TORONTO, July 04, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — LNG Energy Group Corp. (TSXV: LNGE) (TSXV: LNGE.WT) (OTCQB: LNGNF) (FWB: E26) (the “Company” or “LNG Energy Group”) announces that the Failure-to-File Cease Trade Orders in Multiple Jurisdictions (FFTCO) continues and that the Company expects to file the Company’s annual audited financial statements for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, the related management’s discussion and analysis, and the CEO and CFO certificates relating to the audited annual financial statements as required by National Instrument 52-109 – Certification of Disclosure in Issuers’ Annual and Interim Filings (collectively, the “Required Documents”) for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, within the timeframe granted by the Ontario Securities Commission (the “OSC”). Such filings will constitute the Company’s application to have the FFCTO revoked. There can be no assurance that the FFCTO will be revoked on the timeline contemplated by the Company.
As part of the strategic review process the Company announced on December 04, 2024, the Company has contemplated with its financial and legal advisors a number of alternatives including financings, corporate reorganization, strategic partnerships, acquisitions, assets spin-offs and/or farm-outs, sale, and other forms of business combination. As part of this process, the Company has decided to terminate the long-term Gas Sales Agreements in place, and it will evaluate natural gas marketing alternatives more in tune with its current sales volumes and present market conditions. Lenders under the Credit Agreement have notified the Company of an event of default under its Credit Agreement, and LNG Energy Group and the lenders are in conversations about the situation. The Company’s Colombian branch applied for admittance into the Proceso de Recuperación Empresarial (“PRES”) as regulated under the Colombia Law 2437 of 2024, for insolvency protection, which should result in operations optimization and renegotiation of obligations with suppliers and other parties.
LNG Energy Group continues with its initiatives to stabilize natural gas production, optimize costs and enhance its liquidity position. We expect to announce soon the results of this comprehensive strategic review process.
AboutLNGEnergyGroup
The Company is focused on the acquisition and development of natural gas production and exploration assets in Latin America. For more information, please visit www.lngenergygroup.com.
This news release contains certain forward-looking information that reflect the current views and/or expectations of management of LNG Energy Group with respect to performance, business and future events. Forward-looking information can often be identified by words such as “may”, “will”, “would”, “could”, “should”, “believes”, “estimates”, “projects”, “potential”, “expects”, “plans”, “intends”, “anticipates”, “targeted”, “continues”, “forecasts”, “designed”, “goal”, or the negative of those words or other similar or comparable words. Forward-looking statements are based on the then-current expectations, beliefs, assumptions, estimates and forecasts about the business and the industry and markets in which LNG Energy Group operates. Forward-looking information involves known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking information, readers should not place undue reliance on such information. The risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the anticipating timing of filing the Required Documents. Forward-looking information is current as of the date it is made and is based on reasonable estimates and assumptions made by us at the relevant time in light of our experience and perception of historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments, as well as other factors that we believe are appropriate and reasonable in the circumstances. LNG Energy Group does not undertake any obligation to release publicly any revisions for updating any voluntary forward-looking statements, except as required by applicable securities law.
Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.
Since his second inauguration in January, Donald Trump has issued more than 160 executive orders. These orders permit the US president to make directives concerning the workings of the federal government without the need to pass laws in Congress. All US presidents have used them, including George Washington, but Trump has issued his orders at an unprecedented rate.
A number of these have courted controversy. But one stands out in particular: executive order 14160. This was signed on the day of his inauguration, January 20, and seeks to end birthright citizenship for children born in the US where the parents are in the country illegally or on temporary visas.
The purpose of this order was to redefine the scope of the 14th amendment to the constitution. This states that: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” Trump’s executive order sets limits on that principle.
Due to the order’s conflict with the constitution, various district courts have issued what are known as “universal injunctions”, blocking the order. In response to these injunctions, the government brought a case in the Supreme Court: Trump v Casa. The Trump administration argues that district judges should not have the power to issue such wide-ranging injunctions which effectively limit the president’s power.
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On June 27 the Supreme Court delivered its judgment. It found in favour of the government, holding that: “Universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts.” The court stopped short of banning them outright – but it effectively limited the extent to which courts could issue a universal block on the president’s executive orders.
The judgment did not decide on the constitutionality of the executive order itself, but focused solely on the limits of judicial power to block presidential actions more broadly. So the question of birthright citizenship remains unresolved.
People affected can bring personal lawsuits and there is also the avenue of “class action suits” in which a number of people who have grouped together with common cause and been have been ruled by a judge to constitute a “class” can seek legal relief. The New York Times has reported that plaintiffs are how preparing to refile suits to challenge executive order 14160.
But the issue raises questions about the Supreme Court. In the US, the nine Supreme Court justices are nominated by the president, and inevitably bring a corresponding political outlook to their work. Currently, there are six conservative judges – three of whom were appointed by Trump in his first term of office – and three liberal judges.
In Trump v Casa, the court divided on ideological lines. The six conservative judges supported the majority view, while the three liberal judges dissented. This was not entirely unexpected. But the ruling raises the more fundamental question about the vital constitutional role that courts play in acting as a check on government power.
Cornerstone of democracy
In democracies around the world, constitutional principles ensure that power is exercised according to law and that the various holders of legislative, executive, and judicial power do not exceed their authority. Central to these arrangements is the role of the courts. While judges must be careful not to involve themselves in the policy decisions of government, or the law-making deliberations of a legislature, it is their duty to ensure the executive does not act unlawfully or the legislature unconstitutionally.
Case reports across the world are littered with examples of judges reviewing and, on occasion, striking down government or legislative action as unlawful. In the US, the seminal case of Marbury v Madison (1803) which established, for the first time, that the Supreme Court should have the power to strike down an act of Congress as unconstitutional, has served as a beacon of this principle for over 200 years. In the UK, the Supreme Court’s finding in R(Miller) v Prime Minister that the government’s 2019 prorogation of parliament was unlawful provides a notable example of the continued importance of this role.
The balance that the courts must strike in not interfering in the policy decisions of government on the one hand, and their fundamental role in acting as a check on the lawful use of power on the other is at the heart of Trump v Casa. In the Supreme Court’s written majority opinion, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, held that the use of “universal injunctions” by the district courts was an example of judicial overreach. She wrote that federal judges were going beyond their powers in seeking to block the universal application of the executive order.
The dissenting three liberal justices issued a minority opinion saying that this finding was at odds with the rule of law. Indeed, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the ruling in Trump v Casa “cannot coexist with the rule of law. In essence, the Courts has now shoved lower court judges out of the way in cases where executive actions is challenged, and has gifted the Executive with the prerogative of sometimes disregarding the law.”
The finding of the Supreme Court, in other words, has arguably limited the extent to which the courts in America can serve as a check on the exercise of executive power. Trump hailed the Supreme Court’s decision as a “giant win”, while attorney general Pam Bondi said it would “stop the endless barrage of nationwide injunctions against President Trump”.
Here’s the nub of the affair: while courts must be able to act as a check on the lawfulness of government action, at the same time, a government must be able to govern without too frequent or too onerous obstructions from the judiciary and this finding potentially gives the Trump administration greater room for manoeuvre.
But there is a further issue. As mentioned, US Supreme Court justices are nominated by the president. With the justices of the court being divided on political lines in Trump v Casa, questions can fairly be asked about the propriety of this arrangement – and whether it was always inevitable that one day there would be a Supreme Court in which the people might lose faith because they felt that it was more beholden to ideology than the law.
This is a potentially dangerous moment in the US. The independence of the judiciary has long been a bulwark against abuses of power – and has been regarded as such by the US people. Having judges nominated by those holding political office arguably hinders that independence – and, as the judgment in this case suggests, could throw into jeopardy the invaluable role that the courts play in keeping the exercise of government power in check.
John Stanton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Lawmakers and school boards across the country have established policies that limit what schools can teach about gender, sexuality and reproductive health.Alexmia/iStock via Getty Images
Behind the loud debate lies a quiet contradiction. Many parents who say sex education should be taught only at home don’t actually provide it there, either.
Comprehensive sex education delays sexual activity, increases contraceptive use and reduces teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted infection rates. It has a complex history, but has long received bipartisan support.
In June 2025, the Trump administration ordered California to remove gender-identity materials from sex education lessons or risk losing over US$12 million in federal funding.
In 2023, Florida expanded its Parental Rights in Education, also known as the “Don’t Say Gay” law, to extend limits on discussing sexual orientation and gender identity to all K–12 grades. The law states that sex can be defined only as strictly binary, limits discussions of gender and sexuality, imposes rules on pronoun use and increases school board authority over curricula.
Local school boards in states such as Florida, Idaho, Tennessee and Utah have removed textbooks, cut health courses and banned books with LGBTQ+ themes. Conservative, local school boards are reshaping sex education nationwide even though the vast majority of Americans oppose efforts to restrict books in public schools and are confident in public schools’ selection of books.
Who’s having the talk?
A national survey on parental attitudes and beliefs about school-based sex education revealed that some families do not practice what they preach. diane39/iStock via Getty Images
As laws limit teaching about sex, gender and identity, I wanted to explore whether parents are stepping in to fill the gaps.
About 10% of the surveyed parents said sex education should happen only at home. Those parents were also most likely to say they “almost never” or “never” discussed sex, sexuality and romance with their children.
By contrast, parents who supported comprehensive, school-based sex ed were significantly more likely to discuss subjects including consent, contraception, identity and healthy relationships at home.
The survey also found that parents who opposed comprehensive sex education were more likely to believe commonly circulated misinformation, such as the idea that talking about sex encourages early sexual activity and that condoms are not effective.
These preliminary findings align with a robust body of peer-reviewed literature suggesting that parents who are more resistant to school-based sex ed are also less likely and less equipped to have open, informed conversations at home.
These findings point to a gap between expert recommendations and what parents do.
Teenagers learn about sex online, and pornography is among the top sources of information. redhumv?E+ via Getty Images
A 2022 report from Common Sense Media found that nearly half of teens report learning about sex online, with pornography among the top sources.
Research indicates that even when schools and families avoid topics related to sexuality, young people still encounter sexual content. Yet, advocacy groups such as Moms for Liberty support the removal of what it considers “age-inappropriate” or “sexually explicit” materials from classrooms and school libraries.
The absence of structured, accurate education likely has implications for public health. According to the CDC, individuals ages 15 to 24 account for nearly half of all new sexually transmitted infections in the U.S.
LGBTQ+ youth are especially vulnerable to sexually transmitted infections and related health challenges. This vulnerability is compounded in regions with limited access to inclusive education.
A 2023 CDC report found that students who receive inclusive sex education feel more connected to school and experience lower rates of depression and bullying. These benefits are especially critical for LGBTQ+ youth.
As debates over sex education continue, I believe it’s important for policymakers, school boards and communities to weigh parental input and public health data.
I am the author of the book, “A Modern Approach to the Birds and the Bees” which I mentioned in the article and do benefit from its sale.
Conservatives have won two important battles in their decades-long campaign against Planned Parenthood, a network of affiliated clinics that are the largest provider of reproductive health services in the U.S.
One of these victories was a U.S. Supreme Court ruling handed down on June 26, 2025. The other is a provision in the multitrilion-dollar tax-and-spending package President Donald Trump has made his top legislative priority. Both follow the same strategy: depriving Planned Parenthood – and all other providers of abortion care – from getting reimbursed by Medicaid, the government health insurance program that mainly covers low-income adults and children, as well as people with disabilities.
I see in both the legislation and the court’s ruling a culmination of a strategy to defund Planned Parenthood that was in full swing by 2007, toward the end of the George W. Bush administration. This campaign hinges on a strategy of insisting that federal and state dollars are supporting abortion care when they do not.
One of the bill’s provisions will make it impossible for patients with Medicaid coverage to get any health care services at clinics like Planned Parenthood.
The provision will last only for a year.
The House approved the same version of the package that the Senate had passed a week after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states cannot be sued by patients if they make it impossible for Planned Parenthood clinics to be reimbursed by Medicaid.
The case, Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, arose when a South Carolina woman wanted to get gynecological care at her local Planned Parenthood clinic. The rationale South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster gave for the state’s policy was that Planned Parenthood is an abortion provider.
South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster stands outside the Supreme Court building in Washington in April 2025 and speaks about his state’s legal dispute regarding Medicaid funding for health care at Planned Parenthood clinics. Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images
Medicaid and abortion
To be clear, neither the legal dispute nor the provision in the legislative package had anything to do with the use of federal or state dollars to fund abortion.
Although Planned Parenthood offers abortion where and when it is legal, this provision and the court’s decision concern Medicaid reimbursement for all other services. Abortion care is not covered by Medicaid under federal law except in cases of rape, incest or a threat to the pregnant patient’s life.
Medicaid patients instead have relied on their plan at Planned Parenthood clinics when they get annual exams, prenatal care, mental health support, birth control, treatment for sexually transmitted infections, cervical cancer screenings and fertility referrals.
None of those services will be covered by Medicaid for a year. Patients will have to find another health care provider – as long as one is available.
While that provision is in effect, Medicaid won’t be allowed to reimburse Planned Parenthood for any services, mirroring what states just won the right to do in the Supreme Court ruling – but at the national level.
Although the bill blocks Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood for only 12 months, the ruling lets states exclude any provider from its Medicaid program because they also provide abortions.
In other words, people who rely on Medicaid funding will lose access to all of those essential services not just at Planned Parenthood but potentially at any other providers that also offer abortion care.
Abortion-rights demonstrators holds a sign in front of the Supreme Court building in Washington as the Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic case is heard on April 2, 2025. Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images
U.S. Rep. Mike Pence introduced the first federal legislation aimed at “defunding” Planned Parenthood in 2007. It failed to muster enough support in Congress to become law. States such as Texas then started down that path.
The first national legislative success came in 2015. Both houses of Congress passed a budget reconciliation measure with a provision to defund Planned Parenthood that year, but President Barack Obama vetoed it. Republicans had threatened to shut down the government over those demands. A year later, the GOP included a call to defund Planned Parenthood in its presidential campaign platform.
Before Obama left office, his administration passed a rule in December 2016 protecting federal funds for family planning for health care facilities that also provided abortion. The Trump administration rolled back that rule in 2017.
The Trump administration relied on an argument that any support for a health care provider that offers patients abortion services, no matter how segregated the sources of funding, is tantamount to subsidizing abortion.
What to expect next
Nationally, 16 million women of reproductive age rely on Medicaid, and 1 in 5 women will visit a Planned Parenthood clinic for health care at least once in their lives. Those clinics depend on Medicaid reimbursement to offer an array of reproductive health care services, such as prenatal care, that are not tied to abortion.
If Planned Parenthood clinics can’t bill Medicaid for those services, many will close. Planned Parenthood estimates that it could see almost 200 closures – 90% of them in states where abortion is legal. That means over 1 million low-income people risk losing access to their health care provider.
And once clinics close, they may never reopen, U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, a Washington Democrat, recently predicted.
Should the number of Planned Parenthood clinics plummet, it will threaten access to contraceptives, which are all the more important in preventing unwanted pregnancies for people living in states that have banned abortion. Researchers have repeatedly found that unwanted pregnancies, when people are denied access to abortion services, are correlated with increased debt, missed educational and employment opportunities, mental health problems, and diminished care for a family’s older children.
In addition, pregnant patients and new parents may have more limited options for prenatal and postnatal care. That could cause the country’s already-high rates of maternal and infant mortality to increase.
Rachel Rebouché does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The U.S. Capitol is seen shortly after the Senate passed its version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 1, 2025. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
As the U.S. House of Representatives voted to approve President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic tax and spending package, many critics are wondering how the president retained the loyalty of so many congressional Republicans, with so few defections.
Just three Republican senators – the maximum allowed for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to still pass – voted against the Senate version of the bill on July 1, 2025. In the House, only two Republicans voted against the bill, which passed the chamber on July 3.
Trump is not the first president to bend Congress to his will to get legislation approved.
Presidential supremacy over the legislative process has been on the rise for decades. But contrary to popular belief, lawmakers are not always simply voting based on blind partisanship.
Increasingly, politicians in the same political party as a president are voting in line with the president because their political futures are as tied up with the president’s reputation as they have ever been.
Even when national polling indicates a policy is unpopular – as is the case with Trump’s budget reconciliation bill, which an estimated 55% of American voters said in June they oppose, according to Quinnipiac University polling – lawmakers in the president’s party have serious motivation to follow the president’s lead.
Or else they risk losing reelection.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson speaks to reporters at the Capitol building on July 3, 2025. Alex Wong/Getty Images
Lawmakers increasingly partisan on presidential policy
Over the past 50 years, lawmakers in the president’s party have increasingly supported the president’s position on legislation that passes Congress. Opposition lawmakers, meanwhile, are increasingly united against the president’s position.
These patterns are unheard of in the modern Congress. In 2022, for example – a year of significant legislative achievement for the Biden administration – the Democratic majority in Congress voted the same way as the Democratic president 99% of the time. Republicans, meanwhile, voted with Biden just 19% of the time.
Elections can tell us why
Over the past half-century, the two major parties have changed dramatically, both in the absolutist nature of their beliefs and in relation to one another.
Both parties used to be more mixed in their ideological outlooks, for example, with conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans playing key roles in policymaking. This made it easier to form cross-party coalitions, either with or against the president.
A few decades ago, Democrats and Republicans were also less geographically polarized from each other. Democrats were regularly elected to congressional seats in the South, for example, even if those districts supported Republican presidents such as Nixon or Ronald Reagan.
These changes have ushered in a larger phenomenon called political nationalization, in which local political considerations, issues and candidate qualifications have taken a back seat to national politics.
Ticket splitting
From the 1960s through most of the 1980s, between one-quarter and one-half of all congressional districts routinely split tickets – meaning they sent a politician of one party to Congress while supporting a different party for president.
These are the same few districts in Nebraska and New York, for example, that supported former Vice President Kamala Harris for president in 2024 but which also elected a Republican candidate to the House that same year.
Since the Reagan years, however, these types of districts that could simultaneously support a Democratic presidential nominee and Republicans for Congress have gone nearly extinct. Today, only a handful of districts split their tickets, and all other districts select the same party for both offices.
The past two presidential elections, in 2020 and 2024, set the same record low for ticket splitting. Just 16 out of 435 House districts voted for different parties for the House of Representatives and president.
Members of Congress follow their voters
The political success of members of Congress has become increasingly tied up with the success or failure of the president. Because nearly all Republicans hail from districts and states that are very supportive of Trump and his agenda, following the will of their voters increasingly means being supportive of the president’s agenda.
Not doing so risks blowback from their Trump-supporting constituents. A June 2025 Quinnipiac University poll found that 67% of Republicans support the bill, while 87% of Democrats oppose it.
These electoral considerations also help explain the unanimous opposition to Trump’s legislation by the Democrats, nearly all of whom represent districts and states that did not support Trump in 2024.
Thanks to party polarization in ideologies, geography and in the electorate, few Democrats could survive politically while strongly supporting Trump. And few Republicans could do so while opposing him.
But as the importance to voters of mere presidential support increases, the importance of members’ skill in fighting for issues unique to their districts has decreased. This can leave important local concerns about, for example, unique local environmental issues or declining economic sectors unspoken for. At the very least, members have less incentive to speak for them.
Charlie Hunt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments
News story
Nationwide clampdown on delivery riders working illegally
Ramp-up of arrests and visits set to take place across the UK targeting migrants working illegally in the gig economy
Immigration enforcement van
Enforcement teams are gearing up to launch a nationwide blitz targeting illegal working hotspots, with a focus on the gig economy and migrants working as delivery riders.
Under the Government’s Plan for Change to restore order to the immigration system and tougher enforcement of the rules, Home Office Immigration Enforcement teams will launch a major operation to disrupt this type of criminality.
Strategic, intel-driven activity will bring together officers across the UK and place an increased focus on migrants suspected of working illegally whilst in taxpayer funded accommodation or receiving financial support.
The law is clear that asylum seekers are only entitled to this support if they would otherwise be destitute. That is why anyone caught flagrantly abusing the system in this way, as a result of the operation, will face having support discontinued, whether that’s entitlement to accommodation or payments.
Operational teams will target certain hotspots across the country over a period of intensification, as well as going after organisations who wilfully employ those working illegally, through civil penalty referrals. Any business found to be illegally employing someone could face a fine of up to £60,000 per worker, director disqualifications and potential prison sentences of up to five years.
The Government has been surging action against illegal working since coming into power one year ago, with 10,031 illegal working visits leading to 7,130 arrests, marking a 48% and 51% rise respectively, compared to the year before (5 July 2023 to 28 June 2024). This marks the first time in a 12-month period where more than 10,000 visits have taken place.
748 illegal working civil penalty notices were also handed to businesses caught violating immigration rules in the first quarter (January to March) of the year, marking the highest level since 2016 – an 81% increase compared to the same time last year.
And the Government is tightening the law by making it a legal requirement for all companies, including the gig economy, to check anyone working for them has the legal right to do so. This will end the abuse of flexible working arrangements. The new measures will be introduced through the landmark Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, said:
Illegal working undermines honest business and undercuts local wages – the British public will not stand for it and neither will this government.
Often those travelling to the UK illegally are sold a lie by the people smuggling gangs that they will be able to live and work freely in this country, when in reality they end up facing squalid living conditions, minimal pay and inhumane working hours.
We are surging enforcement action against this pull factor, on top of returning 30,000 people with no right to be here and tightening the law through our Plan for Change.
But there is no single solution to the problem of illegal migration. That’s why we’ve signed landmark agreements with international partners to dismantle gangs and made significant arrests of notorious people smugglers.
Director of Enforcement, Compliance and Crime, Eddy Montgomery, said:
Our dedicated Immigration Enforcement officers have been ramping up action to disable illegal working across the board.
This next step of co-ordinated activity will target those who seek to work illegally in the gig economy and exploit their status in the UK.
That means if you are found to be working with no legal right to do so, we will bring the full force of powers available to us to disrupt and stop this abuse. There will no place to hide.
This targeted action is on top of ongoing work across the country to disrupt people flouting the rules across different sectors.
Earlier this week, during a joint operation with the Metropolitan Police to go after people suspected of working illegally as cash in hand builders, officers targeted anti-social behaviour and illegally modified scooters and e-bikes. 20 Indian nationals were arrested as part of the operation. This included 16 overstayers, one illegal entrant, one port absconder and two small boat arrivals.
On 18 June, West Midlands teams conducted an operation on Smethwick High Street after receiving intelligence on a major collection point for people suspected of going to work illegally, primarily on construction sites. The team encountered 73 individuals, arresting 26 suspected immigration offenders (24 Indian nationals, one Nepalese national and one Italian national). This led to the detention of 11 Indian nationals.
And on 12 June, East of England teams conducted a multi-agency operation with police in Lynn Road, Wisbech, focusing on cash in hand builders using illegally modified e-bikes. They carried out 21 immigration checks which resulted the arrest of three men, including one Syrian, one Chinese and one Brazilian national. The police went on to seize six mopeds and one car for offences including driving with no insurance, no driving licence and disqualification.
The crackdown also sits alongside key join up with the delivery industry on tackling illicit account sharing. On Monday, 30 June , the Home Office and Department for Business and Trade met with major delivery firms and pledged to strengthen security checks to tackle illegal working. Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eat have committed to increasing the number of daily facial recognition checks riders are required to take to verify their identity.
Illegal working is linked to exploitation, with teams often encountering squalid living conditions, people receiving little to no pay and inhumane working hours. In the worst instances, these individuals may be victims of modern slavery.
Immigration Enforcement take a number of steps to spot the signs of individuals who are potentially being exploited and, where appropriate, will refer people to the National Referral Mechanism so they can access support. They also work closely with crucial partners like the Gangmasters Labour Abuse Authority, to share insights and strengthen the approach to tackling labour exploitation.
And this new operation is just one part of the government’s action to strengthen UK border security and disable the people smuggling gangs fuelling illegal migration.
Over the past year, the Prime Minister has been resetting relationships and forging partnerships across Europe and beyond, to ensure a targeted international response in breaking the model behind this vile trade.
Furthermore, nearly 30,000 people with no right to be in UK have been returned, landmark agreements have been signed with Iraq to dismantle gangs and Italy to take down illicit finance networks and a world-first people smuggling sanctions regime has been launched to ban travel and freeze assets.
In 1962, poet and Auschwitz survivor Yehiel Dinur took the stand in Jerusalem in the trial of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann. Dinur was a much-anticipated witness, bearing the audience’s hope this man, a poet, would be able to explain – to capture and to transmit – the experience of Auschwitz, and of the Holocaust; that he could speak the unspeakable. Prosecutor Gideon Hausner hoped such a witness might “do justice to the six million personal tragedies”.
Dinur used the name Katzetnik 135633 in his writings, also translated as “Prisoner 135663”. On the stand, he said: “I believe wholeheartedly that I have to continue to bear this name until the world awakens.”
Awakening, understanding, empathy and change are the sentiments many survivors hope for, or ask for, during and after periods of trauma. The 20th century saw many of those pleas. The 21st century has done no better at honouring the promise, captured in the title of the 1984 Argentinian commission report on forced disappearances, Nunca Mas: never again. No matter how many such pleas appear before the courts, before the aggressors, before those in solidarity, the horrors of war, torture, starvation and genocide seem to happen again – and again.
Three recent books from the region where war was been raging since the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7 2023, and the ensuing war on Gaza, are part of these pleas.
Review: Eyes on Gaza – Plestia Alaqad (Macmillan), Letters from Gaza – edited by Mohammed Al-Zaqzooq & Mahmoud Alshaer (Penguin), Gates of Gaza – Amir Tibon (Scribe)
Eyes on Gaza is an on-the-ground account of the death and destruction of the first 45 days of the war by now 23-year-old Palestinian journalist Plestia Alaqad, who moved to Melbourne with her family in November 2023. Letters from Gaza is a collection of 50 stories, poems and fragments from Palestinian writers enduring the past 20 months. And Gates of Gaza is the story of Israeli journalist Amir Tibon, a resident of Nahal Oz, one of the border kibbutz attacked by Hamas on October 7.
Plestia Alaqad. Plestia
These are all first-person testimonies of experiences of being under attack, though those attacks differ. We might say they fit into the genre adopted in truth commissions, such as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa: a response to the nation’s years of living under the apartheid laws, discarded when Nelson Mandela took power in 1994.
The commission was one effort to heal from this past. But, like the Eichmann trial, it needed stories to explain the histories of violence, and it needed the pain to be voiced to explain its impacts on communities, families and relationships.
The use of people’s narratives to “bear witness” to the complex layers of legally sanctioned and militarily executed pain, loss and the traumas they can produce, is sometimes effective in helping audiences understand them. The Bringing Them Home Report in 1997 used this form to explain the incidence and impacts of the forced removal of Indigenous children by the Australian state. It was effective as one form of creating a shared reality for all in Australia, who then understood the term “stolen generations” and the pain, loss and genocidal intent to which this phrase refers.
More recently, the Yoorrook Justice Commission in Victoria, Australia’s first formal truth-telling inquiry into historic and ongoing systemic injustices perpetrated against First Nations Peoples by colonisation, has also brought histories of loss, dispossession and abuse to light, using stories. Stories can make sense of the impact incurred through the intertwined web of policies, statistics, discrimination and quotidian violence at the hands of the state.
The work of testimony
The narratives in these books written since October 7 2023 are part of this genre of testimony or storytelling. But at least two of these books are not attempting to explain the past. They might be described better as pleas to stop what the International Court of Justice has called “a plausible genocide” happening in the present.
They are, in one reading, wishes for the world to understand the experience of pain, rage, loss, fear, distress and defeat that accompanies destruction and unbearable loss. A wish for the world to hear, or perhaps feel, the words on the page – and make the pain stop.
They wish the world would “awaken” to what is happening right now.
The dynamic of awakening is the stock in trade of truth commissions. One party testifies or speaks to an experience, and the audience wakes up to what has been happening. As a result, they either change or facilitate change. The truth, captured as testimony, is supposed to set people free. Not just the speaker, but the community of speakers weighed down by history – or by the struggles of the past or the present.
In legal forms the reason to speak is clear. The reason to speak in literature, biographies and works of nonfiction is less clear. What does the author want from us, the readers? But perhaps more importantly, what can we offer?
She wants the genocide to stop. She wants a free Palestine. She wants her home and her life back. The stories in this book show readers outside Gaza some of the life and death of those first six and a half weeks.
Her last entry before she leaves Gaza for Egypt – and then Australia – is dated Day 45. During those 45 days, she puts on a press helmet and jacket, which both give her protection and weigh her down. And then she speaks: to cameras, to followers, to anyone who will listen. Her social media feeds documenting the war gained worldwide attention, her Instagram following rising from around 3,700 to 4.1 million today.
There are too many deaths to be witnessed – by her and the reader. She describes genocide as an understatement for what is occurring in Gaza: “we lose more people than our hearts can handle”. She has seen so much death, heard so many screams. By day 30,
all you can hear is a voice crying for help from under the rubble. You turn your back and walk away, because there’s nothing you can do to help.
But Plestia’s project is more than documenting death. She is careful to show many aspects of life in Gaza. She shows how Palestinians retain relationships, family and pets. How a young boy just needs his “pot plant” from his destroyed house, under skies filled with drones and bombs. This is a plea for the genocide to stop, but it is also a celebration of being Palestinian. It is an homage to life in Gaza.
It is also a plea to see Palestinians as more than numbers – and more than how they are depicted by Israel.
“The world,” she says, “sometimes treats us like terrorists, trying to justify its complacency in allowing us to be massacred. And we know the perception, we read the propaganda just like everyone else. But the reality is that we’re the opposite.”
She describes gentle moments of love and care between her fellow journalists and the people they interview. The children they bring sweets for, the “bird lady” who renames her tortoise “Plestia” after her. Both Plestia the tortoise and the “bird lady” are now living in a tent. She speaks of the doctors who work tirelessly.
In the midst of brutal amputations and unimaginable burns, she recounts the care of a doctor giving cream for a skin rash that has tormented her, diagnosed as a product of her anxiety. Anxiety seems a gentle diagnosis for symptoms produced by witnessing and documenting such brutality.
Anxiety over her helplessness, perhaps, over the lack of sleep, of nourishing food: dwindling even in those first 45 days. Anxiety seems like a Western preoccupation, from this writing distance. What Plestia experiences seems more like layers of embodied distress. Her empathy allows her to feel, perhaps too much. Empathy can be an enemy.
Around page 100, she begins to deteriorate. “It’s funny how genocide changes a person,” she writes, describing herself as “Genocide Plestia”. She’s devastated, exhausted. She has lost hope. The journal entries are shorter, more repetitive.
They recite her helplessness with what Jacqueline Rose, co-director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, has called the “repetitive thud of referentiality”.
You feel Plestia’s effort to try to speak with some life in the pages, to use writing as a therapeutic tool. You wish it for her, but she has trouble summoning the energy, the life, any hope. As she poignantly quips: “Fake it till you make it doesn’t work during a Genocide”. What is there to say in such relentless days of loss?
You want Plestia to get up, you want a happy ending, for a conclusion to the painful story, but the problem is time. The reader’s time, the reality of time since she wrote her book.
Day 45, her last day in Gaza, is Monday November 20 2023. I read this book in June 2025, 646 days later – and it hasn’t stopped. When Plestia leaves Gaza and finally arrives here in Melbourne, the conditions she describes have been ongoing for more than 20 months. A recently released survey by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research estimates almost 84,000 people died in Gaza between October 2023 and early January 2025, as a result of the war. And that was six months ago.
50 letters from Gaza
The numbers are a way of reducing the experience of grief, devastation, loss (and the viewer’s guilt) to simple digits. Digits have no face and no sound. This is helpful to viewers, but it does not do justice to the 84,000, as Gideon Hausner knew well. No one awakens by hearing the numbers. But they matter.
In Letters from Gaza, psychologist Ahmed Mortaja fears becoming a news story, “a dull number … I don’t want my name and my family name to be reduced to mere numbers, whether odd or even”.
This book, a fragmented collection of 50 poems, stories and accounts, is devoted to giving life to those numbers. To animating the loss, so readers can apply their own imaginations, so we can understand the incomprehensible. It is a collection of fragments of lives since October 7 2023, squeezed into expressive pages. There is no “letter” more than six pages long. They are backed up against each other, permeating one another.
Each letter tells a different story and the same story. Each finds a detail that has no language: flowers in a girl’s hair, dreams of careers that will perhaps never be, the sounds of explosions. They are stories of the impossible search for bread, the longing for a bed and a pillow. And, as in Plestia’s account, they evoke the relentless buzz of the drones in the sky in Gaza: everywhere, all day, every day since October 7 2023. Like tinnitus, like torture.
The book begins with an effort to give names to numbers. On the first page, in the publisher’s note, we read that two of the authors, Sara al-Assar and Basma al-Hor, cannot be contacted. Because of communication lines and constant displacements, the details “may not reflect their current location or circumstances”. Authors may have died or been further displaced. Communication towers are destroyed. Tents are moved as people are moved on. Tents are destroyed.
In Plestia’s accounts, there are displacements to safe zones that then become unsafe, so they move again and again – until the only choice is tents, often without food or blankets. She describes seeing 33,000 people in a displacement shelter, this number increasing daily. Just as numbers are not people, tents are not homes. In Letters from Gaza, the displaced tents are character, metaphor and reality.
The stories are different, as are the deaths and losses within them, but these painful accounts help explain each other. The personal stories help animate words like displacement, refugee camp, genocide, so they do not fall into the pile of legal terms disconnected from names.
But after the United Nations declarations in the opening pages, we hear no more of law – and little of justice. As Palestinian human rights lawyer and founder of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, Raji Sourani said: Gaza is in danger of becoming “the graveyard of international law”. What is left are stories. The short stories, poems and brief accounts are packaged so they do not ask too much of the reader – just enough to provoke tears, and perhaps donations. Many readers will feel some of the helplessness in these pages.
There are stories of hunger; the loss of grandmothers and children. I cried many times reading this book, but the next story would quickly arrive and sometimes bring relief. There is something sad, but ordinary, about details like a cat who finds a tent too hot. Unlike Plestia’s clear analysis and summation of the genocide in Gaza, the politics of this book are comparably quiet. Not absent, but quiet. The word genocide is mentioned four times, “Holocaust” only once. (I counted.)
In Letters from Gaza, no one says Israel, only “the occupiers”. Husam Maarouf writes, “we no longer want anything from you […] Only to die in safety.” His entry is dated March 1 2024; he may well be dead. Batool Abu Akleen makes simple requests of the reader (or perhaps of God): “I want a grave, I don’t want my corpse to rot in the open road.” But the book seems to intentionally not accuse. We are told:
this is not a book about war. It is a book about human souls that strive to avoid being hunted down by war. It is about how innocents are forced to learn how to survive when everything around them is about killing, destruction and death.
But the accusation is there. How could it not be? Against Israel as occupier and aggressor – and the reader as bystander.
Accusation sometimes comes embedded in questions. “Is one person’s pain greater than another’s?” asks Gaza poet and teacher Doha Kahlout. This question resonates with one inscribed on the Holocaust Memorial Tree in Hungary: “Whose agony is greater than mine?”
When comparing agony, only one can live
Jewish author, philosopher and psychoanalyst Jessica Benjamin, writing on Palestine and Israeli peace struggles, cautions against pitting stories from Israel and Palestine against each other, such that “only one can live”. Only one story, one narrative, one version of pain and loss.
Holding multiple stories of suffering in mind is very difficult: for the survivor, for the listener and even for the psychoanalyst. Many survivors suffer symptoms of trauma that reduce the world to interpretation through their experience of its painful histories.
In Eyes of Gaza, writing from Melbourne, Plestia shows a moment of this:
On the train home, I see a lady with a suitcase, and the first thing that I think of is displacement, imagining how everyone in Gaza carries their whole life in their bag […] Then the announcement: Next Stop […] And I’m snapped back into reality.
In this moment, the suitcase is only read through the lens of the past. It’s what is described colloquially as living in the past – a type of banal flashback, often a symptom of trauma. But when pain colonises bodies and narratives, recognising the pain of others is difficult to see. It may be impossible to see the experiences of the other’s world through any other lens than one’s own pain. Whose agony is greater than mine? is a competitive statement, not a question.
In the war of greater pain, an Israeli child in fear may be read against a Palestinian child enduring the loss of their limbs and their whole family. Only one (story) can live.
To hold two competing stories of pain, loss and agony in mind requires a feat of mental health endurance few are capable of: the Nelson Mandelas of this world. Working in the field of transitional justice, I have met a few.
Most have experienced great loss and know there is no comparison at the level of agony. They resist “the repetitive thud of referentiality” because it drowns out conversation, annihilating curiosity and empathy alike. They know all stories must have their time.
In October 2023, “liberal” London Jewish journalist and filmmaker Michael Segalov, once a “staunch defender of Israel”, tried to hold competing stories. He wrote about seeing Israel–Palestine through the lens of “fear and trauma – of the Shoah, of the Nakba, of generations now born into perpetual fear”.
Early Jewish settlers were not “imperial soldiers”, but “a persecuted population failed by global governments pre and post Holocaust”, he points out. But by 1948, the year after the UN resolution that called for Palestine to be divided into Arab and Jewish states, “more than 750,000 Palestinians were made refugees, 15,000 killed”.
“While these lands might well feel a Jewish ancestral home,” he wrote, “within living memory, it was shared with another people: the majority.” In 1922, in the first census carried out under the British Mandate, the population of Palestine was 763,550: 89% were Arabs and 11% Jewish.
As Palestinian psychiatrist Eyad El Sarraj stressed while talking with Jessica Benjamin during peace negotiations, we must “stand simultaneously for the recognition of all injuries, while at the same time being clear that one side was coming from the position of Occupied and less powerful, the other Occupying and dominating”. Stories matter, politics matters.
And some stories take more time than others – some stories are given more time than others. This is a matter of politics and practicality.
Surviving the October 7 attacks
Israeli journalist Amir Tibon and his family survived the October 7 attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, on the Gaza border; they are now internal refugees in northern Israel. He and his partner settled in Nahal Oz and raised a family. On the morning of October 7, they heard the sounds of the attack and raced to their safe room, spending the next five hours in there trying to keep their children – Galia, 3 years old and Carmel, aged 19 months – quiet.
Amir Tibon and his family survived the Oct 7 attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, on the Gaza border. Scribe
In discussing Tibon’s book, Gates of Gaza: a story of betrayal, survival and hope in Israel’s borderlands, I risk comparison and competition. Sometimes stories speak to each other, even when they speak to the silences. I resisted this one’s proximity to the above stories. But that is also to resist reality. It is to resist the importance of difference. All experience is valuable, but sometimes comparison reveals inequality.
Plestia knows this well. The survivor guilt of which she writes is part of the hierarchy experienced by all survivors of mass violence. That she and her family survived, that she migrated, is to feel guilt for escaping the fate of those who have been starved, tortured, obliterated.
Yehiel Dinur spoke from this position of guilt on the stand in 1962, saying he was speaking for those who died in Auschwitz. In the face of others’ death, all survivors struggle with justification. Competition is one form of this: Whose agony is greater than mine?
Tibon was a resident of Nahal Oz, having moved there with his partner because of its beauty, nine years before October 7. He describes it as having “a strong, left-wing, liberal political leaning”, and says residents of the border areas are “some of the strongest advocates of Israeli–Palestinian peace”. He writes that the kibbutz movement has, “for decades”, been in favour of “a compromise that would allow Jews and Arabs to share this land, with agreed-upon borders – borders that, of course, would have to be protected”.
In the 300-plus pages, Tibon describes the morning of October 7 in detail. The fear of his children and his partner as they stayed quiet in a safe room for some five hours. The sounds of shootings and desperation as he read pleas and accounts from other residents on the community’s WhatsApp group as the attacks unfolded.
The narrative of that morning is interspersed with accounts from people who survived in his community: his parents, some of those who attended the Nova music festival, and Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldiers. The narrative moves between that morning and a history of the kibbutz, framed in a history of Israel’s political lurching between right and left – and back again – over the 87 years since its recognition as a nation state by the UN.
In one reading, this is a history book of 87 years – not just an account of five hours. It is a particular history.
The narrative of those five hours is intense, peppered with stories of his parents racing from Tel Aviv to the kibbutz. Tibon’s father is a crucial figure in this narrative. A retired IDF general with “more than three decades” in the military, including combat experience, he seemingly has the capacity to assess situations and navigate a war zone with skill. It is his father who finally knocks on the “safe room” door in the afternoon (about halfway through the book). Tibon reports hearing “a strong bang and a familiar voice” from inside.
The father, we could say, is the embodiment of Tibon’s feelings for – and belief in – a strong, kind Israel. An army general, protective husband and grandfather (in Hebrew, Saba), he is longed for by Tibon’s young children, who “loved their grandparents”, particularly his father, “who pampered and spoiled them at every opportunity”. This grandfather’s presence at the safe-room door allows the family to re-enter the safety of Israel.
If the father is Israel, the sleeping children are its citizens. Carmel and Galia slept through much of the conflict, barely awakened by gunshots. They were rushed to the safe room the moment the shots were heard.
Once you know the stories from Letters of Gaza, it is hard not to compare this to the waking of Mohammed Al Zaqzooq’s three boys – Baraa, Jawad and Basil – to the sound of “Huge missiles in large numbers making terrifying sounds” and the need to flee. Not least, because Amir’s children were barely awakened by shots outside. Their safe room kept the noise muffled and the danger at bay. This is not to say their fear won’t impact on their actions later. Transgenerational trauma has a way of influencing the future.
Mohammed’s children moved quickly, within half an hour, to a refugee camp. At the time of writing, they remain there. His story is five pages long. Amir’s is 300-plus. Amir, an author and award-winning diplomatic correspondent for Haaretz, Israel’s liberal paper of record, has access to a computer, electricity and the security required to think, research and write.
But why does he write this book? In the acknowledgements, he describes himself as needing to be encouraged, unsure of the worth of telling the story of his five hours in the safe room. But he describes much more than five hours.
His book is a story of Israel – and particularly, of its informal settlements. In the early 1950s, he writes, 20 young soldiers – ten men and ten women – were taken by bus to this site to settle it. Nahal Oz is so close to Gaza, it has “agricultural lands which literally touch the border fence”. The kibbutzim functioned as a kind of human border, with increased populations: the 20 broke into couples, then families. Within a few years, they had a small farming community, with a person devoted to security.
Empty land?
This is not a story of military invasion and colonisation, however. It is a story of settlement on land represented as empty. We know this story well in Australia. In this context, it can be a plea for a recognition of innocence.
As Amir tells it, there were no Palestinians in the place before: no one was removed or relocated. Only in passing does he mention the Bedouin who passed through the area before.
In Australia, Irene Watson and Aileen Moreton-Robinson have, in different ways, explained lands do not need to be sites of permanent agriculture to be crucial to the survival of some groups or nations. Borders and settlements can disturb land, law and life regardless of whether houses are demolished or not.
The beauty of Nahal Oz, Amir writes, was due to its access to water and its site on fertile land, where trees provided shelter and probably food. Its loss was likely no small thing to people who required sustenance and shelter as they moved through. After the settlement, they no longer could.
After Israel set up its border there, only Israelis could pass through without being subject to the checkpoints that are well documented sites of humiliation and arbitrary punishment for Palestinians.
By 1997, the walls went up near Nahal Oz. But the walls to shield Nahal Oz from Gaza – and particularly from its people – were not enough. Amir describes the elaborate and extensive tunnels used by Palestinian soldiers to enter Israel (he calls them “terrorists” and “suicide bombers”).
The tunnels became the problem of Palestinian attacks on Israeli settlers. To deal with this problem, the concrete walls were built, reaching 160 metres underground, preventing any permeation. Then, on October 7, the walls could not provide security. Then, there was only the safe room.
The safe room is an obvious metaphor in this book. It is Israel under attack. One of these rooms has been built into every house in the kibbutz, so families can be safe from the mortar attacks from Gaza – a regular occurrence since the 1987 Intifada.
Plestia tells us that the materials for a safe room are not allowed to be brought into Gaza. There are no safe rooms there. Tibon doesn’t mention this; maybe he doesn’t even know this fact, which is its own symptom of the political and social environment in Israel.
He does describe “the unimaginable destruction that Israel has unleashed on Gaza in the aftermath” of the October 7 attacks. He is critical of this “destruction”, though he does not use the term genocide. (There are those who wait for the International Court of Justice to decide if it was more than “plausible” – and there are those who cannot wait.)
Tibon is critical of Israel’s right wing, which cultivates war. He wants peace. But peace here is its own violence.
Like the rhetoric of reconciliation in South Africa, calls for peace can do violence to historical experiences of injustice. There, reconciliation discourse has been criticised, along with its apolitical leanings. Reconciliation in South Africa has largely meant people subject to historical injustices must reconcile themselves to their losses and their reality.
A story attributed to Father Mxolisi Mapanbani, of Tom and Bernard and the bicycle, has been used many times to critique “reconciliation” rhetoric in South Africa. It is helpful here.
Tom and Bernard are friends and live opposite each other. One day, Tom stole Bernard’s bicycle. Every day, Bernard saw Tom cycling to school on it. After some time, Tom went up to Bernard and said, “Let us reconcile and put the past behind us.” Bernard said, “Okay, let’s reconcile – what about the bicycle?” “Oh no,” said Tom, “I’m not talking about the bicycle, I’m talking about reconciliation.”
In the Australian context, after Kevin Rudd’s apology to the stolen generations in 2008, human rights and social justice campaigner Tom Calma described this form of reconciliation as the “unfinished business of justice”.
The apology might have offered some form of acknowledgement, and gone some way toward creating a shared reality on the injustices of the past, but while justice remains unfinished, many are not at peace.
Amir wants peace. He doesn’t want to live in a safe house – but he wants his house and his family to live securely in Nahal Oz. He wants Palestinians to be at peace with this reality.
The word “peace”, like “reconciliation”, does a lot of work to present Tibon on the side of “the good”. Just like, in Letters From Gaza, the relative lack of the word “genocide” keeps the accusation at bay and politics in the background – and it keeps its calls for recognition of suffering at the fore. In this book about “human souls”, the editors call for a recognition of shared humanity.
Tibon is careful not to group “terrorists” under that name – though he uses a Hebrew word that means exactly that. (Mehablim, he calls the people who attacked Nahal Oz.) Why? Though he writes in English and undoubtably spoke Hebrew throughout the siege, why does he speak of the Palestinian attackers as Mehablim?
The answer might be found in the fact no Palestinian name, beyond former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, appears in these pages. He has interviewed many people, but none of them are Palestinian. Their narrative remains outside his text.
We must find the humanity of the Palestinians in other stories.
If the safe room is a metaphor for Israel, the tent – as described in so many of the stories in Letters from Gaza, and in Plestia’s account of those 45 days – is a metaphor for the lives of Palestinians in Israel, and perhaps the world’s eyes.
A tent is permeable, fragile, disposable. Bodies within it are subject to displacement, starvation, genocide. Every house in Tibon’s kibbutz has a safe room. There have been at least seven bombings of tent camps in Gaza. How can you not do the maths?
Stories, awakening and halting the bombs
Stories demand people are not reduced to mathematics. They place the reader in the scene and plead for identification and understanding. Writing on the Eichmann trial, Holocaust historian and legal scholar Lawrence Douglas describes “the words of the survivors that built a bridge from the accused to the world of ashes”.
Afrikaaner journalist and poet Antje Krog writes, on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, “In all the stories a landscape is created.”
But this landscape, if it is to have any effect, must be mapped across previous perceptions. For that, it must do damage to the secure world – the pre-existing imaginative landscape – of the reader or of the listener.
Moral philosopher Rai Gaita describes remorse as “a dying to the world”: a little death is required of the listener or reader who is implicated as a bystander, encountering the suffering of others. A death of complacency. A small disintegration that may mean our own peaceful worlds are no longer tenable.
This is why stories, particularly, are mobilised in truth commissions. They animate the impossible numbers – the dry policies and repetitive loss – with scenes of humanity. Testimony – personal stories – link the words (genocide, massacre, terror) to an imagination of a scene, a person, a child or a parent. To people we can identify or empathise with.
Like the two worlds connected in Ahmed Mortaja’s poem, Hubb and Harb, In Letters from Gaza:
tonight I will fall asleep telling myself that the noise outside is fireworks, a celebration and nothing more.
That the frightened screams of children are the gleeful terror of suspense before something long-awaited, like Eid.
Tonight, I will fall asleep scrolling through the photos on my phone, telling myself that my evening with friends wasn’t that great – really, I was bored – so now I’m skimming through memories to pass the time.
If empathy were all it took to halt the counting of the 646 days in Gaza, then Letters from Gaza and Eyes on Gaza would achieve their aim. But empathy rarely produces political change.
Stories – the 50 voices in Letters from Gaza, accounts like Plestia’s – make us cry, perhaps make us donate, but they do not halt the bombs. This, and more, might be what Yehiel Dinur meant when he asked for the world to “awaken”, that it change, that it stop what Tibon calls “the unimaginable destruction”.
Until then, Dinur pledged to remain Katzetnik 135633. Until then, we will likely only know “Genocide Plestia”: “it’s funny how genocide changes a person”.
Juliet Rogers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The demise of one of Hong Kong’s last major pro-democracy parties, the League of Social Democrats, is the latest blow to the city’s crumbling democratic credentials.
The league is the third major opposition party to disband this year. The announcement coincides with the fifth anniversary this week of the national security law, which was imposed by Beijing to suppress pro-democracy activity.
The loss of this grassroots party, historically populated by bold and colourful characters, vividly illustrates the dying of the light in once-sparkling Hong Kong.
The city is now greyed and labouring under a repressive internal security regime that has crushed civil society’s freedoms and democratic ambitions.
Authoritarian crackdown
The world witnessed Hong Kong at its brightest during the 2014 Umbrella Movement, when hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy protesters camped out on city streets for several months.
We also saw the brutal sequel in 2019, when paramilitarised police sought to put down further civil unrest and protesters fought back.
Since then, “lawfare” has been the preferred strategy of China’s national government and its Hong Kong satellite. The new approach has included a vast security apparatus and aggressive prosecutions.
When Beijing intervened in July 2020, it was nominally about national security. In reality, the new law was designed and used to bring Hongkongers to heel.
Civil freedoms were further curtailed by a home-grown security law, introduced last year to fill the gaps.
International standards such as the Johannesburg Principles, endorsed by the United Nations, require national security laws to be compatible with democratic principles, not to be used to eliminate democratic activity.
Prison or exile
The League of Social Democrats occupied the populist left of the pro-democracy spectrum. It stood apart from contemporaries such as the Democratic Party and the Civic Party, which were dominated by professionals and elites, and have since been disbanded.
The League was most notably represented by the likes of “Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung– known for his Che Guevara t-shirts and banana-throwing – and broadcaster and journalism academic Raymond Wong Yuk-man, also known as “Mad Dog”.
Despite their rambunctious styles, these men had real political credentials and were repeatedly elected to legislative office. But Leung is now imprisoned for subversion, while Wong has left for Taiwan.
Leung Kwok-hung was sentenced to subversion under the national security law. Edwin Kwok/Shutterstock
Party leaders such as Jimmy Sham Tsz-kit and Figo Chan Ho-wun were also prominent within the Civil Human Rights Front. It was responsible for the annual July 1 protest march that attracted hundreds of thousands of people every year. The front is yet another pro-democracy organisation that has dissolved.
Sham and Chan have been jailed for subversion and unlawful assembly under the colonial-era Public Order Ordinance, which has been used to prosecute hundreds of activists.
Zero tolerance
The demise of these diverse organisations are not natural occurrences, but the result of a deliberate authoritarian programme.
Under China, Hong Kong’s political system has been half democratic at best. But it now resembles something from the darkest days of colonialism, with pre-approved candidates, appointed legislators and zero tolerance for critical voices.
Activists and watchdogs are stymied by the national security law. It criminalises – among other things – engagement and lobbying with international organisations and foreign governments.
Then there are the millions of ordinary Hongkongers whose dreams of a liberal and self-governing region under mainland China’s umbrella – as promised in the lead up to the 1997 handover – have been shattered.
But countless ex-protesters remain in the city, where it is impermissible to speak critically of power, and where mandatory patriotic education may ensure new generations will never even think to speak up.
Much blame lies with the British, who failed to institute democratic elections until the last gasp of their rule in Hong Kong. This was despite the colony tolerating liberalism and habit-forming democratic activity over a longer period.
Now China, after almost three decades in charge, has responded to democratic challenges by defaulting to authoritarian control. Hong Kong can only be grateful it has been spared a Tiananmen-style incident. Nor has it experienced the full genocidal extent of the so-called “peripheries playbook” Beijing has used in Tibet and Xinjiang.
Turmoil and authoritarian swings in the United States and elsewhere give China an opportunity to present as a voice of reason on the international stage.
But we should not forget its commitment to repressive politics at home, nor what its support of belligerent regimes such as Putin’s Russia might mean for Taiwan, the region and the world.
Above all, we should not forget the people, in Hong Kong and elsewhere, who made it their life’s work to achieve democracy only to be rewarded with prison or exile.
Brendan Clift does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The U.S. Capitol is seen shortly after the Senate passed its version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 1, 2025. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
As the U.S. House of Representatives voted to approve President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic tax and spending package, many critics are wondering how the president retained the loyalty of so many congressional Republicans, with so few defections.
Just three Republican senators – the maximum allowed for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to still pass – voted against the Senate version of the bill on July 1, 2025. In the House, only two Republicans voted against the bill, which passed the chamber on July 3.
Trump is not the first president to bend Congress to his will to get legislation approved.
Presidential supremacy over the legislative process has been on the rise for decades. But contrary to popular belief, lawmakers are not always simply voting based on blind partisanship.
Increasingly, politicians in the same political party as a president are voting in line with the president because their political futures are as tied up with the president’s reputation as they have ever been.
Even when national polling indicates a policy is unpopular – as is the case with Trump’s budget reconciliation bill, which an estimated 55% of American voters said in June they oppose, according to Quinnipiac University polling – lawmakers in the president’s party have serious motivation to follow the president’s lead.
Or else they risk losing reelection.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson speaks to reporters at the Capitol building on July 3, 2025. Alex Wong/Getty Images
Lawmakers increasingly partisan on presidential policy
Over the past 50 years, lawmakers in the president’s party have increasingly supported the president’s position on legislation that passes Congress. Opposition lawmakers, meanwhile, are increasingly united against the president’s position.
These patterns are unheard of in the modern Congress. In 2022, for example – a year of significant legislative achievement for the Biden administration – the Democratic majority in Congress voted the same way as the Democratic president 99% of the time. Republicans, meanwhile, voted with Biden just 19% of the time.
Elections can tell us why
Over the past half-century, the two major parties have changed dramatically, both in the absolutist nature of their beliefs and in relation to one another.
Both parties used to be more mixed in their ideological outlooks, for example, with conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans playing key roles in policymaking. This made it easier to form cross-party coalitions, either with or against the president.
A few decades ago, Democrats and Republicans were also less geographically polarized from each other. Democrats were regularly elected to congressional seats in the South, for example, even if those districts supported Republican presidents such as Nixon or Ronald Reagan.
These changes have ushered in a larger phenomenon called political nationalization, in which local political considerations, issues and candidate qualifications have taken a back seat to national politics.
Ticket splitting
From the 1960s through most of the 1980s, between one-quarter and one-half of all congressional districts routinely split tickets – meaning they sent a politician of one party to Congress while supporting a different party for president.
These are the same few districts in Nebraska and New York, for example, that supported former Vice President Kamala Harris for president in 2024 but which also elected a Republican candidate to the House that same year.
Since the Reagan years, however, these types of districts that could simultaneously support a Democratic presidential nominee and Republicans for Congress have gone nearly extinct. Today, only a handful of districts split their tickets, and all other districts select the same party for both offices.
The past two presidential elections, in 2020 and 2024, set the same record low for ticket splitting. Just 16 out of 435 House districts voted for different parties for the House of Representatives and president.
Members of Congress follow their voters
The political success of members of Congress has become increasingly tied up with the success or failure of the president. Because nearly all Republicans hail from districts and states that are very supportive of Trump and his agenda, following the will of their voters increasingly means being supportive of the president’s agenda.
Not doing so risks blowback from their Trump-supporting constituents. A June 2025 Quinnipiac University poll found that 67% of Republicans support the bill, while 87% of Democrats oppose it.
These electoral considerations also help explain the unanimous opposition to Trump’s legislation by the Democrats, nearly all of whom represent districts and states that did not support Trump in 2024.
Thanks to party polarization in ideologies, geography and in the electorate, few Democrats could survive politically while strongly supporting Trump. And few Republicans could do so while opposing him.
But as the importance to voters of mere presidential support increases, the importance of members’ skill in fighting for issues unique to their districts has decreased. This can leave important local concerns about, for example, unique local environmental issues or declining economic sectors unspoken for. At the very least, members have less incentive to speak for them.
Charlie Hunt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The U.S. Capitol is seen shortly after the Senate passed its version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 1, 2025. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
As the U.S. House of Representatives voted to approve President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic tax and spending package, many critics are wondering how the president retained the loyalty of so many congressional Republicans, with so few defections.
Just three Republican senators – the maximum allowed for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to still pass – voted against the Senate version of the bill on July 1, 2025. In the House, only two Republicans voted against the bill, which passed the chamber on July 3.
Trump is not the first president to bend Congress to his will to get legislation approved.
Presidential supremacy over the legislative process has been on the rise for decades. But contrary to popular belief, lawmakers are not always simply voting based on blind partisanship.
Increasingly, politicians in the same political party as a president are voting in line with the president because their political futures are as tied up with the president’s reputation as they have ever been.
Even when national polling indicates a policy is unpopular – as is the case with Trump’s budget reconciliation bill, which an estimated 55% of American voters said in June they oppose, according to Quinnipiac University polling – lawmakers in the president’s party have serious motivation to follow the president’s lead.
Or else they risk losing reelection.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson speaks to reporters at the Capitol building on July 3, 2025. Alex Wong/Getty Images
Lawmakers increasingly partisan on presidential policy
Over the past 50 years, lawmakers in the president’s party have increasingly supported the president’s position on legislation that passes Congress. Opposition lawmakers, meanwhile, are increasingly united against the president’s position.
These patterns are unheard of in the modern Congress. In 2022, for example – a year of significant legislative achievement for the Biden administration – the Democratic majority in Congress voted the same way as the Democratic president 99% of the time. Republicans, meanwhile, voted with Biden just 19% of the time.
Elections can tell us why
Over the past half-century, the two major parties have changed dramatically, both in the absolutist nature of their beliefs and in relation to one another.
Both parties used to be more mixed in their ideological outlooks, for example, with conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans playing key roles in policymaking. This made it easier to form cross-party coalitions, either with or against the president.
A few decades ago, Democrats and Republicans were also less geographically polarized from each other. Democrats were regularly elected to congressional seats in the South, for example, even if those districts supported Republican presidents such as Nixon or Ronald Reagan.
These changes have ushered in a larger phenomenon called political nationalization, in which local political considerations, issues and candidate qualifications have taken a back seat to national politics.
Ticket splitting
From the 1960s through most of the 1980s, between one-quarter and one-half of all congressional districts routinely split tickets – meaning they sent a politician of one party to Congress while supporting a different party for president.
These are the same few districts in Nebraska and New York, for example, that supported former Vice President Kamala Harris for president in 2024 but which also elected a Republican candidate to the House that same year.
Since the Reagan years, however, these types of districts that could simultaneously support a Democratic presidential nominee and Republicans for Congress have gone nearly extinct. Today, only a handful of districts split their tickets, and all other districts select the same party for both offices.
The past two presidential elections, in 2020 and 2024, set the same record low for ticket splitting. Just 16 out of 435 House districts voted for different parties for the House of Representatives and president.
Members of Congress follow their voters
The political success of members of Congress has become increasingly tied up with the success or failure of the president. Because nearly all Republicans hail from districts and states that are very supportive of Trump and his agenda, following the will of their voters increasingly means being supportive of the president’s agenda.
Not doing so risks blowback from their Trump-supporting constituents. A June 2025 Quinnipiac University poll found that 67% of Republicans support the bill, while 87% of Democrats oppose it.
These electoral considerations also help explain the unanimous opposition to Trump’s legislation by the Democrats, nearly all of whom represent districts and states that did not support Trump in 2024.
Thanks to party polarization in ideologies, geography and in the electorate, few Democrats could survive politically while strongly supporting Trump. And few Republicans could do so while opposing him.
But as the importance to voters of mere presidential support increases, the importance of members’ skill in fighting for issues unique to their districts has decreased. This can leave important local concerns about, for example, unique local environmental issues or declining economic sectors unspoken for. At the very least, members have less incentive to speak for them.
Charlie Hunt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
In 1962, poet and Auschwitz survivor Yehiel Dinur took the stand in Jerusalem in the trial of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann. Dinur was a much-anticipated witness, bearing the audience’s hope this man, a poet, would be able to explain – to capture and to transmit – the experience of Auschwitz, and of the Holocaust; that he could speak the unspeakable. Prosecutor Gideon Hausner hoped such a witness might “do justice to the six million personal tragedies”.
Dinur used the name Katzetnik 135633 in his writings, also translated as “Prisoner 135663”. On the stand, he said: “I believe wholeheartedly that I have to continue to bear this name until the world awakens.”
Awakening, understanding, empathy and change are the sentiments many survivors hope for, or ask for, during and after periods of trauma. The 20th century saw many of those pleas. The 21st century has done no better at honouring the promise, captured in the title of the 1984 Argentinian commission report on forced disappearances, Nunca Mas: never again. No matter how many such pleas appear before the courts, before the aggressors, before those in solidarity, the horrors of war, torture, starvation and genocide seem to happen again – and again.
Three recent books from the region where war was been raging since the Hamas attacks on Israel on October 7 2023, and the ensuing war on Gaza, are part of these pleas.
Review: Eyes on Gaza – Plestia Alaqad (Macmillan), Letters from Gaza – edited by Mohammed Al-Zaqzooq & Mahmoud Alshaer (Penguin), Gates of Gaza – Amir Tibon (Scribe)
Eyes on Gaza is an on-the-ground account of the death and destruction of the first 45 days of the war by now 23-year-old Palestinian journalist Plestia Alaqad, who moved to Melbourne with her family in November 2023. Letters from Gaza is a collection of 50 stories, poems and fragments from Palestinian writers enduring the past 20 months. And Gates of Gaza is the story of Israeli journalist Amir Tibon, a resident of Nahal Oz, one of the border kibbutz attacked by Hamas on October 7.
Plestia Alaqad. Plestia
These are all first-person testimonies of experiences of being under attack, though those attacks differ. We might say they fit into the genre adopted in truth commissions, such as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa: a response to the nation’s years of living under the apartheid laws, discarded when Nelson Mandela took power in 1994.
The commission was one effort to heal from this past. But, like the Eichmann trial, it needed stories to explain the histories of violence, and it needed the pain to be voiced to explain its impacts on communities, families and relationships.
The use of people’s narratives to “bear witness” to the complex layers of legally sanctioned and militarily executed pain, loss and the traumas they can produce, is sometimes effective in helping audiences understand them. The Bringing Them Home Report in 1997 used this form to explain the incidence and impacts of the forced removal of Indigenous children by the Australian state. It was effective as one form of creating a shared reality for all in Australia, who then understood the term “stolen generations” and the pain, loss and genocidal intent to which this phrase refers.
More recently, the Yoorrook Justice Commission in Victoria, Australia’s first formal truth-telling inquiry into historic and ongoing systemic injustices perpetrated against First Nations Peoples by colonisation, has also brought histories of loss, dispossession and abuse to light, using stories. Stories can make sense of the impact incurred through the intertwined web of policies, statistics, discrimination and quotidian violence at the hands of the state.
The work of testimony
The narratives in these books written since October 7 2023 are part of this genre of testimony or storytelling. But at least two of these books are not attempting to explain the past. They might be described better as pleas to stop what the International Court of Justice has called “a plausible genocide” happening in the present.
They are, in one reading, wishes for the world to understand the experience of pain, rage, loss, fear, distress and defeat that accompanies destruction and unbearable loss. A wish for the world to hear, or perhaps feel, the words on the page – and make the pain stop.
They wish the world would “awaken” to what is happening right now.
The dynamic of awakening is the stock in trade of truth commissions. One party testifies or speaks to an experience, and the audience wakes up to what has been happening. As a result, they either change or facilitate change. The truth, captured as testimony, is supposed to set people free. Not just the speaker, but the community of speakers weighed down by history – or by the struggles of the past or the present.
In legal forms the reason to speak is clear. The reason to speak in literature, biographies and works of nonfiction is less clear. What does the author want from us, the readers? But perhaps more importantly, what can we offer?
She wants the genocide to stop. She wants a free Palestine. She wants her home and her life back. The stories in this book show readers outside Gaza some of the life and death of those first six and a half weeks.
Her last entry before she leaves Gaza for Egypt – and then Australia – is dated Day 45. During those 45 days, she puts on a press helmet and jacket, which both give her protection and weigh her down. And then she speaks: to cameras, to followers, to anyone who will listen. Her social media feeds documenting the war gained worldwide attention, her Instagram following rising from around 3,700 to 4.1 million today.
There are too many deaths to be witnessed – by her and the reader. She describes genocide as an understatement for what is occurring in Gaza: “we lose more people than our hearts can handle”. She has seen so much death, heard so many screams. By day 30,
all you can hear is a voice crying for help from under the rubble. You turn your back and walk away, because there’s nothing you can do to help.
But Plestia’s project is more than documenting death. She is careful to show many aspects of life in Gaza. She shows how Palestinians retain relationships, family and pets. How a young boy just needs his “pot plant” from his destroyed house, under skies filled with drones and bombs. This is a plea for the genocide to stop, but it is also a celebration of being Palestinian. It is an homage to life in Gaza.
It is also a plea to see Palestinians as more than numbers – and more than how they are depicted by Israel.
“The world,” she says, “sometimes treats us like terrorists, trying to justify its complacency in allowing us to be massacred. And we know the perception, we read the propaganda just like everyone else. But the reality is that we’re the opposite.”
She describes gentle moments of love and care between her fellow journalists and the people they interview. The children they bring sweets for, the “bird lady” who renames her tortoise “Plestia” after her. Both Plestia the tortoise and the “bird lady” are now living in a tent. She speaks of the doctors who work tirelessly.
In the midst of brutal amputations and unimaginable burns, she recounts the care of a doctor giving cream for a skin rash that has tormented her, diagnosed as a product of her anxiety. Anxiety seems a gentle diagnosis for symptoms produced by witnessing and documenting such brutality.
Anxiety over her helplessness, perhaps, over the lack of sleep, of nourishing food: dwindling even in those first 45 days. Anxiety seems like a Western preoccupation, from this writing distance. What Plestia experiences seems more like layers of embodied distress. Her empathy allows her to feel, perhaps too much. Empathy can be an enemy.
Around page 100, she begins to deteriorate. “It’s funny how genocide changes a person,” she writes, describing herself as “Genocide Plestia”. She’s devastated, exhausted. She has lost hope. The journal entries are shorter, more repetitive.
They recite her helplessness with what Jacqueline Rose, co-director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, has called the “repetitive thud of referentiality”.
You feel Plestia’s effort to try to speak with some life in the pages, to use writing as a therapeutic tool. You wish it for her, but she has trouble summoning the energy, the life, any hope. As she poignantly quips: “Fake it till you make it doesn’t work during a Genocide”. What is there to say in such relentless days of loss?
You want Plestia to get up, you want a happy ending, for a conclusion to the painful story, but the problem is time. The reader’s time, the reality of time since she wrote her book.
Day 45, her last day in Gaza, is Monday November 20 2023. I read this book in June 2025, 646 days later – and it hasn’t stopped. When Plestia leaves Gaza and finally arrives here in Melbourne, the conditions she describes have been ongoing for more than 20 months. A recently released survey by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research estimates almost 84,000 people died in Gaza between October 2023 and early January 2025, as a result of the war. And that was six months ago.
50 letters from Gaza
The numbers are a way of reducing the experience of grief, devastation, loss (and the viewer’s guilt) to simple digits. Digits have no face and no sound. This is helpful to viewers, but it does not do justice to the 84,000, as Gideon Hausner knew well. No one awakens by hearing the numbers. But they matter.
In Letters from Gaza, psychologist Ahmed Mortaja fears becoming a news story, “a dull number … I don’t want my name and my family name to be reduced to mere numbers, whether odd or even”.
This book, a fragmented collection of 50 poems, stories and accounts, is devoted to giving life to those numbers. To animating the loss, so readers can apply their own imaginations, so we can understand the incomprehensible. It is a collection of fragments of lives since October 7 2023, squeezed into expressive pages. There is no “letter” more than six pages long. They are backed up against each other, permeating one another.
Each letter tells a different story and the same story. Each finds a detail that has no language: flowers in a girl’s hair, dreams of careers that will perhaps never be, the sounds of explosions. They are stories of the impossible search for bread, the longing for a bed and a pillow. And, as in Plestia’s account, they evoke the relentless buzz of the drones in the sky in Gaza: everywhere, all day, every day since October 7 2023. Like tinnitus, like torture.
The book begins with an effort to give names to numbers. On the first page, in the publisher’s note, we read that two of the authors, Sara al-Assar and Basma al-Hor, cannot be contacted. Because of communication lines and constant displacements, the details “may not reflect their current location or circumstances”. Authors may have died or been further displaced. Communication towers are destroyed. Tents are moved as people are moved on. Tents are destroyed.
In Plestia’s accounts, there are displacements to safe zones that then become unsafe, so they move again and again – until the only choice is tents, often without food or blankets. She describes seeing 33,000 people in a displacement shelter, this number increasing daily. Just as numbers are not people, tents are not homes. In Letters from Gaza, the displaced tents are character, metaphor and reality.
The stories are different, as are the deaths and losses within them, but these painful accounts help explain each other. The personal stories help animate words like displacement, refugee camp, genocide, so they do not fall into the pile of legal terms disconnected from names.
But after the United Nations declarations in the opening pages, we hear no more of law – and little of justice. As Palestinian human rights lawyer and founder of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, Raji Sourani said: Gaza is in danger of becoming “the graveyard of international law”. What is left are stories. The short stories, poems and brief accounts are packaged so they do not ask too much of the reader – just enough to provoke tears, and perhaps donations. Many readers will feel some of the helplessness in these pages.
There are stories of hunger; the loss of grandmothers and children. I cried many times reading this book, but the next story would quickly arrive and sometimes bring relief. There is something sad, but ordinary, about details like a cat who finds a tent too hot. Unlike Plestia’s clear analysis and summation of the genocide in Gaza, the politics of this book are comparably quiet. Not absent, but quiet. The word genocide is mentioned four times, “Holocaust” only once. (I counted.)
In Letters from Gaza, no one says Israel, only “the occupiers”. Husam Maarouf writes, “we no longer want anything from you […] Only to die in safety.” His entry is dated March 1 2024; he may well be dead. Batool Abu Akleen makes simple requests of the reader (or perhaps of God): “I want a grave, I don’t want my corpse to rot in the open road.” But the book seems to intentionally not accuse. We are told:
this is not a book about war. It is a book about human souls that strive to avoid being hunted down by war. It is about how innocents are forced to learn how to survive when everything around them is about killing, destruction and death.
But the accusation is there. How could it not be? Against Israel as occupier and aggressor – and the reader as bystander.
Accusation sometimes comes embedded in questions. “Is one person’s pain greater than another’s?” asks Gaza poet and teacher Doha Kahlout. This question resonates with one inscribed on the Holocaust Memorial Tree in Hungary: “Whose agony is greater than mine?”
When comparing agony, only one can live
Jewish author, philosopher and psychoanalyst Jessica Benjamin, writing on Palestine and Israeli peace struggles, cautions against pitting stories from Israel and Palestine against each other, such that “only one can live”. Only one story, one narrative, one version of pain and loss.
Holding multiple stories of suffering in mind is very difficult: for the survivor, for the listener and even for the psychoanalyst. Many survivors suffer symptoms of trauma that reduce the world to interpretation through their experience of its painful histories.
In Eyes of Gaza, writing from Melbourne, Plestia shows a moment of this:
On the train home, I see a lady with a suitcase, and the first thing that I think of is displacement, imagining how everyone in Gaza carries their whole life in their bag […] Then the announcement: Next Stop […] And I’m snapped back into reality.
In this moment, the suitcase is only read through the lens of the past. It’s what is described colloquially as living in the past – a type of banal flashback, often a symptom of trauma. But when pain colonises bodies and narratives, recognising the pain of others is difficult to see. It may be impossible to see the experiences of the other’s world through any other lens than one’s own pain. Whose agony is greater than mine? is a competitive statement, not a question.
In the war of greater pain, an Israeli child in fear may be read against a Palestinian child enduring the loss of their limbs and their whole family. Only one (story) can live.
To hold two competing stories of pain, loss and agony in mind requires a feat of mental health endurance few are capable of: the Nelson Mandelas of this world. Working in the field of transitional justice, I have met a few.
Most have experienced great loss and know there is no comparison at the level of agony. They resist “the repetitive thud of referentiality” because it drowns out conversation, annihilating curiosity and empathy alike. They know all stories must have their time.
In October 2023, “liberal” London Jewish journalist and filmmaker Michael Segalov, once a “staunch defender of Israel”, tried to hold competing stories. He wrote about seeing Israel–Palestine through the lens of “fear and trauma – of the Shoah, of the Nakba, of generations now born into perpetual fear”.
Early Jewish settlers were not “imperial soldiers”, but “a persecuted population failed by global governments pre and post Holocaust”, he points out. But by 1948, the year after the UN resolution that called for Palestine to be divided into Arab and Jewish states, “more than 750,000 Palestinians were made refugees, 15,000 killed”.
“While these lands might well feel a Jewish ancestral home,” he wrote, “within living memory, it was shared with another people: the majority.” In 1922, in the first census carried out under the British Mandate, the population of Palestine was 763,550: 89% were Arabs and 11% Jewish.
As Palestinian psychiatrist Eyad El Sarraj stressed while talking with Jessica Benjamin during peace negotiations, we must “stand simultaneously for the recognition of all injuries, while at the same time being clear that one side was coming from the position of Occupied and less powerful, the other Occupying and dominating”. Stories matter, politics matters.
And some stories take more time than others – some stories are given more time than others. This is a matter of politics and practicality.
Surviving the October 7 attacks
Israeli journalist Amir Tibon and his family survived the October 7 attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, on the Gaza border; they are now internal refugees in northern Israel. He and his partner settled in Nahal Oz and raised a family. On the morning of October 7, they heard the sounds of the attack and raced to their safe room, spending the next five hours in there trying to keep their children – Galia, 3 years old and Carmel, aged 19 months – quiet.
Amir Tibon and his family survived the Oct 7 attack on Kibbutz Nahal Oz, on the Gaza border. Scribe
In discussing Tibon’s book, Gates of Gaza: a story of betrayal, survival and hope in Israel’s borderlands, I risk comparison and competition. Sometimes stories speak to each other, even when they speak to the silences. I resisted this one’s proximity to the above stories. But that is also to resist reality. It is to resist the importance of difference. All experience is valuable, but sometimes comparison reveals inequality.
Plestia knows this well. The survivor guilt of which she writes is part of the hierarchy experienced by all survivors of mass violence. That she and her family survived, that she migrated, is to feel guilt for escaping the fate of those who have been starved, tortured, obliterated.
Yehiel Dinur spoke from this position of guilt on the stand in 1962, saying he was speaking for those who died in Auschwitz. In the face of others’ death, all survivors struggle with justification. Competition is one form of this: Whose agony is greater than mine?
Tibon was a resident of Nahal Oz, having moved there with his partner because of its beauty, nine years before October 7. He describes it as having “a strong, left-wing, liberal political leaning”, and says residents of the border areas are “some of the strongest advocates of Israeli–Palestinian peace”. He writes that the kibbutz movement has, “for decades”, been in favour of “a compromise that would allow Jews and Arabs to share this land, with agreed-upon borders – borders that, of course, would have to be protected”.
In the 300-plus pages, Tibon describes the morning of October 7 in detail. The fear of his children and his partner as they stayed quiet in a safe room for some five hours. The sounds of shootings and desperation as he read pleas and accounts from other residents on the community’s WhatsApp group as the attacks unfolded.
The narrative of that morning is interspersed with accounts from people who survived in his community: his parents, some of those who attended the Nova music festival, and Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldiers. The narrative moves between that morning and a history of the kibbutz, framed in a history of Israel’s political lurching between right and left – and back again – over the 87 years since its recognition as a nation state by the UN.
In one reading, this is a history book of 87 years – not just an account of five hours. It is a particular history.
The narrative of those five hours is intense, peppered with stories of his parents racing from Tel Aviv to the kibbutz. Tibon’s father is a crucial figure in this narrative. A retired IDF general with “more than three decades” in the military, including combat experience, he seemingly has the capacity to assess situations and navigate a war zone with skill. It is his father who finally knocks on the “safe room” door in the afternoon (about halfway through the book). Tibon reports hearing “a strong bang and a familiar voice” from inside.
The father, we could say, is the embodiment of Tibon’s feelings for – and belief in – a strong, kind Israel. An army general, protective husband and grandfather (in Hebrew, Saba), he is longed for by Tibon’s young children, who “loved their grandparents”, particularly his father, “who pampered and spoiled them at every opportunity”. This grandfather’s presence at the safe-room door allows the family to re-enter the safety of Israel.
If the father is Israel, the sleeping children are its citizens. Carmel and Galia slept through much of the conflict, barely awakened by gunshots. They were rushed to the safe room the moment the shots were heard.
Once you know the stories from Letters of Gaza, it is hard not to compare this to the waking of Mohammed Al Zaqzooq’s three boys – Baraa, Jawad and Basil – to the sound of “Huge missiles in large numbers making terrifying sounds” and the need to flee. Not least, because Amir’s children were barely awakened by shots outside. Their safe room kept the noise muffled and the danger at bay. This is not to say their fear won’t impact on their actions later. Transgenerational trauma has a way of influencing the future.
Mohammed’s children moved quickly, within half an hour, to a refugee camp. At the time of writing, they remain there. His story is five pages long. Amir’s is 300-plus. Amir, an author and award-winning diplomatic correspondent for Haaretz, Israel’s liberal paper of record, has access to a computer, electricity and the security required to think, research and write.
But why does he write this book? In the acknowledgements, he describes himself as needing to be encouraged, unsure of the worth of telling the story of his five hours in the safe room. But he describes much more than five hours.
His book is a story of Israel – and particularly, of its informal settlements. In the early 1950s, he writes, 20 young soldiers – ten men and ten women – were taken by bus to this site to settle it. Nahal Oz is so close to Gaza, it has “agricultural lands which literally touch the border fence”. The kibbutzim functioned as a kind of human border, with increased populations: the 20 broke into couples, then families. Within a few years, they had a small farming community, with a person devoted to security.
Empty land?
This is not a story of military invasion and colonisation, however. It is a story of settlement on land represented as empty. We know this story well in Australia. In this context, it can be a plea for a recognition of innocence.
As Amir tells it, there were no Palestinians in the place before: no one was removed or relocated. Only in passing does he mention the Bedouin who passed through the area before.
In Australia, Irene Watson and Aileen Moreton-Robinson have, in different ways, explained lands do not need to be sites of permanent agriculture to be crucial to the survival of some groups or nations. Borders and settlements can disturb land, law and life regardless of whether houses are demolished or not.
The beauty of Nahal Oz, Amir writes, was due to its access to water and its site on fertile land, where trees provided shelter and probably food. Its loss was likely no small thing to people who required sustenance and shelter as they moved through. After the settlement, they no longer could.
After Israel set up its border there, only Israelis could pass through without being subject to the checkpoints that are well documented sites of humiliation and arbitrary punishment for Palestinians.
By 1997, the walls went up near Nahal Oz. But the walls to shield Nahal Oz from Gaza – and particularly from its people – were not enough. Amir describes the elaborate and extensive tunnels used by Palestinian soldiers to enter Israel (he calls them “terrorists” and “suicide bombers”).
The tunnels became the problem of Palestinian attacks on Israeli settlers. To deal with this problem, the concrete walls were built, reaching 160 metres underground, preventing any permeation. Then, on October 7, the walls could not provide security. Then, there was only the safe room.
The safe room is an obvious metaphor in this book. It is Israel under attack. One of these rooms has been built into every house in the kibbutz, so families can be safe from the mortar attacks from Gaza – a regular occurrence since the 1987 Intifada.
Plestia tells us that the materials for a safe room are not allowed to be brought into Gaza. There are no safe rooms there. Tibon doesn’t mention this; maybe he doesn’t even know this fact, which is its own symptom of the political and social environment in Israel.
He does describe “the unimaginable destruction that Israel has unleashed on Gaza in the aftermath” of the October 7 attacks. He is critical of this “destruction”, though he does not use the term genocide. (There are those who wait for the International Court of Justice to decide if it was more than “plausible” – and there are those who cannot wait.)
Tibon is critical of Israel’s right wing, which cultivates war. He wants peace. But peace here is its own violence.
Like the rhetoric of reconciliation in South Africa, calls for peace can do violence to historical experiences of injustice. There, reconciliation discourse has been criticised, along with its apolitical leanings. Reconciliation in South Africa has largely meant people subject to historical injustices must reconcile themselves to their losses and their reality.
A story attributed to Father Mxolisi Mapanbani, of Tom and Bernard and the bicycle, has been used many times to critique “reconciliation” rhetoric in South Africa. It is helpful here.
Tom and Bernard are friends and live opposite each other. One day, Tom stole Bernard’s bicycle. Every day, Bernard saw Tom cycling to school on it. After some time, Tom went up to Bernard and said, “Let us reconcile and put the past behind us.” Bernard said, “Okay, let’s reconcile – what about the bicycle?” “Oh no,” said Tom, “I’m not talking about the bicycle, I’m talking about reconciliation.”
In the Australian context, after Kevin Rudd’s apology to the stolen generations in 2008, human rights and social justice campaigner Tom Calma described this form of reconciliation as the “unfinished business of justice”.
The apology might have offered some form of acknowledgement, and gone some way toward creating a shared reality on the injustices of the past, but while justice remains unfinished, many are not at peace.
Amir wants peace. He doesn’t want to live in a safe house – but he wants his house and his family to live securely in Nahal Oz. He wants Palestinians to be at peace with this reality.
The word “peace”, like “reconciliation”, does a lot of work to present Tibon on the side of “the good”. Just like, in Letters From Gaza, the relative lack of the word “genocide” keeps the accusation at bay and politics in the background – and it keeps its calls for recognition of suffering at the fore. In this book about “human souls”, the editors call for a recognition of shared humanity.
Tibon is careful not to group “terrorists” under that name – though he uses a Hebrew word that means exactly that. (Mehablim, he calls the people who attacked Nahal Oz.) Why? Though he writes in English and undoubtably spoke Hebrew throughout the siege, why does he speak of the Palestinian attackers as Mehablim?
The answer might be found in the fact no Palestinian name, beyond former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, appears in these pages. He has interviewed many people, but none of them are Palestinian. Their narrative remains outside his text.
We must find the humanity of the Palestinians in other stories.
If the safe room is a metaphor for Israel, the tent – as described in so many of the stories in Letters from Gaza, and in Plestia’s account of those 45 days – is a metaphor for the lives of Palestinians in Israel, and perhaps the world’s eyes.
A tent is permeable, fragile, disposable. Bodies within it are subject to displacement, starvation, genocide. Every house in Tibon’s kibbutz has a safe room. There have been at least seven bombings of tent camps in Gaza. How can you not do the maths?
Stories, awakening and halting the bombs
Stories demand people are not reduced to mathematics. They place the reader in the scene and plead for identification and understanding. Writing on the Eichmann trial, Holocaust historian and legal scholar Lawrence Douglas describes “the words of the survivors that built a bridge from the accused to the world of ashes”.
Afrikaaner journalist and poet Antje Krog writes, on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, “In all the stories a landscape is created.”
But this landscape, if it is to have any effect, must be mapped across previous perceptions. For that, it must do damage to the secure world – the pre-existing imaginative landscape – of the reader or of the listener.
Moral philosopher Rai Gaita describes remorse as “a dying to the world”: a little death is required of the listener or reader who is implicated as a bystander, encountering the suffering of others. A death of complacency. A small disintegration that may mean our own peaceful worlds are no longer tenable.
This is why stories, particularly, are mobilised in truth commissions. They animate the impossible numbers – the dry policies and repetitive loss – with scenes of humanity. Testimony – personal stories – link the words (genocide, massacre, terror) to an imagination of a scene, a person, a child or a parent. To people we can identify or empathise with.
Like the two worlds connected in Ahmed Mortaja’s poem, Hubb and Harb, In Letters from Gaza:
tonight I will fall asleep telling myself that the noise outside is fireworks, a celebration and nothing more.
That the frightened screams of children are the gleeful terror of suspense before something long-awaited, like Eid.
Tonight, I will fall asleep scrolling through the photos on my phone, telling myself that my evening with friends wasn’t that great – really, I was bored – so now I’m skimming through memories to pass the time.
If empathy were all it took to halt the counting of the 646 days in Gaza, then Letters from Gaza and Eyes on Gaza would achieve their aim. But empathy rarely produces political change.
Stories – the 50 voices in Letters from Gaza, accounts like Plestia’s – make us cry, perhaps make us donate, but they do not halt the bombs. This, and more, might be what Yehiel Dinur meant when he asked for the world to “awaken”, that it change, that it stop what Tibon calls “the unimaginable destruction”.
Until then, Dinur pledged to remain Katzetnik 135633. Until then, we will likely only know “Genocide Plestia”: “it’s funny how genocide changes a person”.
Juliet Rogers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The demise of one of Hong Kong’s last major pro-democracy parties, the League of Social Democrats, is the latest blow to the city’s crumbling democratic credentials.
The league is the third major opposition party to disband this year. The announcement coincides with the fifth anniversary this week of the national security law, which was imposed by Beijing to suppress pro-democracy activity.
The loss of this grassroots party, historically populated by bold and colourful characters, vividly illustrates the dying of the light in once-sparkling Hong Kong.
The city is now greyed and labouring under a repressive internal security regime that has crushed civil society’s freedoms and democratic ambitions.
Authoritarian crackdown
The world witnessed Hong Kong at its brightest during the 2014 Umbrella Movement, when hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy protesters camped out on city streets for several months.
We also saw the brutal sequel in 2019, when paramilitarised police sought to put down further civil unrest and protesters fought back.
Since then, “lawfare” has been the preferred strategy of China’s national government and its Hong Kong satellite. The new approach has included a vast security apparatus and aggressive prosecutions.
When Beijing intervened in July 2020, it was nominally about national security. In reality, the new law was designed and used to bring Hongkongers to heel.
Civil freedoms were further curtailed by a home-grown security law, introduced last year to fill the gaps.
International standards such as the Johannesburg Principles, endorsed by the United Nations, require national security laws to be compatible with democratic principles, not to be used to eliminate democratic activity.
Prison or exile
The League of Social Democrats occupied the populist left of the pro-democracy spectrum. It stood apart from contemporaries such as the Democratic Party and the Civic Party, which were dominated by professionals and elites, and have since been disbanded.
The League was most notably represented by the likes of “Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung– known for his Che Guevara t-shirts and banana-throwing – and broadcaster and journalism academic Raymond Wong Yuk-man, also known as “Mad Dog”.
Despite their rambunctious styles, these men had real political credentials and were repeatedly elected to legislative office. But Leung is now imprisoned for subversion, while Wong has left for Taiwan.
Leung Kwok-hung was sentenced to subversion under the national security law. Edwin Kwok/Shutterstock
Party leaders such as Jimmy Sham Tsz-kit and Figo Chan Ho-wun were also prominent within the Civil Human Rights Front. It was responsible for the annual July 1 protest march that attracted hundreds of thousands of people every year. The front is yet another pro-democracy organisation that has dissolved.
Sham and Chan have been jailed for subversion and unlawful assembly under the colonial-era Public Order Ordinance, which has been used to prosecute hundreds of activists.
Zero tolerance
The demise of these diverse organisations are not natural occurrences, but the result of a deliberate authoritarian programme.
Under China, Hong Kong’s political system has been half democratic at best. But it now resembles something from the darkest days of colonialism, with pre-approved candidates, appointed legislators and zero tolerance for critical voices.
Activists and watchdogs are stymied by the national security law. It criminalises – among other things – engagement and lobbying with international organisations and foreign governments.
Then there are the millions of ordinary Hongkongers whose dreams of a liberal and self-governing region under mainland China’s umbrella – as promised in the lead up to the 1997 handover – have been shattered.
But countless ex-protesters remain in the city, where it is impermissible to speak critically of power, and where mandatory patriotic education may ensure new generations will never even think to speak up.
Much blame lies with the British, who failed to institute democratic elections until the last gasp of their rule in Hong Kong. This was despite the colony tolerating liberalism and habit-forming democratic activity over a longer period.
Now China, after almost three decades in charge, has responded to democratic challenges by defaulting to authoritarian control. Hong Kong can only be grateful it has been spared a Tiananmen-style incident. Nor has it experienced the full genocidal extent of the so-called “peripheries playbook” Beijing has used in Tibet and Xinjiang.
Turmoil and authoritarian swings in the United States and elsewhere give China an opportunity to present as a voice of reason on the international stage.
But we should not forget its commitment to repressive politics at home, nor what its support of belligerent regimes such as Putin’s Russia might mean for Taiwan, the region and the world.
Above all, we should not forget the people, in Hong Kong and elsewhere, who made it their life’s work to achieve democracy only to be rewarded with prison or exile.
Brendan Clift does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Conservatives have won two important battles in their decades-long campaign against Planned Parenthood, a network of affiliated clinics that are the largest provider of reproductive health services in the U.S.
One of these victories was a U.S. Supreme Court ruling handed down on June 26, 2025. The other is a provision in the multitrilion-dollar tax-and-spending package President Donald Trump has made his top legislative priority. Both follow the same strategy: depriving Planned Parenthood – and all other providers of abortion care – from getting reimbursed by Medicaid, the government health insurance program that mainly covers low-income adults and children, as well as people with disabilities.
I see in both the legislation and the court’s ruling a culmination of a strategy to defund Planned Parenthood that was in full swing by 2007, toward the end of the George W. Bush administration. This campaign hinges on a strategy of insisting that federal and state dollars are supporting abortion care when they do not.
One of the bill’s provisions will make it impossible for patients with Medicaid coverage to get any health care services at clinics like Planned Parenthood.
The provision will last only for a year.
The House approved the same version of the package that the Senate had passed a week after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states cannot be sued by patients if they make it impossible for Planned Parenthood clinics to be reimbursed by Medicaid.
The case, Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, arose when a South Carolina woman wanted to get gynecological care at her local Planned Parenthood clinic. The rationale South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster gave for the state’s policy was that Planned Parenthood is an abortion provider.
South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster stands outside the Supreme Court building in Washington in April 2025 and speaks about his state’s legal dispute regarding Medicaid funding for health care at Planned Parenthood clinics. Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images
Medicaid and abortion
To be clear, neither the legal dispute nor the provision in the legislative package had anything to do with the use of federal or state dollars to fund abortion.
Although Planned Parenthood offers abortion where and when it is legal, this provision and the court’s decision concern Medicaid reimbursement for all other services. Abortion care is not covered by Medicaid under federal law except in cases of rape, incest or a threat to the pregnant patient’s life.
Medicaid patients instead have relied on their plan at Planned Parenthood clinics when they get annual exams, prenatal care, mental health support, birth control, treatment for sexually transmitted infections, cervical cancer screenings and fertility referrals.
None of those services will be covered by Medicaid for a year. Patients will have to find another health care provider – as long as one is available.
While that provision is in effect, Medicaid won’t be allowed to reimburse Planned Parenthood for any services, mirroring what states just won the right to do in the Supreme Court ruling – but at the national level.
Although the bill blocks Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood for only 12 months, the ruling lets states exclude any provider from its Medicaid program because they also provide abortions.
In other words, people who rely on Medicaid funding will lose access to all of those essential services not just at Planned Parenthood but potentially at any other providers that also offer abortion care.
Abortion-rights demonstrators holds a sign in front of the Supreme Court building in Washington as the Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic case is heard on April 2, 2025. Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images
U.S. Rep. Mike Pence introduced the first federal legislation aimed at “defunding” Planned Parenthood in 2007. It failed to muster enough support in Congress to become law. States such as Texas then started down that path.
The first national legislative success came in 2015. Both houses of Congress passed a budget reconciliation measure with a provision to defund Planned Parenthood that year, but President Barack Obama vetoed it. Republicans had threatened to shut down the government over those demands. A year later, the GOP included a call to defund Planned Parenthood in its presidential campaign platform.
Before Obama left office, his administration passed a rule in December 2016 protecting federal funds for family planning for health care facilities that also provided abortion. The Trump administration rolled back that rule in 2017.
The Trump administration relied on an argument that any support for a health care provider that offers patients abortion services, no matter how segregated the sources of funding, is tantamount to subsidizing abortion.
What to expect next
Nationally, 16 million women of reproductive age rely on Medicaid, and 1 in 5 women will visit a Planned Parenthood clinic for health care at least once in their lives. Those clinics depend on Medicaid reimbursement to offer an array of reproductive health care services, such as prenatal care, that are not tied to abortion.
If Planned Parenthood clinics can’t bill Medicaid for those services, many will close. Planned Parenthood estimates that it could see almost 200 closures – 90% of them in states where abortion is legal. That means over 1 million low-income people risk losing access to their health care provider.
And once clinics close, they may never reopen, U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, a Washington Democrat, recently predicted.
Should the number of Planned Parenthood clinics plummet, it will threaten access to contraceptives, which are all the more important in preventing unwanted pregnancies for people living in states that have banned abortion. Researchers have repeatedly found that unwanted pregnancies, when people are denied access to abortion services, are correlated with increased debt, missed educational and employment opportunities, mental health problems, and diminished care for a family’s older children.
In addition, pregnant patients and new parents may have more limited options for prenatal and postnatal care. That could cause the country’s already-high rates of maternal and infant mortality to increase.
Rachel Rebouché does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The Human Rights Committee today concluded its consideration of the second periodic report of Haiti on how it implements the provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights . Committee Experts appreciated the referendum to establish a new national Constitution, while raising questions as to how the State was tackling the high level of violence against women and girls perpetuated by gang members and lynchings carried out by citizens, against a backdrop of distrust in the police.
One Committee Expert said they saw the referendum to establish a new Constitution in a positive light, as an attempt to reestablish the institutionality of the country.
Another Expert said that the scale of violence against women and girls was reportedly considerable, with sexual violence, including rape of children as young as five years old, gang rape, and forced prostitution, used as a weapon of control by gangs. According to reports, the judiciary were not sensitive to cases of gender-based violence and victims were hesitant to report cases. What measures were taken to encourage women to file complaints? Was there a fund to help survivors of violence? How were they supported by State services?
Lynchings continued to be regular and numerous, another Expert said, citing reports of more than 500 cases in 2023. These were often the work of self-defence groups in or around Port-au-Prince, who did not trust the police, mainly due to corruption. Was this violence investigated, including when the police were accused of supporting or encouraging it? Had the perpetrators of lynchings, stonings and mutilations been prosecuted and punished proportionately? How could trust be restored between the police and the civilian population?
Pedrica Saint Jean, Minister for the Status of Women and Women’s Rights and head of the delegation, introducing the report, said from 2020 to 2025, Haiti was confronted with repeated political crises, marked by lockdown operations and successive protests. The COVID-19 pandemic, frequent floods and the earthquake of 14 August 2021, which devastated part of the Great South region, were additional challenges faced by the country. This complex situation was further aggravated by the assassination of the Haitian President on 6 July 2021.
Ms. Saint Jean said an agreement for a peaceful transition was reached on 3 April 2024, establishing a transition period with a nine-member Transitional Presidential Council and a Prime Minister, with the aim of restoring security, continuing constitutional reform, and organising democratic elections.
The delegation said several strategies had been undertaken to combat gender-based violence, including a national strategy that spanned from 2017 to 2024. An assessment of the strategy was almost completed. A gender-based violence cell had been established to train police officers to take the needs of female victims of violence into account. The Office to Combat Gender-Based Violence streamlined services for victims, enabling them to receive legal, psychosocial and medical assistance in one place. In areas with armed gangs, women were typically the primary victims. Violence was used as a weapon of repression.
The delegation also said the Government had always condemned lynchings, which were not part of the country’s culture. Incidents needed to be reported at a police station so perpetrators could be incarcerated and tried for their crimes. The community police were carrying out an awareness raising campaign to progressively build trust with the general population. Training sessions were being organised for police officers, with a view to protecting the population. When complaints were made against the police force, the national inspector for the police carried out investigations and measures were taken as necessary.
In concluding remarks, Ms. Saint Jean thanked the Committee for the kindness it had shown to the Haitian delegation, and the Experts for their insights. Haiti had taken due note of all recommendations and was determined to take further steps to develop effective, concrete responses to the Committee’s concerns relating to the implementation of the Covenant. Everybody was working to see the day when Haiti could leave the crisis behind.
Changrok Soh, Committee Chairperson, in concluding remarks, said the Committee acknowledged the profound political, economic and humanitarian challenges facing Haiti, which had hampered efforts to protect human rights. Haiti was encouraged to take this opportunity to advance necessary reforms to ensure that the rights enshrined in the Covenant were fully recognised for all Haitians.
The delegation of Haiti was made up of representatives of the Ministry for the Status of Women and Women’s Rights; the Ministry of Justice and Public Security; the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; the Ministry of Social Affairs and Work; the Cabinet; the Government of Port-au-Prince; the Prime Minister’s Office; the Haitian National Police; the Anti-Violence Unit; and the Permanent Mission of Haiti to the United Nations Office at Geneva. Some members of the delegation were unable to attend the meeting in person due to travel restrictions.
The Human Rights Committee’s one hundred and forty-fourth session is being held from 23 June to 17 July 2025. All the documents relating to the Committee’s work, including reports submitted by States parties, can be found on the session’s webpage . Meeting summary releases can be found here . The webcast of the Committee’s public meetings can be accessed via the UN Web TV webpage .
The Committee will next meet in public at 3 p.m., Monday 7 July to begin its consideration of the fourth periodic report of Viet Nam (CCPR/C/VNM/4).
Report
The Committee has before it the second periodic report of Haiti (CCPR/C/HTI/2).
Presentation of Report
PEDRICA SAINT JEAN, Minister for the Status of Women and Women’s Rights and head of the delegation , said between 2020 to 2025, Haiti had experienced both positive and negative developments. From a positive perspective, the Government had multiplied efforts in many areas to improve the rule of law and respect for human rights. However, the country had been plagued by unprecedent insecurity that required the intervention of a foreign force, through the deployment of the Multinational Security Support Mission on October 2, 2024. This force intervened in the context of an agreement signed between Haiti and Kenya on police and security cooperation in March 2024, following the adoption of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2699.
From 2020 to 2025, Haiti was confronted with repeated political crises, marked by lockdown operations and successive protests which accompanied them. The COVID-19 pandemic, frequent floods and the earthquake of 14 August 2021, which devastated part of the Great South region, were additional challenges faced by the country. This complex situation was further aggravated by the assassination of the Haitian President on 6 July 2021.
An agreement for a peaceful transition was reached on 3 April 2024, establishing a transition period with a nine-member Transitional Presidential Council and a Prime Minister, with the aim of restoring security, continuing constitutional reform, and organising democratic presidential elections. The Council was also tasked with economic and judicial reforms and combating corruption. The agreement provided for the establishment of three key bodies, including the Body for the Control of Government Action, in charge of controlling the acts of the Executive, since Parliament was currently non-existent; the National Security Council, to respond to the various aspects of the country’s security crisis; and the National Conference, accompanied by a steering committee. The Government had already established the National Security Council and the National Conference and its steering committee. The referendum decree, resulting from the work of the National Conference and the steering committee, would allow Haiti to have a new Constitution. Currently, efforts were underway to strengthen the capacities of the Haitian National Police and the Armed Forces of Haiti, which had a budget increase of 11 per cent in 2024-2025. An agreement was concluded with Colombia to monitor the Haitian coast, to curb the illicit trafficking of firearms.
The Government had attached great importance to the judicial reform already initiated by its predecessors. Six new Courts of First Instance and the corresponding Public Prosecutor’s Offices were created between September 2024 and April 2025. The law of 10 September 2018 created the National Council for Legal Assistance and established legal aid offices in 18 jurisdictions in Haiti, aiming to provide free legal assistance to those who were financially struggling. The Penal Code and the Code of Criminal Procedure had previously been criticised by civil society in 2020. Following the revision of the two texts by a special commission, they were adopted on 24 June 2025. This marked an important step in the fight against insecurity, corruption and impunity.
Two other important decrees had been adopted in the context of judicial reform. The first, adopted on 16 April 2025, which created two specialised judicial poles: one for the repression of complex financial crimes and offences and the other for the repression of mass crimes and sexual violence. The second decree of 4 May 2023 sanctioned money laundering, terrorist financing and the financing of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in Haiti.
Despite Government efforts, due to the deteriorating security situation, the majority of prisons in Port-au-Prince had been vandalised, leading to the uncontrolled release of a number of detainees. The Government had been forced to relocate several jurisdictions to allow the resumption of judicial activities in minimum security conditions and the normal application of appropriate sentences and sanctions.
The Haitian State aimed to follow up on complaints against police officers for excessive use of force, and it organised human rights training sessions for police personnel. However, it was regrettable that, despite the Government’s efforts, some citizens, driven by anger at the atrocities committed by criminal groups, resorted to extreme methods, including the lynching of captured gang members, instead of handing them over to the authorities. The Government recognised the severity of these acts and strongly condemned all forms of mob justice.
The crisis in the country led to an increase in gender-based violence, particularly for displaced persons in camps. The Haitian State was working to protect and facilitate access to justice for survivors of violence, including through the creation of the Office for Combatting Gender-Based Violence as well as the organization of training adapted to the needs of survivors for police officers and judges. Medical, legal and psychosocial assistance were also offered to women and girls at internal displacement camps.
Article 262 of the Penal Code, adopted by decree on 23 June 2025, punished the perpetrators of acts of torture and barbarism, with sentences ranging from 15 to 20 years in prison. Prison overcrowding remained a major problem, especially with the destruction of the main prisons in March 2024. Instructions had been issued to the Public Prosecutor’s Offices and Courts of First Instance to carry out regular criminal hearings, with the aim of relieving overcrowding in the prisons in provincial cities.
The Transitional Presidential Council was making every effort to organise general elections in 2025 and to install a President elected on 7 February 2026. Despite its efforts, the Haitian State was aware that the implementation of the provisions of the Covenant had not yet reached a satisfactory level. However, Haiti pledged to do everything in its power to implement the provisions on the Covenant.
Questions by Committee Experts
A Committee Expert acknowledged how difficult it was for the State party to participate in person in the dialogue and expressed gratitude to the delegation in Geneva. The Committee was aware of the grave humanitarian crisis suffered by Haiti for decades, compounded with the assassination of the President in 2021. In that context, the Committee noted an increase in widespread human rights violations and growing control of armed gangs in significant parts of Port-au-Prince, leaving the population more vulnerable to violence and human rights abuses, and leading to the displacement of more than one million people.
Were courts in Haiti directly applying the Covenant? Could examples be provided? Were courses on international human rights law and the Covenant provided in training to judges? The Committee had been informed of situations where civil servants had opposed the execution of orders handed down by judges to free individuals. Could this be explained? What role did these civil servants play in the judicial system? Had steps been taken to ratify the Optional Protocol of the Covenant on individual communications? In May 2025, a bill of law was presented on the development of a new constitution, with a decree adopted to hold a referendum on the issue. Was this bill in line with the rights enshrined in the Covenant? Was it realistic to carry out a referendum in the context of violence? When was the state of emergency ordered? Was it still in force? Which articles of the Covenant were suspended?
Did the current budget of the Office for Citizen Protection allow it to carry out its functions and extend its activities to the most remote parts of the country? Were there plans to expand the powers of the Office to allow it to consider human rights violations that had their origin in the acts of private entities?
What steps had been taken to end discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons? Were there laws in place to punish acts of discrimination against these groups? Had the State taken actions been to allow these people to carry out public demonstrations and to protect them? Had it adopted measures to change discriminatory cultural attitudes in Haitian society, to end stigmatisation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons?
Another Expert said despite the crisis in the country, Haiti remained bound by its international obligations. The dialogue would address problems such as insecurity, the deep humanitarian crisis that the population was experiencing, the endemic violence of gangs, the forced displacement of the population, the dysfunction of the justice system, chronic impunity and serious challenges to the rule of law. All these problems were linked to corruption. The report published in 2023 by the United Nations Expert on Human Rights in Haiti stated that corruption in Haiti was “public enemy number one” and found that more than 90 per cent of Haitian civil servants did not comply with the national anti-corruption law. The Anti-Corruption Unit and the Central Financial Intelligence Unit, which were suspected of lacking independence, had brought nearly 100 major cases of corruption to justice, but these had not led to any convictions.
Did the State plan to set up a financial prosecutor’s office or judges specialised in the fight against corruption? Could more information be provided on the decree adopted on the creation of financial judicial units? What measures were being taken to support the work of the Anti-Corruption Unit and the Central Financial Intelligence Unit and to ensure that the cases referred were followed up independently?
Haiti had expressed its commitment to ensuring accountability for the serious violations committed during Jean-Claude Duvalier’s presidency. However, a case assessing these violations had been in the courts of cassation since 2014, and there had not been any progress. What explained the delay? Could the delegation enlighten the Committee on the situation of Jean Gabriel Robert, who was convicted in absentia in the case of the “Raboteau massacre”?
Information showed that the scale of violence against women and girls was considerable, with sexual violence, including rape, which was sometimes perpetrated against children as young as five years old; gang rape; and forced prostitution, used as a weapon of control by gangs. According to reports, the judiciary were not sensitive to cases of gender-based violence and victims were hesitant to report cases. What measures were taken to encourage women to file complaints? Was there a fund to help survivors of violence? How were they supported by State services?
According to information received by the Committee, lynchings continued to be regular and numerous, with more than 500 in 2023. These were often the work of self-defence groups in or around Port-au-Prince, who did not trust the police, mainly due to corruption. In addition, the 2024 report of the United Nations Expert on Human Rights in Haiti noted that police were passive, and it appeared that some murders were encouraged, supported or facilitated by the police forces. Was this violence investigated, including when the police were accused of supporting or encouraging it? Had the perpetrators of lynchings, stonings and mutilations been prosecuted and punished proportionately? How could trust be restored between the police and the civilian population?
Another Expert said specific steps had not been taken to combat impunity. What hope existed, looking forward to the immediate and long-term future, regarding a reversal of the situation? There were several cases in which there had been impunity for human rights violations. Attacks against the population in the La Saline suburb in 2018 had not been condemned by the Government and no steps had been taken to provide support to victims. What measures had been taken against the involvement of political agents in these cases? Why was the La Saline case withdrawn from the original judge?
Data showed that 28 percent of civil servants in Haiti were women. In 2019 a strategy was presented to ensure equality for women by 2030. What progress had been made? How would the State party solve the problem of the low rate of political representation of women in Haiti?
What actions were being taken to guaranteed women’s access to health care, in situations where criminal groups took control of health centres? How was access to medicines ensured?
Another Expert asked what Haiti’s prospects were looking forward? What urgent measures were envisaged to protect women and girls in areas under gang control? What mechanisms had been established to guarantee security and safety for survivors of sexual violence, and to encourage the reporting of cases? Could Haiti provide updated information on the draft law preventing violence against women and girls? Was there a timeline for its adoption? What had been done to bolster the amount of medical, legal and psychosocial services for survivors, particularly in areas under gang control? What measures were envisaged to protect the right to life of those in extreme poverty? Was there an intersectional strategy to prevent avoidable deaths linked to poverty?
What measures were taken to protect civilians living in areas under the control of armed gangs? What had been the result of the assistance from Kenya? Was it meeting the challenges? What guarantees existed when it came to the investigation of its own officers by the Haitian police? How was it ensured that the police did not carry out disproportionate use of force during protests? How was action being bolstered in areas under gang control?
Was there a road map regarding ratification of the Covenant’s Second Optional Protocol concerning the death penalty? How did the State party intend to ensure that those who had served their sentence were properly released? Had the system for monitoring judicial cases been reactivated? What efforts were underway to improve detention conditions? Were construction projects for new prisons still planned? How many women had access to shelters in the last three years? What measures were envisaged to guarantee all police stations should have trained personnel, particularly in areas most affected by police insecurity?
Responses by the Delegation
PEDRICA SAINT JEAN, Minister for the Status of Women and Women’s Rights and head of the delegation , said the Government had priorities outlined in the April 2024 agreement on the peaceful transition, including combatting insecurity, conducting the referendum and bringing the country to elections to appoint a robust Government. To combat insecurity, the budget allocated to the police and armed forces had been increased, allowing them to better contain the problems they were confronting. The police, the Haitian armed forces, and the security mission needed to work together to combat insecurity to allow for the milestone referendum to be held. Nine electoral commissioners were currently out in the field assessing the requirements. Haiti was not waiting for the security issues to subside before moving to the referendum.
Haiti was doing its utmost to implement its commitments under the Covenant through a raft of measures. Six new courtrooms had been established in the country, allowing proximity between those needing to access the justice system and the infrastructure in place. Bureaus had been established to work on specific criminal areas, including mass crimes which had remained unpunished. For some time, courts had not been operational because they were in the hands of gangs. Two bureaus would be responsible for crimes of sexual violence, and another was responsible for financial crimes. Some 34 new judges and prosecutors had been appointed to support the justice system.
The method of choosing judges for the Anti-Corruption Unit had not hindered its independence. Cases were currently going ahead at the Court of First Instance. Three prisons had been built to international standards, with one dedicated to female inmates. Institutional measures had been put in place to freeze the funds of certain agencies which were found to be corrupt but had impunity from the Anti-Corruption Unit, and those responsible were being brought before the court.
The Government of Haiti had always condemned lynchings, which were not part of the country’s culture. Incidents needed to be reported at a police station so perpetrators could be incarcerated and tried for their crimes.
The delegation said several assessment missions had been established to gain an understanding of the situation of detention centres and propose tangible solutions. One of the main challenges was the provision of food, due to lack of access to main roads. To address this situation, the Justice Ministry sought to ensure that providers of food should be placed directly in situ. In the last few months, prisons had greater autonomy and managed their needs themselves, providing a better and tailored approach to local realities.
Haiti had done a lot to combat gender-based violence. This phenomenon was topical in Haiti, particularly when it came to displaced women. Several strategies had been undertaken to combat gender-based violence, including a national strategy that spanned from 2017 to 2024. An assessment of the strategy was almost completed. A gender-based violence cell had been established within the police, to train police officers to take the needs of female victims of violence into account. The Office to Combat Gender-Based Violence streamlined services for victims, enabling them to receive legal, psychosocial and medical assistance in one place. Psychosocial support services had been set up for women victims in internal displacement camps. Several initiatives had been adopted to bolster protections for minors, including host families and prevention and readaptation programmes for children recruited by armed games. Training and awareness raising sessions were organised for judges.
In areas with armed gangs, women were typically the primary victims. The number of victims was increasing, particularly against younger women, but violence by armed gangs was also affecting children and the elderly. Violence was used as a weapon of repression. There were still people in Haiti who did not want to report. During times of political turbulence, the phenomenon of violence against women was heightened. There was a need for awareness raising to eradicate the phenomenon. Women should not be used as an instrument to place pressure on the Government.
Incest had never been part of Haitian culture, but it did not mean this phenomenon did not exist. When incest occurred, people usually preferred to solve the issue in the family. Attention needed to be paid to the phenomenon of incest involving displaced people. The State sanctioned based on the relevant 2006 decree and used case law when dealing with these offences. It was important to continue legislating to bring tangible solutions to this phenomenon.
For 15 years, judges had been receiving training on the Covenant from the Government and the Haitian police.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex persons had been looked down on in Haiti; they were formerly not given the right to complain. While progress was not significant, these people were now considered to be fully fledged citizens who needed to be protected by the State and to enjoy their full human rights.
Quotas had been implemented calling for at least 30 per cent of decision-making posts to be held by women. This issue had been poorly addressed. In the new Constitution, the State was advocating for parity. Until there was a critical mass of women in decision-making posts, the problems they faced would persist. A series of consultations had been launched with officials to create incentive measures to promote equality regarding candidate lists.
The law on the organization of the Ministry on the Status of Women had not properly been reformed, which was why the Ministry had difficulties in playing its primary role. The Ministry submitted a law on its reorganization to ensure it could achieve its goals. By the start of next year, the State would launch its first national action plan covering the participation of women in restoring peace and security in Haiti. Work was being done with survivors in internal displacement camps to transform them into fully-fledged actors. Women, including young girls and survivors of violence in these camps, had been appointed as peace ambassadors, to sensitise the message of peace throughout Haiti.
Haiti was relying on the work of the Multinational Security Support Mission and the international community to help the police and armed forces overcome the corruption and security issues in the country.
Follow-up Questions by Committee Experts
A Committee Expert asked follow-up questions, including on the functions to be undertaken by the bureaus on mass crimes, sexual crimes and financial crimes. This was a fantastic idea, but the bureaus needed to have the resources to operate properly. Other questions were asked on measures planned to restore the trust between the police and the justice system; lynchings committed by the police force; steps to tackle the circulation of weapons; and the mandate of the Office for Citizens’ Protection.
An Expert said they saw the referendum to establish a new Constitution in a positive light, as an attempt to reestablish the institutionality of the country. Who drafted this bill? Did it go through various sectors, with participation from civil society? What did the “green and red zones” mean? Were green zones under Government control? Did red zones mean there was no State control? What happened if there was a referendum in the red zones?
More questions were asked on how the long tradition of impunity could be alleviated; alternative measures to detention; detention beyond the lengths of sentences; efforts to prevent discrimination against women; and access to voluntary interruption of pregnancy. What was the Government’s perception of the processes involving the participation of the international community that aimed to improve the situation for the population of Haiti?
According to information received by the Committee, around 40 per cent of births enjoyed the proper medical support. How did midwives treat risky pregnancies? Did the State intend to include the ratification of the Second Optional Protocol in the planned reform of the draft Constitution?
Responses by the Delegation
The delegation said the death penalty was abolished in Haiti through a decree adopted in 1987.
Regarding the red and green zones, there were currently zones under gang control, where the State was doing everything possible to convert them to green zones. Green zones were placed where the State could provide appropriate services to the population. The police were trying to gain access to the red zones to bring about peace and security. Progress had been made in penetrating many of the red zones; it was expected that there would be further progress in this area.
The referendum was a compulsory, milestone measure to lay the groundwork for national elections and allow the population to get their new Constitution. All different sectors of society had been consulted in the drafting of the new Constitution.
Haiti had implemented measures that aimed to provide a structure to prevent the free circulation of weapons, including weapons of mass destruction.
The delegation said there was a legal bureau on mass crimes and sexual violence in Port-au-Prince and another on financial crimes. The bureaus were comprised of 10 judges who worked with the police and financial oversight and regulatory bodies. Their operations were ensured by donors from the international community and the State.
The community police were carrying out an awareness raising campaign to progressively build trust with the general population. Training sessions were being organised for police officers, with a view to protecting the population. When complaints were made against the police force, the national inspector for the police carried out investigations and measures were taken as necessary.
Haiti had a plan to set up scanners at customs to prevent the flow of illegal weapons into the country. Controls at the border with the Dominican Republic and checks of containers coming from the United Staes had been strengthened, and strict checks were being conducted on private vehicles, including motorbikes. Authorities had also suspended land imports from the Dominican Republic, ensuring seizures of illegal imports. Despite this, Haiti was facing increased criminal activity and corruption, with the need for increased international support to reduce the weapons flow into Haiti.
Green zones were safe zones while red zones were ones where there was a heightened risk.
A draft of the new Constitution had been shared across different sectors to receive their inputs, which had been sent to the Committee responsible for the drafting of the new Constitution.
Haitian midwives played a key role in early detection of illnesses and in responding to complications during birth. They carried out post monitoring operatives in rural areas, while caesarean procedures were performed by obstetric doctors.
Questions by Committee Experts
A Committee Expert asked if there were obstacles preventing Haiti from ratifying the Covenant’s Second Optional Protocol? Murderous attacks by gangs against ambulances had been reported, and health staff had fled the country. Did the Government have any plans to confront these problems? Haiti had an astonishing overcrowding rate in its prisons, at allegedly over 300 per cent. There was a lack of access to the appellate procedure for all inmates and for persons with disabilities. How did Haiti plan to resolve this problem?
Another Expert appreciated Haiti’s delegation comprised of high-level women. It was reported that police agents or persons acting with their complicity tortured inmates on a daily basis in prisons and police custody facilities. Why had the perpetrators of cases of torture not been prosecuted and brought to justice? Had there been capacity building of law enforcement in the area of torture? Why had the State not ratified the Convention against Torture?
Reports received by the Committee stated that forced evictions had become widespread since the earthquake in 2010, but this was denied by the State. It was alleged that these evictions affected a wide number of families and were not addressed by the State. What information was available about three resident families who had not taken up possession of reconstructed homes? Which Government civil servants were responsible for these families’ forced evictions? How had the Government taken steps to prosecute those involved?
Hurricane Matthew had affected more than 2.6 million people, including 600,000 children; what measures had been taken to protect them? Could information be provided on the distribution of financial aid and the resources used to reconstruct infrastructure following this natural disaster? During the imposed state of emergency, was it only economic rights which were affected? What solutions were available for those still awaiting assistance from the damage 10 years ago? What resources had been allocated to address housing issues?
A Committee Expert asked about the implementation of the National Plan to Combat Child Labour, adopted in 2019; what was the duration of the plan? Was it still in force or had a new plan been adopted? Could data on the number of children exploited and those in situations of begging be provided? What work had been done specifically on the exploitation of children by the Committee to Combat Human Trafficking?
Various reports had documented violence against children, who were recruited and used by the gangs and injured or killed as a result. An even more severe impact was felt by children with disabilities. The Secretary-General’s report had outlined 383 grave violations against children in 2024. In December 2024, the gangs had committed a high number of abductions, including of 17 girls and 10 boys. What measures had been taken by the State to combat these grave violations? To help minors, child soldiers and victims of armed groups, a Commission had been created to support the creation of a national network of shelters and rehabilitation centres. How did the State ensure that the Commission had the human and financial resources necessary to support its functions? What did its work consist of? Was the National Committee for Combatting Human Trafficking able to carry out its functions? What measures had been adopted along the Dominican-Haitian border to prevent trafficking of children who were then sold in the Dominican Republic?
It was understood that a commission to implement criminal reform was created in July 2024. What were the main reforms being carried out? What measures had been adopted to deal with the firebomb attacks on judges? How was the safety and security of judges being ensured? What was the current situation of the National Council for Legal Assistance? Regarding the appointment of judges in the Cassation Council, how was it ensured that the involvement of the Senate did not affect the Council’s independence? What role did the Council play in combatting corruption in the judicial sphere?
Another Committee Expert said people who were displaced often lost their identification documents. What was the State party doing to resolve this issue? Two journalists reporting on insecurity in Haiti had been executed in 2022. The Committee had also received information that five journalists were murdered in 2024, with no investigations carried out. Gang violence had also led to the closure and restriction of media, including the suspension of popular programmes on suspicion of serving as platforms for gangs. Journalists had also been threatened by gangs. How could elections take place if the State could not facilitate the free circulation of ideas? How did Haiti intend to combat impunity surrounding executions or ill-treatment of journalists? What was done to protect human rights defenders? How was it ensured that social media platforms were regulated?
In March 2025, anti-Government protests were held to decry the security context and inaction by the State. What measures had been taken to establish the responsibility of police directly involved in the use of force in suppressing peaceful demonstrations? What had been done to guarantee the work of non-governmental organizations in full security and free from harassment?
Responses by the Delegation
The delegation said overcrowding in prisons remained a major issue for the Government which it was working to address. Instructions had been issued to the prosecution offices and tribunals of the Courts of First Instance to encourage the holding of more criminal sessions, including sessions in which a jury was not present, with a view to relieving overcrowding in provincial prisons. In 2023 and2024, this occurred in 14 jurisdictions, leading to 159 convictions. In 2024, the total number of people detained in the country was around 12,000. The State had managed to capture around 12 prisoners who had escaped. The drop in the number of detainees in 2025 was explained primarily due to the escapes that followed the armed attacks carried out against certain penitentiary infrastructure. Courts had been actively engaged to implement non-custodial measures when appropriate, as a means of alleviating prison overcrowding. The Government recognised the need to prevent arbitrary arrests. Men, women and children were placed in different prisons. Despite the State’s efforts, there was only one police officer per every 14 detainees.
The Government remained committed to improving prison conditions, despite security constraints. The mortality rate had dropped between 2024 and 2025 thanks to coordinated action to provide medical care and humanitarian aid. Healthcare services had been established in several penitentiaries. In 2017, a Presidential Commission was established to shed light on deaths in the Port-au-Prince prison. It highlighted aggravating factors including severe overcrowding, insufficient hygiene and a lack of medical support, among others. Measures were implemented to improve nutrition, detention conditions and investigate causes of deaths.
The internal regulations of the penitentiary administration outlawed all forms of torture and inhumane treatment. Finances had been provided to the National Anti-Trafficking Committee to support the implementation of its national action plan. A protocol had been signed to guarantee legal aid to victims of trafficking. Some 100 students from the University of Haiti had received training on the issue of human trafficking. Several human traffickers had been prosecuted, however following the mass escapes in March 2024, a number of these traffickers were unfortunately able to escape.
The Constitution guaranteed that judges could not be dismissed. In the judicial hierarchy in Haiti, the Constitution had the highest ranking, followed by international conventions. In Haiti, the Constitution outlawed the death penalty in all areas, meaning there was no need to fear its reinstation. The ratification of the Second Optional Protocol could be discussed when the legislature was functional.
Families who were forcibly evicted due to the development of road infrastructure or for airport security purposes had a right to fixed compensation, as well as the right to appeal decisions blocking their access to redress.
A State project had been launched to combat domestic labour by children, in line with the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The project had been launched in 16 regions in the country and included a concrete list of jobs banned for children. Twenty-three surveys of young people had been conducted, allowing them to express themselves on themes including domestic labour, birth registration, violence against children, and education. A social protection project ensured monetary transfers for children under the age of five, pregnant women and persons with disabilities. The project was financed by the World Bank and allowed vulnerable families to provide care to their children. Around 25,000 homes received regular monetary transfers to the value of 40 United States dollars per month.
A professional training programme had been launched in conjunction with the International Labour Organization, allowing for the training of more than 800 vulnerable teenagers in various technical and farming activities. Some 9,200 children had received support for school re-enrolment. Four thousand vulnerable homes at risk of family separation received monetary transfers to support income-generating activities, as well as financial education. A pilot programme had been launched in targeted communes with the United Nations Children’s Fund, which had developed a foster programme for children taken out of situations of domesticity to support their reintegration.
Legal assistance officers had been established in 12 jurisdictions and the rollout was ongoing. A decision would be made on the draft Constitution based on a participatory process. A Commission had been established to follow up on gender-based violence cases in the country.
Steps had been taken to prevent the phenomenon of forced evictions, but results were still limited. The Government had not been encouraging forced evictions and had taken new steps to support victims. Demolished homes had been rebuilt and several previous owners had already taken ownership of their new homes. Authorities ensured that no one living in camps or informal housing was evicted without a humane alternative provided.
The Haitian State reiterated its commitment to freedom of the press and its respect for the work of human rights defenders. Efforts were made to ensure journalists could freely conduct their work, including by strengthening protection mechanisms. Haitian authorities reaffirmed their desire to shed light on the murders of several journalists, which were currently at being investigated by the Public Prosecutor.
The courts did not all apply the Covenant in the same way, but it was often evoked in individual cases. Alternative measures to prison were allowed for in the new Criminal Code, which had been adopted in June 2025. Judges were equipped with armed vehicles and would have security details at their disposal for their personal safety. The police force was taking steps to bolster security in zones with a heightened level of insecurity and ensure that the referendum could take place. The Government was engaged in an intense campaign to fight the armed violence being perpetrated by gangs.
Follow-up Questions by Committee Experts
Committee Experts asked follow-up questions regarding identification papers, which more than 70 per cent of the population did not have, as well as the role of the Government Commissioners within the courts of justice.
A Committee Expert expressed hope that the programme being laid out by the State for elections would bring about the enjoyment of rights by the population. It seemed impossible to bring this about given the current insecurity in Haiti. Was the State in a position to achieve peace given the current context? The context in Haiti required international, shared responsibility, with involvement from all States parties.
Closing Statements
PEDRICA SAINT JEAN, Minister for the Status of Women and Women’s Rights and head of the delegation , thanked the Committee for the kindness it had shown to the Haitian delegation, and the Experts for their insights. Haiti had taken due note of all recommendations and was determined to take further steps to develop effective, concrete responses to the Committee’s concerns relating to the implementation of the Covenant. One day, in the not-too-distant future, the country would exit the crisis. Everybody was working to see the day when Haiti could leave the crisis behind. Despite the efforts it had made, the Haitian State was aware that the implementation of the Covenant and progress in bolstering of the rule of law had not yet reached a satisfactory level. Haiti had a massive raft of problems to resolve, including travel restrictions, which had prevented some members of the delegation from traveling to Geneva. The State of Haiti was committed to doing its utmost to implement the provisions of the Covenant.
CHANGROK SOH, Committee Chairperson, expressed sincere gratitude to all who had contributed to the dialogue. The Committee acknowledged the profound political, economic and humanitarian challenges facing Haiti, which had hampered efforts to protect human rights. The Committee underscored the importance of continued diligence and commitment to the rights enshrined in the Covenant, especially in times of crisis. During the dialogue, the Committee had raised serious issues regarding the right to life, gang violence, lynchings, protection of vulnerable populations, corruption, protection of journalists and the need to combat impunity, among other concerns. Despite these challenges, the Committee appreciated the State party’s willingness to engage in dialogue. Haiti was encouraged to take this opportunity to advance necessary reforms to ensure that the rights enshrined in the Covenant were fully recognised for all Haitians.
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Produced by the United Nations Information Service in Geneva for use of the media; not an official record. English and French versions of our releases are different as they are the product of two separate coverage teams that work independently.
There are 50 wildfires currently burning across Alberta in the Forest Protection Area, and four mutual aid fires.
14 are classified as out of control, eight are being held and 28 are under control.
There have been 12 new wildfires since yesterday.
Since Jan. 1, there have been 707 wildfires in the Forest Protection Area, burning more than 679,000 hectares.
More than 1,500 Alberta firefighters, contract firefighters and imported firefighters are currently battling wildfires across the province.
Resources currently being used include heavy equipment, air tankers, helicopters and night vision helicopters.
Alberta has imported firefighters and aircraft from New Brunswick, Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre, Australia, Costa Rica and the United States Forest Service.
Information about wildfires can be found by visiting the Alberta Wildfire Status Dashboard.
Orders and alerts
Updates on evacuation orders are available on www.alberta.ca/emergency.
The Kee Tas Kee Now Tribal Council’s evacuation orders for Peerless Lake and Trout Lake remain in effect.
Registration centre at 10451 170 Street, Edmonton.
The Municipal District of Opportunity No. 17’s evacuation order for Chipewyan Lake also remains in effect.
Reception centre at Lakeview Sports Centre, 102 Opportunity Drive, Wabasca-Desmarais.
The Kee Tas Kee Now Tribal Council’s evacuation alert for the Loon River First Nation (Loon Lake) remains in effect.
The Municipal District of Opportunity No. 17’s evacuation alert for Red Earth Creek remains in effect.
Saddle Hills County’s evacuation alert for the Blueberry Mountain area remains in effect.
Alberta Emergency Alerts are issued by local authorities and are updated at their discretion. For the best source of information on the status of evacuation orders and alerts, residents are encouraged to follow their local authorities’ preferred communication channels for updates.
People living in Alberta are encouraged to download the Alberta Emergency Alert mobile app, which immediately pushes all alerts out to subscribers.
Fire bans
Due to rain and cooler temperatures, the fire ban in the Fort McMurray and High Level Forest Areas has been lifted.
Please confirm advisories, restrictions or bans for your area at alberta.ca/fire-bans.
Fire bans outside the Forest Protection Area are the responsibility of municipalities and counties.
Everyone has a role to play in wildfire prevention. Follow all fire bans and restrictions to avoid new fire starts. If you see smoke or flames in the forest, call 310-FIRE to report it.
Applying FireSmart principles to homes and property can mitigate the risk of wildfire damage. Removing flammable materials and vegetation around the property and preventing embers from accumulating can help protect your home from wildfires. To learn more, visit FireSmart Alberta.
Air quality
Visit Wildfire Smoke Information for air quality monitoring information to make informed decisions about outdoor activities to protect your health. While wildfire smoke is affecting air quality in parts of Alberta, the presence of smoke does not necessarily mean there is fire near your community. Find information about the status of active wildfires and wildfire updates at Alberta Wildfire.
Roads and highways
Highway 686 between Red Earth Creek and Trout Lake is closed due to a wildfire.
511 Alberta is the best source of real time information as conditions change on our highways. Follow on X (formerly known as Twitter) @511alberta.
Alberta highways that are affected by the wildfires will open and close frequently depending on safety and weather conditions. Be patient and respect the staff at the closure/detour sites – they are there with your safety in mind.
Health
For information about wildfire resources, including mental health, visit Wildfire Resources | Alberta Health Services.
Child care
One child-care centre is currently closed in response to community evacuations:
Opportunity Childcare, in Red Earth Creek.
Licensed child-care programs are required to notify Child Care Connect if they close unexpectedly.
Parents and guardians should reach out to their child-care provider for information on closures.
Justice and court services
Court sittings will resume in person at the Red Earth Creek courthouse on July 15.
Visit the Alberta Courts website for the most current information regarding court scheduling.
Related information
Active emergency updates
Alberta Emergency Alerts
Download the Alberta Emergency Alerts app
Download the Alberta Wildfire app
How to prepare for an emergency
Wildfire smoke information
Emergency evacuation payments
Free admission to provincial museums and historic sites
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BISHKEK, July 4 (Xinhua) — A scientific and practical conference titled “Shanghai Spirit: Bridges of Mutually Beneficial Cooperation and Sustainable Development within the SCO” was held in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek on Friday. The event was attended by more than 100 representatives of political, scientific, business and other circles of China and Kyrgyzstan.
In her speech, Chinese Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan Liu Jiangping outlined the rich content and modern value of the “Shanghai Spirit”, introduced China’s work as the SCO chair country and the organization’s achievements in cooperation. She stated that China is willing to work with all parties to develop the “Shanghai Spirit”, promote continuous achievements in the development of the SCO, and contribute to stimulating stability and development in the region.
The Minister of Justice of Kyrgyzstan, Director of the National Institute for Strategic Initiatives under the President Ayaz Baetov, as well as other participants from the Kyrgyz side highly appreciated China’s contribution to promoting the development of the SCO and expressed Kyrgyzstan’s readiness to work together with China to continuously achieve new results in cooperation in all areas within the SCO.
The event was jointly organized by the Chinese Embassy in Kyrgyzstan and the National Institute for Strategic Initiatives under the President of Kyrgyzstan. –0–
Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Joe Neguse (D-Co 2)
Washington, D.C. — Colorado U.S. Representative Joe Neguse issued the following statement on the Supreme Court’s decisionregarding birthright citizenship.
“The Trump Administration has engaged in cruel and lawless immigration practices, including the unconstitutional attempt to end birthright citizenship by executive fiat. I strongly disagree with the Supreme Court’s misguided and reckless decision today — which as Justice Sotomayor correctly notes in her dissent — “renders constitutional guarantees meaningful in name only for individuals who are not parties to a lawsuit.” In so doing, the decision also eviscerates the principle of judicial economy, potentially forcing countless Americans to initiate litigation across the country to vindicate their constitutional rights.”
“But the legal fight — to preserve birthright citizenship, and to push back against unlawful executive orders, is far from over. Today’s ruling did not address the merits of Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order — which countless courts have deemed unconstitutional. Nor does the decision foreclose universal injunctive relief via state lawsuits or class action proceedings. That is precisely why House Democrats participated in two pending lawsuits —initiated by the State of Washington and the State of New Jersey — to protect birthright citizenship. And it is why the Litigation Task Force will continue to do so in both cases, among many others, and use every legal tool at its disposal to vindicate our constitution and the rule of law.”
One person has died after a serious crash in Leeston last night.
Police were called to the intersection of Leeston and Lakes Road and Harts Road at around 7.40pm after a report of a vehicle colliding with two pedestrians.
Sadly, one pedestrian was located deceased at the scene.
The other pedestrian received serious injuries and was transported to hospital.
The road was closed while the Serious Crash Unit conducted a scene examination.
Enquiries into the circumstances of the crash are ongoing.
The Kingdom of Morocco and the Republic of Ecuador reiterated on Friday in Rabat their mutual willingness to further strengthen the development of their bilateral relations.
Following the meeting held between the Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccan Expatriates, Mr. Nasser Bourita, and the Ecuadorian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Human Mobility, Mrs. Gabriela Sommerfeld, both parties underscored the outstanding bilateral ties of friendship and solidarity, and agreed on the importance of sustaining these exchanges and regularly reviewing them to further strengthen cooperation.
The ministers stressed that International Law is fundamentally based on mutual respect for the territorial integrity, sovereignty, and independence of States, as well as on fulfilling obligations under treaties and other sources of international law.
Bourita and Sommerfeld said they were pleased with the convergence of their views on regional and international issues and reiterated their commitment to working for global peace and security.
They agreed to pool efforts to address global challenges within various international and multilateral bodies, such as climate change, gender issues, human rights, the blue and green agendas, food security, health, pandemic prevention and response, and combating insecurity and corruption.
The two sides also tackled the significance of implementing the SDGs in an integrated and holistic manner to eradicate poverty and fight climate change while promoting sustainable land use and water management.
During their meeting, the two ministers also exchanged views on regional and international issues, including the situations in Africa and Latin America, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
They reaffirmed the importance of people-to-people exchanges in strengthening mutual understanding, friendship, and cooperation in communication, culture, education, sports, arts, youth, civil society, and the economy.
They also expressed their strong commitment to boosting investments through fluid commercial information exchange, promoting strategic alliances with the private sector, and actively supporting initiatives that facilitate and expand bilateral trade, in order to multiply business opportunities and explore the potential for diversified trade and investment between the two countries.
The two parties explored collaborative prospects within various Atlantic cooperation initiatives. They also voiced their aspiration to make this space a geostrategic framework for dialogue, aimed at promoting development and ensuring security and solidarity, as well as bringing together the peoples of the Global South and North.
Regarding migration, Morocco and Ecuador commended the efforts made in the area, especially within the framework of the Marrakesh Pact, the Rabat Process, and the Los Angeles Declaration, and reaffirmed their shared commitment to dynamic mobility that enables a safe, smooth, and orderly movement of people.
The two officials also expressed their shared will to further strengthen the bilateral legal framework to address common areas of interest in cooperation.
To this end, the ministers welcomed the signing of two legal instruments: a Memorandum of Understanding on diplomatic training and exchange of experiences between Morocco’s Institute of Training, Research, and Diplomatic Studies (IMFRED) and the “Galo Plaza Lasso” Diplomatic Academy of the Ecuadorian Foreign Affairs Ministry; and a Memorandum of Understanding establishing a mechanism for bilateral political consultations.
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Kingdom of Morocco – Ministry of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccan Expatriates.
From 2 to 3 July 2025, Eurojust and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Ministry of Justice jointly hosted a successful workshop in Abu Dhabi, marking a significant advancement in the fight against transnational organised crime. The event brought together 25 participants, including prosecutors from all Public Prosecution departments of the seven emirates of the UAE, central authority staff, and representatives from the UAE’s Interpol office. Attendees had the opportunity to exchange best practices, tackle common challenges, and strengthen existing partnership.
The workshop centered on presenting Eurojust’s mandate and activities to UAE counterparts, while discussing the respective roles in international judicial cooperation, cybercrime, money laundering, and asset recovery. Eurojust’s representatives shared their knowledge and experience, emphasizing the critical importance of cooperation and coordination in tackling complex, cross-border crimes. The event also served as a platform for constructive dialogue and knowledge exchange. By exploring ways to enhance collaboration, participants sought to identify opportunities for more effective cooperation between the UAE and EU Member States in combating organised crime.
The workshop is a key deliverable under the framework of the 8th UAE–EU Structural Dialogue on Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT). This dialogue aims to strengthen cooperation between the UAE and the EU in the areas of anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism.
In Abu Dhabi, the Eurojust delegation, led by Vice-President José de la Mata, also took part in several high-level meetings, including discussions with the UAE Minister of Justice Abdullah Al Nuaimi, the EU Ambassador to the UAE Lucie Berger as well as Ambassadors and representatives from EU Member States.
Eurojust’s collaboration with the UAE is part of its broader efforts to strengthen cooperation with third countries, and to promote the rule of law and justice globally. The workshop was supported by the CTJUST project.
Priority question for written answer P-002710/2025 to the Commission Rule 144 Matjaž Nemec (S&D)
The provincial parliament of the Austrian province of Styria has adopted a proposal by the ruling Freedom Party (FPÖ), a member of the Patriots Group, and the People’s Party (ÖVP), a member of the EPP Group, to include the controversial Dachsteinlied in the law on provincial symbols.
The song is controversial for Slovenia because the lyrics, which date from the 19th century, refer to the land of Austrian Styria extending ‘to the banks of the Sava and the Drava’, in other words to encompass present-day Slovenian territory.
By adopting this measure, the provincial government and parliament have taken a step in the direction of nationalist rhetoric, historical revisionism and politically motivated provocation, contrary to the fundamental principles and values of the European Union, including the principle of sincere cooperation between Member States, mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, and commitment to the peaceful settlement of disputes.
Laws that can be understood as an expression of territorial claims or encroachment on the territorial integrity of another Member State have no place in the EU.
1.Is the Commission aware of the adoption of this law and of its content?
2.Is the law compatible with the values and legal order of the EU, in particular the principles of sincere cooperation and respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Member States?
3.What steps does the Commission intend to take to ensure that Austria respects its obligations under the Treaties, and is the Commission considering initiating infringement proceedings before the Court of Justice of the EU?
Source: Northern Territory Police and Fire Services
Enabling work will make the future construction work safer for workers, as well as path and road users.
In brief:
Enabling works have begun on the southern section of the Athllon Drive Duplication project.
These will prepare the Athllon Drive corridor for the project’s main construction.
The work will take around six months to complete (weather permitting).
Work has begun on the second package of enabling works for the duplication of the southern section of Athllon Drive.
The work will prepare the Athllon Drive corridor for the main construction of the duplication between Sulwood Drive and Drakeford Drive in Kambah. This is a key link connecting Tuggeranong and Woden.
These enabling works will make it safer for workers, as well as path and road users, when the main construction takes place.
This phase of the project will include:
relocating underground services
upgrading active travel paths
construction of new path connections
improving path lighting.
The work will take around six months to complete (weather permitting).
The Athllon Drive Duplication project
The project will see the duplication of 2.4 kilometres of Athllon Drive between Sulwood Drive and Drakeford Drive in Tuggeranong.
Athllon Drive is a vital road for people living in Canberra’s south.
Two rapid bus routes, cyclists and around 2,000 vehicles currently use this road every hour during peak periods.
The duplication will:
improve travel times for all transport modes
improve safety for walking, cycling, public transport and driving
not preclude light rail which may be constructed in this transport corridor in the future.
Question for written answer E-002593/2025 to the Commission Rule 144 Sebastian Everding (The Left), Anja Hazekamp (The Left), Manuela Ripa (PPE), Sirpa Pietikäinen (PPE), Diana Iovanovici Şoşoacă (NI), Emil Radev (PPE), Friedrich Pürner (NI), Tilly Metz (Verts/ALE), Merja Kyllönen (The Left), Emma Fourreau (The Left), Tomáš Kubín (PfE)
There is a well-founded suspicion that EU funding is being severely misused in Romania, where stray dogs are being killed systematically by privately run organisations financed by the Romanian government. The resources used for these operations are EU funds received to protect animals.
In several counties, local authorities regularly conclude contracts with private organisations whose business model is based on the methodical killing of stray animals. In 2024 alone, 3 871 dogs were captured, of which 3 286 were killed. These operations generated revenues in excess of RON 2.7 million.
1.Does the Commission plan to undertake an immediate, independent investigation into the use of EU funds in connection with the killing of stray animals in Romania?
2.Since animal welfare is expressly enshrined in Article 13 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, is the Commission prepared to make sure that no form of applicable EU funding is used for the killing of stray animals, but can only be used for the humane management of stray animals, such as castration/sterilisation programmes, public education campaigns and the funding of non-profit shelters?
3.Could the Commission specifically confirm that EU funding has not been used for the killing of stray animals under the pretext of the Animal Health Law delegated act on the eradication of infectious diseases[1]?
Submitted: 26.6.2025
[1] Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/687 of 17 December 2019 supplementing Regulation (EU) 2016/429 of the European Parliament and the Council, as regards rules for the prevention and control of certain listed diseases (OJ L 174, 3.6.2020, p. 64, ELI: http://data.europa.eu/eli/reg_del/2020/687/oj).
Michael Gahler, Andrzej Halicki, Sebastião Bugalho, David McAllister, Siegfried Mureşan, Isabel Wiseler‑Lima, Nicolás Pascual de la Parte, Mika Aaltola, Wouter Beke, Krzysztof Brejza, Lena Düpont, Jan Farský, Mircea‑Gheorghe Hava, Rasa Juknevičienė, Sandra Kalniete, Ewa Kopacz, Andrey Kovatchev, Reinhold Lopatka, Antonio López‑Istúriz White, Liudas Mažylis, Danuše Nerudová, Mirosława Nykiel, Ana Miguel Pedro, Paulius Saudargas, Oliver Schenk, Michał Szczerba, Davor Ivo Stier, Alice Teodorescu Måwe, Ingeborg Ter Laak, Riho Terras, Matej Tonin, Pekka Toveri, Inese Vaidere on behalf of the PPE Group Yannis Maniatis, Nacho Sánchez Amor, Thijs Reuten on behalf of the S&D Group Adam Bielan, Michał Dworczyk, Małgorzata Gosiewska, Sebastian Tynkkynen, Roberts Zīle, Reinis Pozņaks, Ivaylo Valchev, Aurelijus Veryga, Mariusz Kamiński, Charlie Weimers, Alexandr Vondra, Assita Kanko, Joachim Stanisław Brudziński on behalf of the ECR Group Petras Auštrevičius, Malik Azmani, Dan Barna, Anna‑Maja Henriksson, Ľubica Karvašová, Ilhan Kyuchyuk, Nathalie Loiseau, Urmas Paet, Marie‑Agnes Strack‑Zimmermann, Eugen Tomac, Hilde Vautmans, Lucia Yar, Dainius Žalimas on behalf of the Renew Group Sergey Lagodinsky on behalf of the Verts/ALE Group
European Parliament resolution on the human cost of Russia’s war against Ukraine and the urgent need to end Russian aggression: the situation of illegally detained civilians and prisoners of war, and the continued bombing of civilians
–having regard to its previous resolutions on Ukraine and on Russia,
–having regard to the Hague Conventions, the UN Charter, the Geneva Conventions and their additional protocols, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the European Convention on Human Rights, the UN Convention Against Torture, the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the UN Convention on the rights of the child,
–having regard to the Association Agreement between the European Union and its Member States, of the one part, and Ukraine, of the other part[1], and to the accompanying Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area between the European Union and Ukraine, signed in 2014,
–having regard to all relevant resolutions by the UN General Assembly and Security Council, in particular UN General Assembly Resolution ES-11/7 adopted on 25 February 2025,
–having regard to the NATO Washington Summit Declaration of 10 July 2024 and the Hague Summit Declaration of 25 June 2025,
–having regard to Rule 136(2) of its Rules of Procedure,
A.whereas Russia has been waging a brutal, illegal, unprovoked and unjustified full-scale war of aggression against Ukraine since 24 February 2022;
B.whereas Russia’s aggression against Ukraine did not begin in February 2022, but in 2014, with the illegal occupation and annexation of Crimea and parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, with severe humanitarian, economic and ecological consequences and resulting in regional instability; whereas Russia could stop the brutal and unjustified war of aggression at any time;
C.whereas the UN General Assembly, in its resolution of 2 March 2022, immediately qualified the Russian war against Ukraine as an act of aggression in violation of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, and, in its resolution of 14 November 2022, recognised the need to hold Russia accountable for its war of aggression and legally and financially responsible for its internationally wrongful acts, including by making reparation for the injuries and damage caused;
D.whereas thus far in 2025, Russia has deployed over 20 000 drones against Ukraine, or around 3 500 per month, representing a 350 % increase compared to the 2024 monthly average; whereas Russia has killed over 1 050 civilians and injured 4 300 more, constituting clear evidence that it actively targets civilians, including ambulances and rescue personnel, in contrast to Ukraine’s defensive actions; whereas the recent attacks on Kyiv and Dnipro were the second deadliest and the deadliest attacks on these cities since the start of Russia’s invasion, starkly conflicting with Russia’s claims that it is interested in peace;
E.whereas, as a reaction to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, the EU has adopted 17 sanctions packages of unprecedented scope against Russia and continues to adopt sanctions against Russia with a view to definitively undermining its capacity to continue waging its illegal war of aggression against Ukraine; whereas the circumvention of sanctions, including through Russia’s shadow fleet and the incomplete implementation of sanctions, remain a major enabler of Russia’s war of aggression; whereas despite these and other sanctions, Russia continues to wage its war of aggression against Ukraine;
F.whereas the US has again halted supplies of crucial military assistance to Ukraine;
G.whereas Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has caused the largest forced displacement of civilians in Europe since the Second World War, with 10 million Ukrainians – mostly women and children – displaced, including 7 million who have found refuge abroad[2];
H.whereas Russia continues unabated to commit heinous war crimes against innocent civilians; whereas according to the Ukrainian authorities, approximately 16 000 Ukrainian civilians are known to be currently detained in Russia and the temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories, although the real figures are likely to be significantly higher; whereas more than 70 000 Ukrainians – including civilians, children, and military personnel – are officially listed as missing;
I.whereas theRussian authorities have systematically carried out enforced disappearances against large numbers of Ukrainian civilians, detaining individuals with no military affiliation on baseless and fabricated charges, with their fate and whereabouts remaining unknown, leaving their families in agonising uncertainty;whereas enforced disappearances by Russia are part of a widespread, systematic and coordinated assault on Ukraine’s civilian population;
J.whereas, according to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, at least 29 civilians have died in custody in Russian detention facilities, and 170 have been executed in areas under Russian control since February 2022;
K.whereas throughout the process of enforced disappearances, the Russian authorities have consistently failed to inform the families of the fate or location of their loved ones; whereas multiple responses from various authorities have likewise failed to provide any meaningful information;
L.whereas the Russian authorities have systematically employed torture and other forms of inhumane and degrading treatment against numerous illegally detained Ukrainian civilians; whereas the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine has found evidence of Russia using rape and sexual violence as means of torture against both male and female detainees;
M.whereas Russia refuses to disclose the number of Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) it currently holds; whereas the Russian authorities are blatantly failing to meet their obligations under the Geneva Conventions to allow international representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to visit prisoners and to transmit the relevant information to the ICRC, state authorities and the families of POWs;
N.whereas Ukrainian POWs and civilian captives are subjected to torture, including starvation, beatings, various types of coercion, physical, sexual and psychological violence and denial of medical care and legal representation;
O.whereas Ukraine and international bodies have documented hundreds of executions of Ukrainian POWs by Russian forces since February 2022; whereas the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine is investigating the execution of 268 Ukrainian POWs (208 on the battlefield and 59 in the ‘Olenivka’ prison); whereas the increasing number of executions and available evidence suggests that these crimes are not isolated incidents but part of a systematic and deliberate policy, constituting serious violations of international law and human rights, and war crimes under the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute;
P.whereas Ukraine and Russia have conducted 65 prisoner exchanges since February 2022, resulting in the release of 5 757 people, including three large-scale exchanges in May 2025, with an additional 469 individuals released outside formal exchange mechanisms;
Q.whereas since the occupation and annexation of Crimea in 2014, Russia has systematically targeted Crimean Tatars with politically motivated prosecutions, enforced disappearances, intimidation and harassment; whereas Crimean Tatar leaders, journalists, civil society activists and religious figures have faced disproportionate repression, including under the guise of anti-extremism and anti-terrorism charges; whereas these actions amount to violations of international human rights and humanitarian law and aim to erase the identity and presence of the indigenous Crimean Tatar people;
R.whereas Russia, while posturing as a defender of the Christian faith and values, has been conducting mass and systematic violations of religious rights in occupied Ukrainian territories, with the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church banned outright, at least 47 Ukrainian religious leaders killed and more subjected to torture, and religious property willingly targeted and destroyed by Russian forces; whereas in parallel Russia weaponises the Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate as a tool to tyrannise and control religious communities and the Ukrainian population more broadly;
S.whereas the torture and killing of Ukrainian journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna in Russian captivity highlights the grave and growing dangers faced by Ukrainian journalists held by Russian forces; whereas others, including Iryna Danylovych, Dmytro Khyliuk, Iryna Levchenko and Heorhiy Levchenko, remain in detention under life-threatening conditions;
T.whereas according to the ‘Bring Kids Back UA’ initiative and the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL), since February 2022 around at least 20 000 and possibly up to 35 000 Ukrainian children have been forcibly deported to Russia and Belarus or detained in temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories, with only 1 366 returned and 637 confirmed dead; whereas the real figures are assumed to be much higher, as these transfers and deportations continue; whereas the HRL’s Ukraine Conflict Observatory has had its funding cut as of 1 July by the Trump administration, jeopardising the continuation of its work;
U.whereas the ICC has been conducting an investigation into the situation in Ukraine since 2 March 2022 and on 17 March 2023 issued arrest warrants for Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, and Maria Lvova-Belova, so-called Commissioner for Children’s Rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation, for the war crime of unlawful deportation of Ukrainian children, followed up by additional arrest warrants against Russian officials issued on 24 June 2024; whereas the EU supports the Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression that is being established in the framework of the Council of Europe;
1.Condemns, in the strongest possible terms, Russia’s unprovoked, illegal and unjustified war of aggression against Ukraine; demands that Russia immediately cease all military activities in Ukraine, fully withdraw from Ukraine’s internationally recognised territory, end forced deportations, release all detained and deported Ukrainians and compensate Ukraine and victims of war crimes; reiterates its condemnation of Belarus’s direct involvement in Russia’s brutal war of aggression against Ukraine;
2.Confirms its unwavering commitment to the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine, within its internationally recognised borders and reiterates its policy of non-recognition of Ukrainian territories temporarily occupied by Russia; strongly underlines Ukraine’s inherent right to self-defence, in line with Article 51 of the UN Charter, which entails the right to strike military targets on Russian soil;
3.Reaffirms its unwavering solidarity with the people of Ukraine in their heroic defence of their nation, their land, and our shared European values; reiterates its belief that a strong, independent and democratic Ukraine is vital for Europe’s security, stability and prosperity;calls for the EU and all its 27 Member States to substantially enhance the effectiveness and accelerate the delivery of military support to Ukraine in order to allow Ukraine to legitimately defend itself against Russia’s escalating attacks on cities and civilian infrastructure across the country, and to put Ukraine in the strongest possible position for negotiations;
4.Condemns Vladimir Putin’s ongoing revisionist and imperialist rhetoric and ideology, and treacherous propaganda; denounces the systematic attempts by the Russian Government to erase Ukraine’s history, culture, language and identity;
5.Stresses that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has shattered peace and stability in Europe and gravely undermined global security; underscores that Russia remains the most significant and direct threat to European security;
6.Strongly condemns the execution of Ukrainian POWs by Russian forces, constituting war crimes and grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions;
7.Reiterates that Russia bears sole responsibility for its war of aggression and that there can be no impunity for violations of human rights, war crimes, or other breaches of international law committed by Russian forces and officials; expresses deep outrage at Russia’s brutal attacks on civilians and the indiscriminate targeting of civilian infrastructure; stresses that the systematic and deliberate targeting of civilians and, in particular, the deportation of children may constitute a genocidal strategy orchestrated and executed by the Russian Government;
8.Fully supports the ICC’s ongoing investigations into the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Russia; welcomes the recent agreement between the Council of Europe and Ukraine on the establishment of a Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine; emphasises that all those responsible for war crimes perpetrated in Ukraine must be held accountable and stresses that justice is essential for any sustainable peace;expresses its utmost concern about the US sanctions on the ICC and its prosecutors, judges and staff, which undermine all its ongoing investigative and prosecutorial work and constitute a serious attack on the system of international justice; calls on the Commission to urgently activate the Blocking Statute and on the Member States to urgently step up their diplomatic efforts in order to protect and safeguard the ICC as an indispensable cornerstone of the system of international justice;
9.Reiterates its condemnation of Russia’s forcible deportation, illegal detention and inhumane treatment of countless Ukrainian civilians; demands that Russia immediately provide families with accurate information regarding the whereabouts and state of health of detainees and calls for the immediate release of all the Ukrainian civilians currently held captive by the Russian authorities; underscores that the forced displacement, unlawful detention and mistreatment of Ukrainian civilians exemplify the intrinsic brutality of the Russian regime and its flagrant disregard for human life; strongly condemns the gruesome tactics deployed by the Russian authorities against both Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war; deplores the wide and systematic use of terror in Ukraine’s occupied territories, aimed at intimidating the civilian population, stifling resistance and political dissent, suppressing civic activism and eradicating the Ukrainian language and national identity;
10.Condemns the ongoing persecution of Crimean Tatars in illegally occupied Crimea, including politically motivated detentions, torture, enforced disappearances and restrictions on freedom of religion, expression and association; calls for the immediate release of all Crimean Tatars imprisoned on political grounds and urges the EU and international organisations to enhance monitoring and advocacy on behalf of the indigenous people of Crimea;
11.Urges Russia to immediately agree to and implement a comprehensive ‘all-for-all’ exchange of POWs with Ukraine, in accordance with its obligations under international humanitarian law and the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War;
12.Strongly condemns Russia’s violent actions and the complicity of Belarus in the mistreatment of Ukrainian children, including murder, torture and criminal prosecution, forced transfer and deportation, sexual abuse and exploitation, forced Russification and militarisation; denounces the forced imposition of Russian citizenship on deported children and their state-sponsored adoption by Russian families as part of a deliberate policy of forced assimilation; regrets that the EU was unable to help Yale’s HRL secure sufficient funding; calls on its Member States to closely cooperate with and support the Ukrainian authorities and local and international non-governmental organisations in their efforts to document all missing and deported Ukrainian children, determine their whereabouts and repatriate them in order to promptly reunite them with their parents or legal guardians; reiterates that the deportation of Ukrainian children is a grave violation of international humanitarian law, in particular of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, and constitutes a war crime;urges the EU to hold those responsible to account and to sanction individuals and entities implicated in these crimes;
13.Demands that, in line with its obligations under the respective Geneva Conventions, Russia grant the ICRC immediate access to POW camps and other sites where Ukrainian soldiers or civilians are being held captive; notes the marked difference in the way Ukraine and Russia have treated the POWs they hold, with Ukrainian military personnel having been severely tortured, maltreated and malnourished, in violation of the laws of war and international humanitarian law;
14.Reiterates its call for the EU and its Member States to increase humanitarian and rehabilitation assistance for victims of Russian captivity, including access to medical and psychological care, reintegration services and legal assistance; commends Ukrainian and international civil society organisations for supporting families of abducted Ukrainian children, POWs and illegally detained civilians;
15.Reaffirms the EU’s steadfast commitment to the reconstruction of Ukraine and reiterates its readiness to contribute to rebuilding Ukraine’s economy and infrastructure; stresses the strategic importance of the Ukraine Facility in reinforcing Ukraine’s resilience, accelerating its recovery, and supporting its path towards sustainable development and EU membership; reiterates its firm conviction that Russia must pay for the massive damage caused in Ukraine and therefore calls for the confiscation of Russian state assets immobilised under EU sanctions or otherwise for their use to support Ukraine’s defence and reconstruction; underlines its conviction that various legal pathways to do so are available and that lack of action is an inexcusable failure on the part of European governments;
16.Condemns the Russian State Duma’s protocol adopted on 24 June 2025 allowing the member states of the Collective Security Treaty Organization to deploy their troops on the territory of other members in the event of armed conflict, threats, crisis situations and military exercises; condemns this step as a clear attempt by Russia to further scale up its relentless attacks on Ukraine by forcibly mobilising troops from neighbouring and allied states;
17.Strongly condemns the recruitment and deployment of Cuban soldiers in addition to the involvement of North Korean troops;
18.Urges all Member States to immediately provide further military assistance and to engage in joint procurement of additional capabilities, in particular air defence, long range strike and artillery systems and ammunition; in that regard, urges all Member States to devote a significant part of their SAFE Defence Investment Plans to assistance for Ukraine; urges the Member States and their defence industries to invest in and partner with the Ukrainian defence industry, including through additional investments and setting up joint ventures, in order to maximise the full potential of its production capabilities to produce critical equipment in the most efficient way;
19.Recalls the bold statements by several EU Heads of State and Government that Russia’s failure to agree to the US-proposed 30-day ceasefire would be met with severely enhanced sanctions and therefore urges the Council, the Commission and the Member States to follow-up on their declarations and substantially increase the effectiveness and impact of sanctions on Russia; welcomes the seventeenth sanctions package of 20 May 2025 but urges the Member States to adopt the next sanctions package without further delay; underlines that there is a current strategic imperative to act boldly now; stresses that the negative global security and economic consequences of any future Russian aggression far outweigh the military and financial commitment needed today to definitively end Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, to deter further Russian aggression and achieve a just, fair and lasting peace; resolutely calls on the EU Member States to stop their shameful business as usual approach and instead act with a renewed sense of urgency and purpose;
20.Believes that in order to pressure Russia to end its war of aggression, beginning with a sustained ceasefire, substantially more effective military, economic, political and diplomatic efforts and measures must be applied by the EU and like-minded partners; calls for all necessary steps to be taken to avoid the circumvention of sanctions, in particular by targeting Russia’s ‘shadow fleet’ vessels; calls for a full ban on Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG), oil and raw materials, and interim measures to minimise Russia’s ability to pay for its war of aggression through energy exports, including a lower oil price cap and the introduction of an LNG price cap; underlines the importance of adopting the 18th sanctions package without further delay; calls on the Member States that are blocking the adoption of the latest sanctions package to follow other Member States, which have successfully found alternative sources for oil and gas deliveries; underlines that it is unacceptable that, in the fourth year of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, Russian missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles used in attacks continue to rely heavily on Western-manufactured components;
21.Recalls that the overall support for Ukraine must be sufficient to stop Russia’s war of aggression and allow Ukraine to liberate all its people, re-establish full control over its territory within its internationally recognised borders and deter any further aggression by Russia;recalls that Europe has already supported Ukraine with EUR 50 billion in military aid, but underlines that further assistance is required and that such support now depends largely on Europe itself; urges the Member States to provide more arms and ammunition to Ukraine before any negotiations are concluded; denounces any attempts to pressure Ukraine to cede occupied territory, in which the population is exposed to continued repression, violence, forced disappearances, illegal detentions, deportations and other forms of systematic terror;
22.Calls on the EU to impose personal sanctions against Russian officials responsible for violence and torture against imprisoned and detained Ukrainians;
23.Expresses its full support for a just and lasting peace in Ukraine, based on terms determined byUkraine and acceptable to its people; stresses that any agreement must uphold Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, prevent Russia from rearming and guarantee Ukraine’s long-term security; insists on accountability for war crimes and on reparations; underlines that peace negotiations must be preceded by an unconditional ceasefire;
24.Stresses that in the light of the shift in the US stance on Russia’s war of aggression, the EU and its Member States must remain Ukraine’s primary strategic allies and should reinforce their leadership role in supporting Ukraine’s struggle for sovereignty, peace and justice; calls for the EU and its Member States to work towards maintaining the broadest possible international support for Ukraine, including through building coalitions with like-minded non-EU partners;
25.Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the Council, the Commission, the governments and parliaments of the Member States, the Council of Europe, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the President, Government and Parliament of Ukraine, and to the authorities of Russia and Belarus.
Question for written answer E-002590/2025 to the Commission Rule 144 Ilaria Salis (The Left), Mimmo Lucano (The Left), Benedetta Scuderi (Verts/ALE), Cristina Guarda (Verts/ALE)
Filippo Ferri was recently appointed head of the Monza and Brianza State Police, despite receiving a final sentence in 2012 for aggravated forgery in relation to the violent raid on the Diaz school during the G8 meeting in Genoa in 2001.
This appointment raises questions about the effectiveness of accountability mechanisms for officials involved in serious human rights violations and the implications for the credibility of democratic institutions.
In view of its role in ensuring compliance with Article 2 TEU and in accordance with the European Code of Police Ethics:
1.Does the Commission consider it compatible with EU standards on the rule of law and the protection of fundamental rights to assign individuals convicted of abuses of power and serious human rights violations to top roles in law enforcement agencies?
2.Does it intend to push for the introduction, at national or European level, of enhanced integrity and ethical verification procedures for appointments to senior security forces, including binding or advisory opinions from independent human rights bodies?
Source: United States Senator for North Dakota John Hoeven
07.04.25
Legislation Heads to President Trump to be Signed into Law
BISMARCK, N.D. – Senator John Hoeven issued the following statement after the House of Representatives passed the One Big Beautiful Bill, legislation that delivers on promises to:
Provide permanent tax relief for American families and small businesses.
Secure the border.
Rebuild our military.
Support farmers and ranchers by passing the heart and soul of the farm bill.
Unleash American energy dominance.
At the same time, the legislation finds savings of $1.6 trillion through common sense reforms and reducing waste, fraud and abuse, ultimately reducing the deficit by $507 billion.
“The One Big Beautiful Bill will make our nation more prosperous and more secure. We worked to pass this legislation to provide permanent tax relief for American families that will enable them to keep more of their hard-earned paychecks. We invest in priorities like border security, national defense, unleashing American energy dominance and passing the heart and soul of the farm bill for our farmers and ranchers. At the same time, we find $1.6 trillion in savings to help with our debt and deficit. This bill delivers on the priorities that President Trump promised to get our nation back on track.”
Tax Relief for Families and Small Businesses
The legislation permanently extends current individual tax rates and bracket changes of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, providing $4 trillion in tax relief and will increase take-home pay by up to $10,900 in the first four years for the typical family, resulting from economic growth and tax relief.
The bill provides new and expanded tax deductions and credits for individuals, families and seniors, including:
No taxes on tips or overtime for millions of American workers.
Increasing and making permanent the enhanced child tax credit at $2,200, with $1,700 of that amount being refundable, adjusted for inflation.
Permanent relief from the death tax by setting the exemption to $15 million or $30 million for those married filing jointly, adjusted for inflation.
Savings accounts for newborns to help build financial security.
A new $6,000 tax deduction for millions of low- and middle-income seniors. Combined with other deductions, this will result in the average beneficiary paying zero taxes on Social Security.
The legislation helps small businesses, including agricultural producers and manufacturers invest in their operations by:
Permanently extending the Section 199A pass-through deduction for small businesses, farmers and ranchers.
Permanently extending the Section 199A(g) deduction used by agricultural cooperatives.
Increasing the Section 179 expensing amount to $2.5 million and increasing the phaseout for qualified property at $4 million.
Establishing a 100 percent accelerated depreciation for new industrial and manufacturing facilities that begin construction between 2025-2028.
Making permanent the 30 percent interest expense allowance.
Permanently extending the 100 percent domestic research and development deduction.
Making permanent 100 percent bonus depreciation.
Support for Farmers and Ranchers
To support the nation’s farmers and ranchers, Hoeven worked to pass the heart and soul of the farm bill in the One Big Beautiful Bill. The legislation improves the farm-safety net to meet today’s markets and input costs, essentially providing a seven year farm bill. Specifically, the bill:
Increases reference prices for Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) by 10% to 20% (specific increase varies by commodity).
Built-in future reference price increases with an inflation adjuster and an improved price escalator to prevent reference prices from becoming outdated when market and input costs change.
New safety net begins right away – producers can receive the higher of the ARC or PLC payment for this crop year, 2025, with the new updated reference prices. North Dakota farmers will see tens of millions of dollars in relief in 2025 alone thanks to these updates.
Includes key provisions of Hoeven’s FARMER Act to strengthen and expand access to affordable crop insurance:
Increases premium support for individual-based coverage across nearly all levels – starting at 55% — by an additional 3-5%.
Enhances the Supplemental Coverage Option by raising the coverage level from 86% to 90%, and boosts premium support from 65% to 80%.
Extends the sugar program through 2031, while increasing the sugar loan rate to better align with current market conditions.
Improves livestock disaster programs
Sets Livestock Indemnity Program (LIP) payments at 100% of market value for losses from federally protected predators and 75% for weather and disease losses.
Improves the Livestock Forage Program (LFP) to provide one monthly payment to eligible producers with grazing land in counties rated D2 (severe drought) for at least four consecutive weeks and two payments if D2 persists during any seven of eight consecutive weeks within the normal grazing period.
Unleashing U.S. Energy Dominance
The One Big Beautiful Bill will help restore American energy dominance by rolling back burdensome Green New Deal policies and empowering domestic energy production, including:
Increasing the value of the 45Q tax credit for captured carbon used in enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and utilization to match that of sequestration.
Requiring the Interior Department to hold regular oil and gas lease sales across federal lands and waters.
Requiring the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to act timely on coal lease applications.
Reducing the royalty rate for oil, gas and coal produced on federal land to their levels prior to the Biden administration’s tax-and-spend legislation.
Stopping the Biden-era natural gas tax.
Investing in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
Providing regulatory relief for energy producers and repeals Biden-era Green New Deal policies and programs.
Bolstering the Military
$25 billion to support the Golden Dome initiative, with investments in hypersonic testing, ground-based radars, and space-based sensors that support North Dakota-based missions and capabilities.
$15 billion to enhance nuclear deterrence, including the nuclear missions based at Minot Air Force Base:
$2.5 billion for the new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program.
$500 million to sustain the existing Minuteman III ICBM.
$200 million for additional MH-1139 Grey Wolf helicopters.
Improves servicemembers’ quality of life through increased allowances and special pays, as well as improvements to housing, health care, childcare, and education.
Securing the Border
Completes construction of the border wall, and upgrades barrier systems including access roads, cameras, lights, and sensors.
Improves border screening technology to help prevent drug trafficking and human smuggling.
Strong funding to hire and train more border security personnel.
Funds the Operation Stonegarden grant program to equip state and local law enforcements to cooperate with Border Patrol.
Invests in state and local capabilities to detect threats from unmanned aerial systems.
Supporting Water Infrastructure
Provides $1 billion in funding for Bureau of Reclamation Water Conveyance Projects, including for eligible projects like the Eastern North Dakota Alternate Water Supply Project (ENDAWS).
Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region – 4
A spokesman of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government today (July 4) said that the statement made by the former non-permanent judge of the Court of Final Appeal (CFA), Brenda Hale, on the Hong Kong National Security Law (HKNSL) and the rule of law and independent judicial power in Hong Kong is far from the truth, particularly her assertion that the so-called “the National Security Law has taken over the Basic Law” is absolutely incorrect and contrary to the facts.
Brenda Hale was appointed as a non-permanent judge of the CFA in 2018 but has never been involved in the hearing of any cases. She indicated to the Judiciary in June 2021 that, for personal reasons, she would not wish to have her appointment extended for another term upon the expiry of her then appointment, which differs from her current statement.
The HKSAR Government spokesman said that any claims that the HKNSL overrides the Basic Law are incorrect. Article 1 of the HKNSL clearly states that the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC) enacts the HKNSL in accordance with the Constitution, the Basic Law, and the Decision of the National People’s Congress on Establishing and Improving the Legal System and Enforcement Mechanisms for Safeguarding National Security in the HKSAR. The HKNSL was promulgated and implemented in the HKSAR on June 30, 2020, which has addressed the shortcomings and plugged the loopholes in the legal system and enforcement mechanisms for safeguarding national security of the HKSAR. The HKNSL and other laws in safeguarding national security in the HKSAR firmly adhere to the principle of the rule of law while protecting the rights and freedoms enjoyed under the Basic Law in accordance with the law.
The judicial system of the HKSAR is protected by the Basic Law. According to Articles 2, 19 and 85 of the Basic Law, the HKSAR shall be vested with independent judicial power, including that of final adjudication; the courts shall exercise judicial power independently, free from any interference. All judges and judicial officers abide by the Judicial Oath and administer justice in full accordance with the law, without fear or favour, self-interest or deceit. When adjudicating cases of offences endangering national security, as in any other cases, judges remain independent and impartial in performing their judicial duties, free from any interference. The implementation of the HKNSL over the past five years has proven that the courts have handled all the cases involving the HKNSL strictly in accordance with the above principles.
The authority of the NPCSC to interpret the Basic Law and national laws that apply in the HKSAR is a fundamental aspect of the “one country, two systems” principle and has long been recognised in the jurisprudence of the HKSAR. It is therefore entirely in line with the “one country, two systems” principle that the general power to interpret the HKNSL being a piece of national law, as stipulated in Article 65 thereof, is also vested in the NPCSC. The interpretation given by the NPCSC on Articles 14 and 47 of the HKNSL in December 2022 does not and did not directly deal with any specific judicial proceedings or cases. Rather, it clarifies the meaning of the relevant legal provisions and the basis for application of the HKNSL. It does not in any way impair the independent judicial power and the power of final adjudication of the HKSAR courts as guaranteed by the Basic Law. It is for the HKSAR to resolve specific cases and issues by itself.
The long-time presence of esteemed judges from overseas appointed or reappointed as non-permanent judges of the CFA participating in hearings of the Court, as well as after the enactment of the HKNSL, has been conducive to the international legal environment and the development of the jurisprudence of common law in Hong Kong. There are currently six non-permanent judges from the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand in the CFA.
A special mobile application – “Gosuslugi Avto”, “OSAGO Assistant” or the insurer’s own application with the ability to issue an electronic Europrotocol – allows you to fill out a notification of an accident without calling the traffic police to the scene of the accident, as well as take photographs of the damage.
The law provides for two options for registering an accident — with or without photo recording. In the case of photo recording without disagreement on the circumstances of the accident, the maximum limit of compensation under OSAGO is 400 thousand rubles, if photo recording is performed and there is disagreement — 200 thousand rubles, and when there is no photo recording and no disagreement — 100 thousand rubles (Article 11.1 of the Law on OSAGO). It is worth considering that if there is disagreement between drivers on the circumstances of the accident or the nature of the damage to vehicles, photo recording is mandatory for registering an accident without traffic police officers, without it, the insurance payment is not guaranteed. Make sure that the photos have been successfully uploaded through the application — wait for a confirmation notification.
Mobile applications are available for download in application stores (App Store, Google Play), as well as onPublic servicesor websites of insurance companies.
Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.
Detectives are appealing to the public to help trace a suspect, after shots were heard in Ladywell Fields, Catford.
Officers are releasing an image of the suspect, who fled the scene on a motorbike shortly after the incident.
Police were called to Ladywell Fields at 15:43hrs on Tuesday 14 May after gunshots were heard by several witnesses.
No injuries were reported and no arrests have been made at this stage.
Detective Inspector Jordan Gardner from the Trident Reactive team leading the investigation, said:
“My team are following multiple lines of inquiry in this investigation, which I know has caused concern in the community.
“We are now asking the public to help us in identifying this suspect and are also asking if anyone recognises the pictured motorbike. If you recall seeing it, either on the day of the incident, parked in a driveway or specific location, or know someone who may have been using it in recent years – please get in touch.”
If anyone has any information that can help, please contact the police on 101 quoting CAD5273/14MAY.
To remain anonymous, call the independent charity Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or visit crimestoppers-uk.org.
