Some (mostly) human rights links and thoughts - Saturday 25th December, 2021

Some human rights (including significant, relevant links in other fields - such as geopolitics, democracy, or authoritarianism) links: 

• despite a notoriously backwards president, Brazil has shut down "illegal logging schemes in the Amazon that involved hundreds of companies";
  
• the genocidal military junta in power in Burma have used illegal  airstrikes against a village on the border with Thailand, causing thousands to flee;
  
• Russia has decided to abuse foreigners using medical xenophobia as a cover excuse; 
• a sporting event was - quite rightly, IMO - abandoned due to racist abuse by some spectators;
  
• confirmation that hormone therapy saves the lives of TGD kids as a US school's transphobia leads to $4 million damages, a sport changes its name to distance itself from a notorious transphobe, and a judge in India who admitted his bias and addressed that, has ordered "the Indian government and states to ban conversion therapy and to act against any person trying to "cure" homosexuality". Meanwhile, "the French first lady plans to sue over fake news that she was born male.";
  
• neochristian schools want to sack LGBT teachers and divorced women - and STILL have failed to introduce protections for LGBT students as was promised years ago;
  
• as China gives women some rights, sexism in India is causing death by suicide amongst housewives - and one Indian company is taking legal action against women who have protested against gig work rules that will reduce their income;  
• the USA has banned "imports from China’s Xinjiang over human rights abuses"; 
  
• so-called "security" forces in Sudan are reported to have raped and gang raped women and used live ammunition on protestors;
  
• criticism of Universities for their role in colonialism, neoliberalism, the climate crisis, etc - and how to change that . . . and a criticism of the way neoliberals have "directed" research; 
• "press freedom in Africa has suffered in 2021 due to growing authoritarianism and insecurity, especially in East Africa — the region most hostile to journalists on the continent";
  
• a call for Japan to stop militarily aiding the genocidaires in Burma;
• police in South Sudan are being trained in human rights, and community "collaborative policing" is happening in some African cities;  
• the European Union has started "new legal action against Poland over [the] rule of law";
  
• concern that human trafficking may surge as borders ease;
  
• the US Congress has "imperilled" human rights by not passing the "Build Back Better" bill; 
• food aid in Yemen is being cut to inadequate levels as funds run out; 
  
• Saudi Arabia is continuing its religious bigotry as Islamophobia continues to grow in Sri Lanka; 
• a Reuters exclusive reports that concerning allegations that violence and threats of extended incarceration are being used to force prisoners in Thailand to do harmful, unpaid labour to support for-profit companies are being investigated;
  
• "experts call for [the] immediate release of [a] Kashmiri human rights defender"; 
  
• a report on the fifteen year delay in closing money-laundering loopholes - which is pushing up house prices; 
  
• "a Victorian man and two companies have been charged with more than 250 animal cruelty offences over the deaths of dozens of koalas during a land clearing operation" (while appalling cruelty has undoubtedly occurred, to prevent potential abuses of power persons charged are presumed innocent unless proved otherwise beyond reasonable doubt in a court law).