Latest news with #HRC
Maroc
a day ago
- Politics
- Maroc
HRC: Morocco Calls for Placing Human Rights at Heart of Anti-corruption Efforts
Morocco's Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations Office in Geneva, Omar Zniber, called on Friday for placing human rights at the heart of all anti-corruption initiatives. "A human rights-based approach remains the cornerstone of any effective anti-corruption strategy," Zniber stated at the opening of a high-level side event on "Human Rights and Anti-Corruption in Practice," held on the sidelines of the 59th session of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) in Geneva. "From Morocco's perspective, prevention must lie at the center of all efforts to eliminate this scourge from our societies," he noted at the event held by the core group behind the resolution on "The Negative Impact of Corruption on the Enjoyment of Human Rights." The diplomat underlined that the Marrakech Declaration, adopted in 2011, remains a "key roadmap" for states aiming to align anti-corruption efforts with human rights objectives. He further urged stronger synergy between the HRC's work and the monitoring of the declaration's implementation. He also highlighted Morocco's "significant progress" in the fight against corruption as part of its national effort to promote and protect human rights. He cited Morocco's 2011 Constitution, which introduced laws penalizing conflicts of interest, insider trading, and financial crimes, alongside the establishment of the National Authority for Integrity, Prevention, and Anti-Corruption. Reflecting on the impact of corruption, the diplomat warned that it "undermines social cohesion, erodes trust in public institutions, exacerbates inequality, and fosters conditions for the most serious human rights violations." "Effective policies to prevent and combat corruption are essential to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030," he said, adding that "States carry the primary responsibility to prevent and remedy human rights violations arising from corruption." This fundamental obligation was highlighted by the founding report of the Human Rights Council Advisory Committee in 2015, whose recommendations have since been incorporated into the Council's biannual resolution presented by Morocco on behalf of the core group, which also includes Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Poland, the United Kingdom, and Ecuador, the diplomat recalled. This year's resolution builds on progress made since 2015, aiming to clarify states' procedural and substantive obligations in upholding human rights within anti-corruption frameworks. The side event was co-organized by the resolution's sponsors, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Transparency International, and the UNCAC Coalition. It sought to foster stronger links between the implementation of the UN Convention against Corruption and international human rights mechanisms, offering practical tools and sharing experiences to help bridge the gap between anti-corruption efforts and human rights protection. MAP: 19 June 2025
The Star
4 days ago
- Health
- The Star
YAYASAN UEM BOOSTS LIFESAVING MEDICAL AID WITH RM2MIL CONTRIBUTION
From left: HRC director Dr Fairul Nizam Abu Salim, Yayasan UEM chief executive officer Aishah Nor, Yayasan UEM Board of Trustees member Datuk Amran Hafiz Affifudin, HPUSM director Prof Datuk Dr Ab Rahman Izaini Ghani, Health Ministry secretary-general Datuk Seri Suriani Ahmad, HCTM director Datuk Dr Azmi Baharudin, Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya state health director Dr Nor'Aishah Abu Bakar and UMMC director Prof Dr Nazirah Hasnan at the ceremony. — FAIHAN GHANI/The Star YAYASAN UEM, the philanthropic arm of UEM Group Bhd (UEM Group), has contributed RM2mil for the implementation of its annual Medical Assistance programme this year, bringing the total contributions nearing RM13.9mil since its inception in 2014. Entering its 12th year, the programme which to date has benefited more than 1,600 underprivileged patients from across Malaysia, continues to expand with Cheras Rehabilitation Hospital (HRC) under the Health Ministry joining as its fourth strategic partner. The programme's other existing strategic partners are University Malaya Medical Centre (UMMC), Hospital Canselor Tuanku Muhriz Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (HCTM) and Hospital Pakar Universiti Sains Malaysia (HPUSM). This year, each hospital has once again received a contribution of RM500,000 from Yayasan UEM which are used to procure life-saving medical devices such as pacemaker and breathing device, medications, treatment charges including those for chemotherapy as well as to facilitate high-cost, critical surgeries for each of the hospitals' underprivileged patients. The contribution ceremony for the 2025 Yayasan UEM Medical Assistance Programme was held at HRC, where Yayasan UEM chief executive officer Aishah Nor presented mock cheques to representatives of its strategic partners. This included Dr Faizul Nizam Abu Salim from HRC, Prof Dr Nazirah Hasnan from UMMC, Datuk Dr Azmi Baharudin from HCTM and Prof Datuk Dr Ab Rahman Izaini Ghani from HPUSM. At HRC specifically, the funding is used to procure a Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) device for its neurological rehabilitation treatment as well as to subsidise other rehabilitation costs for its patients to support their long-term recovery and health. The funding will also help cover rehabilitation costs for underprivileged asnaf and non-Muslim patients, ensuring they have equal access to essential treatment. Health Ministry secretary-general Datuk Seri Suriani Ahmad who graced the ceremony, said: 'This initiative is a testament to Yayasan UEM's commitment to expanding access to quality, inclusive and equitable rehabilitation care for all segments of society, in line with the principles of Malaysia Madani.' She also emphasised that the initiative marked a historic and meaningful step for both HRC and the Health Ministry as it is the only rehabilitation facility under ministry that provides comprehensive rehabilitation services for patients with stroke, spinal cord injuries, amputations and other conditions requiring long-term intervention. According to Aishah, Yayasan UEM is deeply committed to providing access to quality medical care for the underprivileged, especially against the backdrop of rising medical cost and inflation. 'Despite medical advancements, disparities in access to medical care persist in Malaysia, exacerbated by the recent Covid-19 pandemic. 'We believe that every individual has the right to access health and medical services. 'It is with this notion that we fully support the government's efforts to promote inclusive and sustained medical support and we hope to continue to make a meaningful difference in the lives of those who need it most,' she added. Also present to witness the ceremony were Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya state health director Dr Nor'Aishah Abu Bakar, as well as UEM Group managing director and Yayasan UEM Board of Trustees member Datuk Amran Hafiz Affifudin.
Asia Times
6 days ago
- Politics
- Asia Times
Francophone summit turns blind eye to Cambodia's cybercrime
The French-speaking world, as represented by the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), will be holding its summit in Cambodia in 2026. So what could possibly go wrong? Plenty, actually. The OIF, which has 93 members, held its last summit in France in 2024. It has not held the event in the Asia-Pacific region since 1997, when Vietnam played host. So the idea of holding the summit in a poor country that usually struggles for attention, such as Cambodia, is logical and laudable. But everything is in the timing. The decision to hold the summit in Siem Reap, Cambodia, was announced by French President Emmanuel Macron in October 2024. It comes alongside an increasing body of evidence that organized cyber-criminals are operating inside Cambodia with Cambodian government protection. The country is the 'absolute global epicenter' of transnational fraud in 2025 and is primed for further growth in cyber-criminality, according to research authored by Jacob Sims and published in May 2025 by the Humanity Research Consultancy (HRC), a UK-based group that campaigns to end modern slavery. The Cambodian government had denied the claims made in the HRC report. The research finds that the cyber-scam industry, which relies on the forced labor of the victims of human trafficking, generates US$12.5 billion to $19 billion per year, or as much as 60% of Cambodia's GDP. An estimated 150,000 people are involved in cyber scams in Cambodia, according to the report. The HRC confirms a wealth of other research that cybercrime on an industrial scale is taking place in Cambodia, as well as elsewhere in Southeast Asia. The HRC finds that 'endemic corruption, reliable protection by the government, and co-perpetration by party elites are the primary enablers of Cambodia's trafficking-cybercrime nexus.' 'Cambodian state institutions systematically and insidiously support and protect the criminal networks involved in transnational fraud and related human trafficking,' the report says. Many of those accused of playing leading parts or obscured but purposeful roles in organized cybercrime are either connected with the ruling regime or are its core members. Hun To, a cousin of Prime Minister Hun Manet, is a director of Huione Pay, a financial conglomerate which has been cut off from the US financial system due to its alleged role in cybercrime. Ly Yong Phat, a permanent member of the central committee of the ruling Cambodian People's Party, was sanctioned by the US Department of the Treasury in 2024 for human rights abuses of trafficked workers subjected to forced labor in online scam centers. Cambodia's legal system, universally acknowledged as being completely under government control, is powerless to tackle the situation. It ranked 141 out of 142 countries globally in the 2024 World Justice Project Rule of Law Index. Among lower-middle-income countries, Cambodia ranks 38th out of 38. The idea of a global French-speaking community is in itself a dubious colonial relic. During the colonial period, France concentrated the Southeast Asian version of its mission civilisatrice on Vietnam and paid relatively little attention to Cambodia and Laos, which together made up French Indochina. French missionaries in the 19th century devised a system for transcribing the Vietnamese language into Roman letters, known as quoc-ngo, which became the national standard. The use of Chinese characters to write Vietnamese was stamped out at French insistence. This was a compromise solution in face of the extreme view of some French colonialists that Vietnam should simply abandon its language with everyone being made to speak French. There was no such romanization of the Khmer language, and the idea that Cambodia is a meaningful part of a 'French-speaking world' is a tenuous fiction. Today, the OIF estimates that only about 3% of Cambodians speak French. The historical Western focus on Vietnam as the region's main player continued into the post-Khmer Rouge period. During the 1990s, senior diplomats such as the US Ambassador to Cambodia Kenneth Quinn were specialists on Vietnam, not Cambodia. Quinn believed that the Hun Sen regime, a result of the Vietnamese invasion of 1979, was the best way to bring lasting peace and stability to Cambodia. With the country now recognized as a hub for state-protected organized cybercrime, the project has clearly not gone to plan. The best possible outcome from the summit, which the organizers may hope for, would be for Cambodia to make a sustained effort to combat organized cybercrime. We can expect some high-profile raids on cyber-slavery compounds as part of the summit preparations. However, previous Cambodian compound raids have left the organizers untouched, and the compounds have simply reappeared elsewhere in the country. Victims of human trafficking who thought they had been rescued by the Cambodian police were sold back into slavery. The evidence that the compounds are operating under government protection indicates that the pattern is likely to be repeated. If the idea is to try to hold the summit in Cambodia to make amends for the disastrous French colonial record in Southeast Asia, this is hardly the way to do it. David Whitehouse is a freelance journalist who has lived in Paris for 30 years. He has both French and British nationality.
Car and Driver
12-06-2025
- Automotive
- Car and Driver
Acura Aims to Break Front-Wheel-Drive Record with Integra at Pikes Peak
Acura declared its goal of breaking the front-wheel-drive record at this year's Pikes Peak International Hill Climb using an Integra race car. The Integra Type S DE5 will be driven by Katherine Legge, whose 10:51:359 time in her rookie attempt last year was just over three seconds off the record. Acura is also supplying the pace car for the event, using the Integra Type S HRC Prototype that debuted at Monterey Car Week in 2024. While it may not have the same degree of cachet as races like the 24 Hours of Le Mans or Indianapolis 500, the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb is undoubtedly one of the most challenging racing events to occur each summer. Drivers scale nearly 5000 feet of elevation at breakneck speed, with often only a guardrail to prevent them from tumbling down the mountainside, before finishing at the summit, 14,115 feet above sea level. Now Acura, alongside Honda Racing Corporation (HRC), has announced its factory-backed entry into the Pikes Peak Hill Climb, declaring its goal of breaking the front-wheel-drive record with an Integra race car. Acura The Integra Type S DE5 race car will compete in the Time Attack 1 (TA1) division and will be piloted by Katherine Legge. This will be her second time ascending the mountain, and Legge—known for competing in IndyCar and IMSA—managed a top-five finish in the TA1 division last year, where she set a time of 10:51.359 on the 12.42-mile course. The result was just a few seconds behind the current front-wheel-drive record of 10:48.094, which was registered by Nick Robinson, an Acura engineer and Pikes Peak veteran, behind the wheel of a 500-hp TLX sedan in 2018. Clearly, Acura thinks that having come so close last year, and with a year's experience under her belt, Legge has what it takes to break Robinson's mark. Acura The Acura Integra Type S HRC Prototype. The official pace car for the hill climb will also be an Acura Integra, with the automaker electing to show off the yellow Integra Type S HRC Prototype. The HRC Prototype was unveiled last year at Monterey Car Week and previews a line of HRC performance parts that will be available for purchase in the near future. The HRC Prototype will be driven by U.S. Olympic bronze-medalist speed skater Rusty Smith, who last competed at the Winter Games in 2006. Acura says that Smith is a lover of both Honda and Acura cars, owning a first-generation yellow-over-yellow Acura NSX-T. Smith's appearance is tied to Honda's role as a partner for the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 2028 and a sponsor of Team USA. The 103rd running of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb will kick off on Sunday, June 22, with the green flag set to drop at 7:30 a.m. MDT. Caleb Miller Associate News Editor Caleb Miller began blogging about cars at 13 years old, and he realized his dream of writing for a car magazine after graduating from Carnegie Mellon University and joining the Car and Driver team. He loves quirky and obscure autos, aiming to one day own something bizarre like a Nissan S-Cargo, and is an avid motorsports fan.
Yahoo
10-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Hundreds rallying at Supreme Court demand Trump return disappeared gay asylum-seeker Andry Hernández Romero
In front of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., on Friday, about 300 people gathered to demand the return of someone the U.S. government erased. Keep up with the latest in + news and politics. Andry Hernández Romero — a 31-year-old gay Venezuelan asylum-seeker, actor, and makeup artist — fled to the United States legally in 2024 to escape homophobic persecution. He passed a credible fear interview and was preparing for his asylum hearing. But before that hearing could take place, the Trump administration deported him under a 2025 executive order invoking the Alien Enemies Act — a law from 1798 once used to imprison Japanese Americans during WWII. Related: Rachel Maddow sees Americans' active resistance as key to overcoming Donald Trump's strongman game Hernández Romero was sent to CECOT, El Salvador's notorious mega-prison, accused of gang affiliation based on two crown tattoos above the names of his mother and father. His attorneys say he had no criminal history. Immigration authorities never gave him a chance to respond. He was last seen in chains, crying out, 'I'm gay. I'm a stylist.' Since that day, there has been no proof of life. 'Andry is a son, a brother. He's an actor, a makeup artist. He is a gay man who fled Venezuela because it was not safe for him to live as his authentic self,' Lindsay Toczylowski, executive director of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, which is representing Hernández Romero, told the crowd. 'He's a dedicated member of a theater troupe that he has been in since he was seven years old… someone who put nothing but beauty and light into this world.' Related: 'We believe at this moment that he sits in a torture prison, a gulag in El Salvador,' she continued. 'We say 'believe' because we have not had any proof of life for him since the day he was put on a U.S. government-funded plane, forcibly disappeared.' HRC national press secretary Brandon Wolf, Immigrant Defenders Law Center executive director Lindsay Toczylowski, HRC senior VP Jonathan Lovitz and Crooked Media co-founder Jon Lovett speak at the U.S. Supreme Wiggins for The Advocate 'Andry is not alone,' she added. 'He is one of more than 235 men who were disappeared and rendered to CECOT with no due process… Many of them, like Andry, were in the middle of their asylum cases. They were denied their day in court. In an attempt to erase their very existence, they were sent to suffer in a prison that officials in El Salvador have bragged that people only leave in a coffin.' Jon Lovett, the Crooked Media co-founder and Pod Save America host, warned the crowd that the deportation program isn't over — and its logic is meant to desensitize the public. 'They're going to try to say it proves whatever bullshit they've been saying,' Lovett said, referring to the administration's claim, despite an order from the U.S. Supreme Court to return him, that deportees were out of the federal government reach. On Friday, the administration returned Maryland father Kilmar Abrego Garcia to the U.S. from El Salvador to face criminal charges that his attorney says are dubious. Related: 'What that tells us is two things. One, it means the pressure matters. They can pretend they're immune to politics and democracy — they are not. That's one. And two: they can send people back at any time they want. They can bring Andry back anytime they fucking want," Lovett said. He blasted DHS Secretary Kristi Noem for refusing to confirm whether Hernández Romero is alive. 'Kristi Noem, a mother, is asked to give proof of life. That's it. Proof of life that Andry, this innocent person who'd only touched the immigration system because he followed the rules, is alive — and she wouldn't do it.' Gay California U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia pleaded with Noem during a recent House hearing, during which she refused to acknowledge the concern about Hernández Romero. Sarah Longwell, the lesbian publisher of The Bulwark and a former longtime Republican political strategist, said the outrage many former conservatives feel over Hernández Romero's disappearance is rooted in values their party abandoned. 'The Republican Party that we grew up in understood that immigrants added tremendous value to our country,' she said. 'Ronald Reagan used to say… 'if you had freedom in your heart and you wanted to follow our laws, anybody can come to America from anywhere and become an American.'' Related: Kristi Noem won't say if gay asylum-seeker deported to El Salvador's 'hellhole' prison is still alive 'But the other thing we were raised on as young conservatives was fidelity to the Constitution,' she added. 'It was a belief in the rule of law and due process and equal treatment… And so what I want from us… is to remind Republicans that they're Americans first… and that the values this country was founded on, they still have to abide by.' Supporters gather at the U.S. Supreme Court in suport of the "Free Andry" movmement. Christopher Wiggins for The Advocate 'That's what we do when we don't forget about people like Andry,' Longwell said. 'They know it's wrong. And we should never let them forget what they're doing.' Tim Miller, her colleague at The Bulwark, issued a blunt indictment. 'We did this to Andry — not some crooked cop or some corporation or some foreign country. We did it,' he said. 'And so it is up to us to get him back.' He described scrolling through Hernández Romero's Instagram. 'It's a fucking tough scroll, to be honest, thinking about this nightmare that we put him through. But there's one caption that he wrote on one story. He said this: 'Always give more than what's expected of you because 80 percent of success is simply persistence. So, do not be afraid of failure. Be afraid of not trying.'' 'Donald Trump wants to dehumanize these folks,' Miller said. 'He wants to say that they are vermin, that they're thugs, that they're bringing fentanyl into the country, and he wants people to not care about them… but he's wrong about that.' Related: Longwell, Lovett, and Miller joined forces to host a joint The Bulwark and Crooked Media fundraising event and podcast taping on Friday evening at the Lincoln Theatre in D.C. to support the Immigrant Defenders Law Center in its fight for the rights of wrongfully deported Venezuelans, such as Hernández Romero. Rep. Mark Takano, a California Democrat who was the first gay person of color elected to Congress, invoked his family's own forced removal. 'The Alien Enemies Act was once used, along with other evil laws, to imprison my own parents and grandparents during World War II,' he said. 'Their only crime being Japanese American. No charges, no trial, just locked up and stripped of their dignity. And the trauma didn't end when the war did. It echoed through my family for generations.' Related: 'Now we see it happening again,' Takano said. 'The same fear, the same injustice, repackaged and rebranded, but just as cruel.' The Bulwark's Tim Miller and Sarah Longwell speak at the U.S. Supreme Court rally for Andry Wiggins for The Advocate He called Hernández Romero's deportation 'scapegoating,' not safety. 'Let's be crystal clear,' he said. 'We must repeal the Alien Enemies Act… because none of us gets to sit this out.' Jonathan Lovitz, the Human Rights Campaign's new senior vice president for campaigns and communications, delivered one of the rally's most impassioned speeches — honoring Hernández Romero while indicting the system that disappeared him. 'He's a vibrant soul who made the world beautiful just by being in it,' Lovitz said. 'You heard that in 2024, he fled Venezuela — not for opportunity, not for handouts — for survival. He was beaten, he was abused, and he was targeted for being an outspoken gay man. That was his crime.' Related: Lovitz condemned the weaponization of bureaucracy: 'No hearing, no justice — just vanished. That is cruelty. That is cowardice. And it is the product of a broken and weaponized system, one that treats human dignity like a paperwork error.' 'Our Constitution does not say due process only for citizens,' he added. 'It does not say only for the lucky. And it certainly does not say only for the white, the straight, and the tattoo-free. It says that all people — all people — deserve justice.' But in front of the Court, the message was simpler: Bring Andry home. 'If Andry isn't safe,' Lovitz said, 'none of us are. Not immigrants, not asylum-seekers, not gay or trans people, not any of us.' And as the chants of 'Free Andry' swept through the crowd, Lovitz's final words rang out: 'These colors don't run.'
