Articles

Today marks the 25th anniversary of the UN Committee against Torture, the guardian of one of the most widely accepted international human rights conventions. In a campaign for universal ratification of the Convention against Torture, several leading human rights organisations now call on the remaining 42 countries to join the treaty and recognize the full competence of the Committee against Torture.

We are writing to urge you to express the UK government's grave concern in relation to human rights abuses in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) when you meet the country's president, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, in the course of his forthcoming state visit to the United Kingdom.

Two human rights activists from the Gulf to receive Alkarama Award

Geneva – 26 September 2012 - "Imprisonment has never changed someone's ideas... Oppression has never postponed the coming of tomorrow" said last year's Alkarama Award laureate, Aida Saif Al Dawla of Egypt, in a video announcing the Alkarama Foundation's choice of two leading human rights figures from the Gulf region as the Laureates for the 2012 Alkarama Award.

The Paris court responsible for the consideration of the Algerian request for the extradition of Dr Mourad Dhina handed down its decision today.

The President of the trail chamber rejected the extradition request in a short deliberation, due to its lack of conformity with the 1964 extradition convention between Algeria and France and the French criminal procedure code.

According to the Convention against Torture, ratified by Lebanon in 2000, the term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having

On 17 January 2012, Alkarama submitted to the UN Special Procedures information regarding the arrest of Dr. Mourad Dhina and the extradition request made by the Algerian authorities, and asked them to urgently intervene with the French authorities. The four Special Rapporteurs who made an urgent appeal to the Permanent Mission of France in Geneva have received a response from the French authorities which aims to be "reassuring".