since 15 October 2025. The former New York Times photographer is accused of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”, an offence punishable by five years in prison and routinely used by the Chinese regime to suppress journalists and press freedom defenders.

The photojournalist’s family has repeatedly requested to see the written detention order, but the authorities have refused to provide one. The officer in charge of the case has also declined to give further information, citing confidentiality. Through his photos, books and documentary films, Du Bin has extensively documented human rights abuses committed by the Chinese regime. His work has been published in major international media outlets, including The New York Times, Time magazine and The Guardian.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/46639484

Archived

Here is the report The party’s AI: How China’s new AI systems are reshaping human rights - (pdf)

The Chinese Communist Party's AI: A new report shows how Beijing is using LLMs as ‘precision tools’ of censorship and repression at home and abroad

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming China’s state control system into a precision instrument for managing its population and targeting groups at home and abroad, a report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) finds.

China’s extensive AI‑powered visual surveillance systems are already well documented. This report reveals new ways that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is using large language models (LLMs) and other AI systems to automate censorship, enhance surveillance and pre‑emptively suppress dissent.

Key summary:

Chinese LLMs censor politically sensitive images, not just text.

• While prior research has extensively mapped textual censorship, this report identifies a critical gap: the censorship of politically sensitive images by Chinese LLMs remains largely unexamined.
• To address this, ASPI developed a testing methodology, using a dataset of 200 images likely to trigger censorship, to interrogate how LLMs censor sensitive imagery. The results revealed that visual censorship mechanisms are embedded across multiple layers within the LLM ecosystem.

The Chinese Government is deploying AI throughout the criminal‑justice pipeline—from AI‑enabled policing and mass surveillance, to smart courts, to smart prisons.

• This emerging AI pipeline reduces transparency and accountability, enhances the efficiency of police, prosecutors and prisons, and further enables state repression.
• Beijing is pushing courts to adopt AI not just in drafting basic paperwork, but even in recommending judgements and sentences, which could deepen structural discrimination and weaken defence counsels’ ability to appeal.
• The Chinese surveillance technology company iFlyTek stands out as a major provider of LLM‑based systems used in this pipeline.

China is using minority‑language LLMs to deepen surveillance and control of ethnic minorities, both in China and abroad.

• The Chinese Government is developing, and in some cases already testing, AI‑enabled public‑sentiment analysis in ethnic minority languages—especially Uyghur, Tibetan, Mongolian and Korean—for the explicitly stated purpose of enhancing the state’s capacity to monitor and control communications in those languages across text, video and audio.
• DeepSeek and most other commercial LLM models have insufficient capacity to do this effectively, as there’s little market incentive to create sophisticated, expensive models for such small language groups. The Chinese state is stepping in to provide resources and backing for the development of minority‑language models for that explicit purpose.
• China is also seeking to deploy this technology to target those groups in foreign countries along the Belt and Road.

AI now performs much of the work of online censorship in China.

• AI‑powered censorship systems scan vast volumes of digital content, flag potential violations, and delete banned material within seconds.
• Yet the system still depends on human content reviewers to supply the cultural and political judgement that algorithms lack, according to ASPI’s review of more than 100 job postings for online‑content censors in China. Future technological advances are likely to minimise that remaining dependence on human reviewers.

China’s censorship regulations have created a robust domestic market for AI‑enabled censorship tools.

• China’s biggest tech companies, including Tencent, Baidu and ByteDance, have developed advanced AI censorship platforms that they’re selling to smaller companies and organisations around China.
• In this way, China’s laws mandating internal censorship have created market incentives for China’s top tech companies to make censorship cheaper, faster, easier and more efficient—and embedding compliance into China’s digital economy.

The use of AI amplifies China’s state‑supported erosion of the economic rights of some vulnerable groups abroad, to the financial benefit of Chinese private and state‑owned companies.

• ASPI research shows that Chinese fishing fleets have begun adopting AI‑powered intelligent fishing platforms, developed by Chinese companies and research institutes, that further tip the technological scales towards Chinese vessels and away from local fishers and artisanal fishing communities.
• ASPI has identified several individual Chinese fishing vessels using those platforms that operate in exclusive economic zones where Chinese fishing is widely implicated in illegal incidents, including Mauritania and Vanuatu, and ASPI found one vessel that has itself been specifically implicated in an incident.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/46377338

Opinion piece by Li Qiang, founder and executive director of China Labor Watch, and a human rights advocate with over 30 years of experience investigating global supply chains.

Archived

[...]

China’s low rights model is no longer a domestic labor issue but a systemic challenge to global labor standards, supply chain governance, and fair market competition. Without a coordinated civil society response, the global baseline for worker rights will continue to fall.

I call China’s economic model a “low rights” one because it has long relied on suppressing labor costs to maintain industrial competitiveness. As a result, trade imbalances between China, the United States, and Europe are strategically linked to China’s ability to attract multinational companies through low-cost labor and policy incentives. At the same time, Chinese companies internalized the technology and management know-how of these foreign companies into their domestic systems, gradually transforming what were originally Western competitive advantages into China’s own strengths.

[...]

In recent years, China’s “low-standard, low-cost” development model has expanded beyond its borders. Through the Belt and Road Initiative, it has spread globally, exporting labor, environmental, and governance risks to host countries. Nowhere is this more evident than in Indonesia’s nickel sector, where mining and smelting contracts are so short that they function like countdown clocks, pressuring companies to recoup capital as fast as possible.

[...]

This “low-cost” model has been permitted to exist due to an increasingly shrinking civic space. Independent labor monitoring inside China has become dramatically harder in the past decade. Today, only a few independent organizations remain capable of conducting investigations, such as China Labor Watch. Yet, political risks deter most international funders from supporting work inside China, leaving independent oversight critically under-resourced in an area where it is needed most.

[...]

To counter this dynamic, civil society organizations must be central to any strategy for raising global labor standards. We can advance change in three key ways.

First, increase public awareness. We can collectively highlight that consumers must recognize the real costs behind low-priced products: long working hours, low pay, job displacement, low labor standards. The public must understand that declining labor standards ultimately harm every society. In reality, with wages stagnating in many Western countries, more consumers rely on cheaper products that are produced by workers who are, in fact, competing with them for similar types of jobs in the global labor market.

Second, advocate and partner with authorities for the rigorous enforcement of forced-labor laws. Import bans, labor regulations, and due diligence laws already exist. But enforcement depends on independent organizations holding authorities accountable, and providing evidence if there are enforcement gaps. It also requires sufficient and sustained funding to ensure that these laws can be implemented in practice, rather than remaining symbolic commitments.

[...]

The EU Forced Labor Regulation and the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) had their scope narrowed during the legislative process, while U.S. forced labor import enforcement remains inconsistent and lacks clear direction, making the global regulatory landscape by significant uncertainty. If global civil society does not intervene now, global labor standards will not simply stagnate; they will be redefined downward by a model built on speed, opacity, and the suppression of rights.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/46147523

Archived

UN Special Procedures experts warn of an escalating wave of transnational repression by or linked to authorities in China and several Southeast Asian countries.

In joint communications to China, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), they detail at least 150 cases in which human rights defenders, dissidents, members of marginalised groups, and their family members were subjected to violence, refoulement, harassment, and intimidation by States or their proxies outside their territories.

[...]

Patterns of repression include:

Physical attacks, assassinations, and enforced disappearances: At least nine political exiles from Thailand, Cambodia and Laos have been assassinated or forcibly disappeared in neighbouring countries. Cases cited include the killing of Cambodian opposition figure Lim Kim Ya in Thailand, and the enforced disappearances of Thai dissidents Wanchalearm Satsaksit in Cambodia and Surachai Darnwattananusorn in Laos.

Refugees and dissents refouled: In violation of the principle of non-refoulement, authorities have forcibly returned refugees and asylum seekers to places where they face persecution. Thailand returned 40 Uyghur men to China after nearly 11 years in detention, and seven United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)‑recognised Cambodian opposition activists and family members to Cambodia. Laos returned Chinese human rights lawyer Lu Siwei to China, and Malaysia returned Thai dissident and asylum seeker Praphan Pipithnamporn to Thailand; both were subsequently imprisoned.

Legal harassment: Hong Kong authorities issued National Security Law arrest warrants and HKD 1 million (approximately USD 128,000) bounties for at least eight overseas activists in exile, including Anna Kwok, Carmen Lau, Ted Hui, Frances Hui, and Chloe Cheung. Vietnam further criminalised civil society by designating Montagnards Stand for Justice and Boat People SOS as terrorist entities.

Surveillance and intimidation: In the United Kingdom, associates of Hong Kong activist Carmen Lau received flyers urging them to report her to Hong Kong authorities or bring her to the Chinese Embassy, citing the bounty on her head. In Thailand, a Vietnamese security delegation, accompanied by Thai police, reportedly entered refugee communities near Bangkok to pressure Montagnard refugees to return to Vietnam.

Retaliation against families: As Hong Kong activists such as Anna Kwok, Carmen Lau, and Ted Hui continued their advocacy overseas, their relatives in Hong Kong were interrogated, arrested, or publicly shamed in state media. In Cambodia, the father of France‑based activist Sorn Dara was imprisoned on fabricated charges.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/45707079

Archived

In late November 2022, for a brief moment, Shanghai appeared to loosen the grip that had defined its pandemic years. On Wulumuqi Road normally an unremarkable thoroughfare residents gathered with candles to mourn ten people who died in a fire in far-off Urumqi. Local accounts later described how the victims, trapped behind locked exits during a COVID lockdown, became symbols of a policy that had exhausted the country long before the flames claimed their lives.

What began as a quiet vigil on 26 November evolved into the most overt public challenge to the Chinese leadership since the Tiananmen demonstrations more than three decades earlier. The crowds swelled, some chanting slogans that would have been unthinkable only weeks before. Yet the opening proved fleeting. By the morning of 28 November, the street was deserted. The sudden silence was not organic it was engineered.

The speed with which authorities restored control demonstrated not only the strength of China’s policing apparatus but the degree to which three years of pandemic management had equipped the state with an unusually detailed map of its citizens’ movements, networks, and vulnerabilities. The crackdown that followed was not a spontaneous reaction to dissent. It was the culmination of a system refined through data, surveillance, and the routinisation of extraordinary powers.

The turning point came in the early hours of 27 November. As more demonstrators assembled some holding blank A4 sheets as understated rebuttals to censorship plainclothes officers blended into the crowd. Witnesses later described people being pulled into police vans at around 4:30am. Among those seized was Ed Lawrence, a BBC journalist detained and beaten while covering the protest. Beijing later insisted he had “failed to identify himself”, a claim rejected by the broadcaster.

[...]

The censorship campaign that followed was comprehensive and efficient. Searches for “Shanghai,” “Wulumuqi Road,” and “Urumqi fire,” which normally generated millions of posts, began returning only a handful. References to “white paper,” “A4,” and related hashtags vanished across Weibo and WeChat.

[...]

By Monday morning, the authorities had all but erased digital traces of the protest. The memorials had been cleared, and the street resumed its familiar subdued rhythm.

[...]

Where previous generations of Chinese protest movements relied on anonymity faces in a crowd the demonstrators of 2022 faced an entirely different environment. China’s security apparatus had spent years constructing one of the world’s most extensive networks of facial recognition cameras, combined with compulsory health-code apps, QR-based movement tracking, and real-time linkage of mobile phone data to personal identity.

This infrastructure, designed and justified through the zero-COVID period, played a decisive role in identifying attendees. Multiple participants later reported receiving calls or home visits from police within 24 hours of the vigil. One, a protester identified only as Zhang, took elaborate steps to avoid detection: wearing a balaclava, switching jackets, and navigating backstreets. Yet his phone had connected to towers near the demonstration. The next day, police rang to ask about his whereabouts: minutes later, they arrived at his door.

[...]

Those detained included university graduates, publishing editors, and a state media journalist, Yang Liu. Among the most well-known was Cao Zhixin, an editor at a publishing house, who was taken into custody alongside several friends. Videos recorded before their arrests pleaded that if they disappeared, it was because they had attended the vigil.

[...]

Comparisons with 1989 are inevitable, but they also illustrate how China’s methods have evolved. Where Tiananmen relied on overwhelming military force, Shanghai’s protest was extinguished with algorithms, phone data, and targeted detentions. The absence of visible violence made the repression less conspicuous but no less effective.

This model carries implications far outside China’s borders. Through its Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing has supplied surveillance infrastructure including camera networks, cloud-based monitoring systems, and facial recognition software to dozens of countries. Several African states have adopted variants of these tools to monitor domestic unrest. Human rights groups warn that the technology exported is often calibrated using data gathered from China’s own population, sometimes optimised for use on minority ethnic groups abroad.

The Shanghai crackdown demonstrated how these systems can function when deployed at scale: quick identification, quiet detentions, minimal public spectacle.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/45599434

Archived

[...]

A new investigation by People of Baikal reveals another tactic the Russian military has employed to stem personnel losses: torturing the friends and family of deserters. Journalists reporting from the Transbaikal region spoke to Olga Vtorushina, the mother of a 24-year-old man named Pavel.

On November 2, 2025, masked men kidnapped her son, drove him outside of town, and tortured him with a stun gun, demanding that he help them locate his cousin Pyotr, who’d recently failed to return to his unit. The men who abducted and tortured Pavel wore camouflage uniforms and masks, but Olga said she’d seen them around town and had recognized one as a member of the local military police. She told journalists that the men beat her son and shocked him repeatedly with a stun gun until he passed out several times. Pavel wasn’t released until he telephoned Pyotr and lured him to a meeting where he was later apprehended.

[...]

A 25-year-old contract soldier who deserted his unit when the military ordered him back to duty after he sustained a head injury [...] escaped to his hometown and spent several months in hiding. To find the missing soldier, masked men tracked down his father and tortured him with a stun gun. They also beat his friend. The soldier’s mother told journalists that the assailants were not military police but a search group from her son’s military base. Her son is now in the army’s custody.

[...]

Military police officers tracked down 36-year-old Viktor at his friend’s home. They tased him, broke his nose, stuffed him in the trunk of a car, and drove him 300 miles away. Viktor had failed to return to his unit on time, staying at home to assist his wife, who was expecting their third child any day. She gave birth a week later. Viktor’s mother told People of Baikal that the men who took her son are the same ones who tortured Pavel on November 2.

Similar raids have been reported in towns throughout the Transbaikal region. In Ushmun, for example, masked men were spotted patrolling the streets. According to a local newspaper, these were military police officers. Authorities in Trubachevo and Novoshirokinsky confirmed to People of Baikal by phone that locals had been subjected to “measures of force.”

[...]