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Amnesty International To Halt India Operations (bbc.com) 47

Amnesty International says it has been forced to halt its India operations due to "reprisals" from the government. From a report: The watchdog also accused the government of pursuing a "witch-hunt" against human rights organisations. Amnesty said its bank accounts had been frozen and it had been forced to lay off staff in the country and suspend all its campaign and research work. India's government said in a statement that the accusations were "unfortunate, exaggerated and far from the truth." Rajat Khosla, Amnesty's senior director of research, advocacy and policy, told the BBC: "We are facing a rather unprecedented situation in India. Amnesty International India has been facing an onslaught of attacks, bullying and harassment by the government in a very systematic manner. "This is all down to the human rights work that we were doing and the government not wanting to answer questions we raised, whether it's in terms of our investigations into the Delhi riots, or the silencing of voices in Jammu and Kashmir."

In a report released last month, the group said police in the Indian capital, Delhi, committed human rights violations during deadly religious riots between Hindus and Muslims in February. Rebutting the claims, the Delhi police told The Hindu newspaper that Amnesty's report was "lopsided, biased and malicious." Earlier in August, on the first anniversary of the revocation of Indian-administered Kashmir's special status, Amnesty had called for the release of all detained political leaders, activists and journalists, and for the resumption of high-speed internet services in the region. In 2019, the watchdog testified before the US Foreign Affairs Committee during a hearing on human rights in South Asia, where it highlighted its findings on arbitrary detentions, and the use of excessive force and torture in Kashmir.

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Amnesty International To Halt India Operations

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  • I am not aware of these guys ever doing anything useful.
    • Re:Phylantropists (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2020 @12:14PM (#60554008)

      We all have instincts to be Cruel to others, we also create an environment for ourselves, where the negative aspects of our actions can be reduced.

      I am sure we all have fantasized about creating harm to someone who's only slight against you personally is the fact they disagree with you. Most of us with a healthy psyche know to control these urges as you know that you would be the aggressor and the person you attack would be the victim, and you would be in the wrong, despite your feelings.

      Now if you are a person in Power, and backed by people who will support you and whatever your do. They are willing to give you information that makes you happy, and hide or reword information that is negative. The person in power may not want to be a Bad or Evil person, but they are unaware of the level of harm they are doing, And while their job is to make a tough decision where both sides may be bad, there needs to be a group to point of the problems with such decisions and what harm it has caused.

      These Human Rights groups do help moderate these people from just following their basic instinct. If you think of Early 20th century Germany, Germany was a major power country, who was the center of culture of the world. They were also involved in the most heinous acts of Crudity that the world has seen. After WWII a lot of these Philanthropists groups have formed to keep the governments accountable for their actions. So now for most countries and their leadership, they do need to at least consider what will be the response for their actions.

      What in particular did they stop, it is tough to say, however being that most countries are willing to discuss human rights as an issue, means they have done something, and probably stopped a lot of issues well before they became a problem.

      • It sounds like your saying that just having someone around asking hard questions helps keep governments civil. I would agree. It may appear that these groups are doing nothing but a presence and willingness to ask the hard questions has an effect.
        • If (bbc agrees with the group under illegal financial transaction investigation)
                Provide platform for said group to political lobby for itself
          else
                Provide platform for government investigators and 'independent commentators' to say misleading statements and negatively affect said organization

          The BBC article needs actual facts to be credible. /. should not have such political push articles.

        • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

          They are doing this in a country where people put dots on their foreheads to specifically differentiate between themselves and to limit and control their different dot interactions. Before you can do anything else, first those dots have got to go, else you are just asking for trouble. Until you can remove those dots, you will see no real change, simple fact of reality. They will retain those dots as long as they want to differentiate themselves, to include and exclude.

          'THE DOTS GOTTA GO', good luck with tha

          • You have no idea what youâ(TM)re talking about. The âoedotâ shows that that person performed a ritual in the morning after bathing.

            Compare and contrast with people who grow their beards long, shave their mustaches and deliberately create ghettos which are âoeshariah compliantâ zones.

            Very common in the UK, Belgium, France and Sweden. Travel around and youâ(TM)ll see it for yourself.

    • They're not a "do" kind of organization. They're a "reporting" kind of organization. Their role has been to draw attention to issues that the world seems to be ignoring. So, I guess you could argue how useful that's been. But I give them points for making an effort. But alleviating human suffering and human right's violations are like yelling into a hurricane. Often, the world can't hear you and even when they can? They don't seem to care very much.
    • Re:Phylantropists (Score:5, Insightful)

      by 2TecTom ( 311314 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2020 @02:50PM (#60554614) Homepage Journal

      I am not aware of these guys ever doing anything useful.

      Funny,all the rights you enjoy but don't appreciate came from these people and others just like them. Hopefully someday you'll come to understand how important human rights really are and how difficult they are to procure.

      • I am not aware of these guys ever doing anything useful.

        I suppose by "useful" you might mean the usual charity stuff of giving to the poor. Amnesty International is not that kind of charity. They bring wrongdoing to people's attention. In this case of Amnesty being harassed in India, this is some kind of hooter going off, indicating "bad stuff going on here". This is like suppressing a free press.

  • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Way to deflect. Feel better, Vlad?

      By definition, all religions are cults but not all cults are religions. Scientology falls into the latter category. They are not a religion but designed to fleece people.

      This has nothing to do with Amnesty International being sent home from India because unlike Scientology, they don't do anything other than report abuses by the government or others.

      That you don't want Amnesty in Russia to report on the abuses of the Putin regime is par for the course. And
    • by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

      Germany didn't ban Scientology, they just said it's a business rather than a religion. And they're right.

  • the group said police in the Indian capital, Delhi, committed human rights violations during deadly religious riots between Hindus and Muslims in February.

    All atheists should join together and buy an island somewhere to live without these dangerous religious people.

    • That soeciety wont survive because they wont be having children, or they will sterilizing themselves with hormones.
      • What does being atheist has anything to do with having children?!

        • by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

          Have you seen the scientific evidence on birth rates today?

          Religious continue to have children, though in lesser amounts. Godless people are having far less, and often no children. I am among the latter group.

          What causes this relationship? We're not sure. But reality is that humans evolved to be religious, as we can observe religious activity in historic digs going all the way to the early Homo Sapiens and even in Homo species before that. It seems to have evolved alongside ability to think abstractly, whic

        • It is a fact that religious people have more kids than non-religious. I'm not talking about one religion or another. ALL Religions are out reproducing the non-religious.
  • And, frankly, it doesn't really matter to me, either.

  • These days leftist organizations (like the SPLC) are a dime a dozen, and they all spout the same rhetoric. What differentiates AI from the others?

    Are they more credible than others? Do they go in and investigate? How do they determine if the people they're talking about are telling the truth? Just because someone says they're oppressed doesn't mean they are oppressed. Just because someone says something happened does not mean it happened. And it's worse when you're actively looking for "violations." How doe

    • I think you're applying American politics to an international organization. AI's primary role is to report on issues from around the world. Have they ever made mistakes? Probably. Every organization does. However, they seem to be making an effort to draw attention to human right's issues that we wouldn't normally be addressing. So, take that as you will.
    • AI worked a lot with groups oppressed by the tyrannical middle eastern governments. Thus they have developed lots of close associations with muslim groups. These groups oppose not just the tyrannical Arab governments they also oppose idol worshipers other pagan religions.

      Till about 1990s ordinary Hindu folks in India never knew what the actual media portrayal and stereotypes of Hindus were in the West. The Indians who knew were all secular, westernized folks. Only after the influx of IT based immigration

      • Hindus are becoming aware of the level of negative image that has been created in west about Hindus, the caste system, etc. They are appalled and they are slowly organizing a push back. It will take a decade or two for the West to get a balanced portrayal of Hindus.

        There is _nothing_ positive about a caste system - full stop.

    • by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      >These days leftist organizations (like the SPLC) are a dime a dozen, and they all spout the same rhetoric. What differentiates AI from the others?

      It's international, with presence outside US. I.e. it can penetrate language barriers that organisations like SPLC have no tools to penetrate.

      >Are they more credible than others?

      To whom? Defining this is critical to answering this specific question, as some people actually pay money to support some of these organisations, while others actively point out at

    • These days leftist organizations (like the SPLC) are a dime a dozen, and they all spout the same rhetoric. What differentiates AI from the others?

      Are they more credible than others? Do they go in and investigate? How do they determine if the people they're talking about are telling the truth? Just because someone says they're oppressed doesn't mean they are oppressed. Just because someone says something happened does not mean it happened. And it's worse when you're actively looking for "violations." How does AI know that the "victims" aren't just telling them what they want to hear?

      After all, in prison everyone is innocent. Why should that be any different outside of prison?

      "We campaign for a world where human rights are enjoyed by all
      Amnesty International is a global movement of more than 7 million people in over 150 countries and territories who campaign to end abuses of human rights."

      That is leftist?

      Care to explain what a rightist analog would look like?
      "Law and Order International - We campaign for a world where everybody keeps to themselves and minds their own damn business."
      "Make India Great Again - Everything is great here, the other guy is lying and hates our country,

      • Yeah that is leftist. If you don't want it to be called leftist create a multiparty system. Until then don't throw around weak arguments and expect to be taken seriously because it sounds good.

        Amnesty doesn't give a shit of rights of all humans. It is the soft-power extension of western powers, and soft-power has been the domain of leftist parties in the west. It serves no value to India and has been kicked for consistently hiding its funding that directly comes from politicians in the USA and other western

    • Are they more credible than others?

      Actually, Amnesty do fact checking as far as I know, just like any news organisation. If it were easy to discredit Amnesty for making stuff up, they would not last very long. The Amnesty International journal has articles that I might call rather "worthy", but not specifically "lefty". If caring for people less fortunate than yourself is "lefty", then I would be happy to be called that.

  • Expected (Score:4, Interesting)

    by cygnusvis ( 6168614 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2020 @12:30PM (#60554044)
    The USA is the only country in the world where you have a protected freedom to ask any questions and get any information you want. In most other countries, you will be silenced by the government for asking hard questions. And look where the USA is now because of that.
    • Thank you first and second amendments for maintaining that privilege.

      • Re:Expected (Score:5, Insightful)

        by LatencyKills ( 1213908 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2020 @01:00PM (#60554166)
        Not so much the second anymore. Sure, the 2A guys hoard a lot of guns, but if they believe the government really worries about their guns when the Air Force can bomb you into non existence from 30kft, they're kidding themselves. It's mostly the media (and to a lesser extent the courts) that support the US right to ask hard questions.
        • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

          by jythie ( 914043 )
          Not much the second amendment ever. The whole 'to protect from the government' idea is a very recent idea, only dating back to white supremacists groups fighting back against new civil rights and integration laws that were being federally enforced. Historically, even in the very early post-revolution period the US government put down multiple armed rebellions within the US. Even when weapons technology was far more primitive and federal soldiers had the same equipment as insurrectionists, the later gro
          • Nah, there have been successful civil unrest events in the US, such as the Battle of Athens and the Bundy Standoff. Even in unsuccessful events you'll find an armed populace informing and flavoring the entire proceedings.

            And don't think the US military is ready at a moment's notice to turn on their own and start bombing and slaying. Any bomber pilot who's ready to unquestioningly drop ordnance on US cities is a fucking psychopath. Any series of events that leads to passably rational people engaging in
          • dating back to white supremacists

            Gun control is to keep guns away from minorities.

            Even when weapons technology was far more primitive and federal soldiers had the same equipment as insurrectionists, the later group still lost every time

            The USA gov cant use Arial bombardment or heavy artillery on its own citizens in a world where everything is on camera.

            • The USA gov cant use Arial bombardment

              Well, I would hope not. With the size of the defense budget, they should be able to at least use Helvetica.

    • The USA is the only country in the world where you have a protected freedom to ask any questions and get any information you want.

      This guy does not agree [denverpost.com] with you.

      In most other countries, you will be silenced by the government for asking hard questions.

      India is supposed to be the largest democracy in the world.

      • India is supposed to be the largest democracy in the world.

        Its supposed to be. A democracy without freedom of speech and the like is just a pretend democracy like China or the USA.

    • The USA is the only country in the world where you have a protected freedom to ask any questions and get any information you want. In most other countries, you will be silenced by the government for asking hard questions. And look where the USA is now because of that.

      Really? The leader of Her Majesty's Opposition in Parliament would beg to differ. I am not an important chap like Sir Keir Starmer, but I write all sorts of critical stuff about Bumbling Boris and his cabinet of fools, without any fear of hefty guys in dark suits banging my door down. The same probably goes for most countries in Europe.

  • by smooth wombat ( 796938 ) on Tuesday September 29, 2020 @01:00PM (#60554164) Journal
    Stereotypes exist for a reason and the stereotype of Indian men raping is well documented. Which is another reason Amnesty was told to leave. Wouldn't want people asking how the police know four men of a higher caste raped a woman of a lower caste, who subsequently died, but those men haven't been arrested [bbc.com], let alone charged.

    Or why 200 women took matters into their own hands [theguardian.com] when they killed the man responsible for a decade-long criminal gang who threatened, beat, killed and raped people in the village. This after police laughed at the women who reported being raped.

    No, wouldn't want any of those events to keep coming out. Better to sweep them under the rug and claim Amnesty is lying.
  • And just think, this is the regime that people keep pointing to as the other 'good' example of a country banning Tiktok
  • Thatâ(TM)s the claim being made about Amnesty. If true, how are they different from a news organisation?

    Follow the money.

  • Ever noticed on BBC:

    "Earthquake in the U.K., Government in action to help the victims." (Factual)

    "Earthquake in the U.S., let's see how the Government helps the victims." (Inferiority complex)

    "Earthquake in India, will the government help the victims?" (Superiority complex)

    Read some articles and verify yourself. Also, BBC covers surface news only, often for real important details about an event I have to Google for other sources esp. local news outlets.

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not "Eureka!" (I found it!) but "That's funny ..." -- Isaac Asimov

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