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	Egyptian death sentences a ‘gross miscarriage of justice’: UN human rights chief by United Nations News   An Egyptian court’s confirmation of 75 death sentences on Saturday has been condemned by Michelle Bachelet, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, as being the result of an unfair trial.   Ms. Bachelet expressed her extreme concern at the decision which, if carried out, would amount to “a gross and irreversible miscarriage of justice”.   The trial is one outcome of the military crackdown on Muslim-Brotherhood led protests in the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares in Cairo on 14 August 2013.   It is alleged that up to 900 mostly unarmed protesters were killed by members of the Egyptian security forces.   The Government later claimed that many protesters had been armed, and that a number of police were killed.   Subsequently, charges were brought against a total of 739 people during a mass trial at the Cairo Criminal Court. These charges included murder and incitement to violence, membership of an illegal group, participation in an illegal gathering, and other crimes.   In addition to the death sentences, 47 people were sentenced to life imprisonment, while the remainder were handed jail terms of varying length.   There have been several mass trials in Egypt, involving hundreds of cases being heard at the same time, and raising many of the same issues about due process and fair trial standards.   “The conduct of the trial in the Cairo Criminal Court has been widely criticised,” Bachelet said. “And rightly so. The 739 people were tried en masse, and were not permitted individual legal representation before the court. In addition, the accused were not given the right to present evidence in their defence, and the prosecution did not provide sufficient evidence to prove individual guilt.   The evident disregard of basic rights of the accused places the guilt of all those convicted in serious doubt. I hope that the Egyptian Court of Appeal will review this verdict and ensure that international standards of justice are respected by setting it aside,”.   Ms. Bachelet also pointed to the stark contrast between Egypt’s mass trials and a recent law that effectively grants members of the security forces complete immunity for crimes they may have committed.   In July this year, the Egyptian Parliament approved a law that will effectively bestow immunity from prosecution on security force personnel for any offences committed in the course of duty between 3 July 2013 – the date the military overthrew the Government of President Morsi – and 10 January 2016.   “Justice must apply to all – no one should be immune,” the High Commissioner said. “Attempts to bestow immunity from prosecution for crimes allegedly committed by members of the security forces merely promotes impunity, and undermines the faith of the Egyptian people in the Government’s capacity to deliver justice for all. I urge the Government of Egypt to ensure that justice will be done, according to law, in relation to any individuals – including members of the State security forces – who are suspected of committing a crime.”   To date, no State security personnel have been charged in relation to the so-called “Rabaa massacre”. http://bit.ly/2x4eLbJ   * Read the Opening Statement by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet to the 39th session of the UN Human Rights Council; 10 September 2018 via the link below: http://bit.ly/2oWagfE Visit the related web page
	Reimagining justice: human rights through legal empowerment by Namati, CPR, NYU School of Law, agencies   Reimagining justice: human rights through legal empowerment, by Sukti Dhital.   According to the United Nations, more than four billion people live outside the protection of the law. Adding to this unjust and ongoing status quo are profound levels of income inequality and rising authoritarianism, deepening the marginalization of communities across the globe. The result is an urgent need to reimagine justice, to build legal systems that work for everyone, driven by the voices of those who have been historically powerless.   American writer James Baldwin once said that to 'know how justice is administered in a country, one must go to the unprotected and listen to their stories to learn not whether the country is just, but whether or not it has any love for justice, or any concept of it'.   Legal empowerment is a growing field of human rights practice, scholarship, and education that strives to do just this, to listen to the stories of communities affected by injustice, and to reverse the tide by strengthening the capacity of marginalized individuals to use the law to find solutions to their justice problems.   Indeed, in September 2015 the UN General Assembly adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), through which the global community pledged to promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development and ensure access to justice for all by 2030 (Goal 16).   The 2030 Agenda acknowledges the significance of rule of law to sustainable development in several distinct ways: by reducing crime and violence, advancing equality and eradicating discrimination, strengthening laws and institutions at the national and international levels, and empowering people.   Although the Agenda doesn't explicitly discuss the role of legal empowerment, it necessarily plays a catalytic role in reaching the proposed SDGs.   Notwithstanding the strong rhetoric about access to justice for all, the SDGs have not been backed up with much action. When the goals were announced, many of them were supported with significant financial pledges. For example, $25 billion in public and private financing was committed to improve healthcare for women and children. Not one dollar was pledged for access to justice.   There is much greater promise, however, at the grassroots: today there are more than 1400 organizations around the world dedicated to legal empowerment. One such example is Namati, an organization committed to building an evidence-based movement of grassroots legal advocates.   Namati convenes the Global Legal Empowerment Network, a network of practitioners and scholars who learn from each other through the sharing of online resources, in-depth learning exchanges, and an annual Legal Empowerment Leadership course.   The Network has also built a growing library of legal empowerment resources to advance grassroots justice worldwide.   Legal empowerment continues to take many forms: from grassroots paralegal programs, to mediation and dispute resolution initiatives, and law and organizing efforts that marry litigation with broad mobilization efforts.   A central tenet of the work is the shifting of power relations, with communities working closely with lawyers and activists to expand access to justice, keeping the community in the lead in defining the justice they seek.   Unlike traditional legal interventions, legal empowerment is broad and flexible, uniting multiple disciplines of law, development, political science and pedagogy to address power dynamics that are key to addressing poverty and marginalization.   The concept of legal empowerment is anchored in international human rights law and rests on Sen's theory that poverty is a deprivation of capabilities and opportunities, with external constraints inhibiting an individual's ability to shape and exercise his or her basic rights.   It provides citizens with a stake in the state and draws from trade union and feminist movements, which saw emancipatory power of popular education and embedded rights awareness with self-reflection and collective action.   Legal empowerment emerged in part as a response to criticisms of top-down approaches within the development field and the failure of development methodologies to meaningfully impact the lives of poor and marginalized communities.   But violations or deprivation of human rights are often a barrier to legal empowerment. Violations of the right to health, education, security, and association can prevent or inhibit individual and/or community participation in domestic legal systems. Legal empowerment programs must adopt specific strategies to tackle these barriers and encourage meaningful participation from marginalized communities.   Towards this end, human rights lawyers are expanding their work beyond traditional legal representation to include legal empowerment interventions that create safe social and political spaces for communities to (re)claim their rights.   This year, the Robert L. Bernstein Institute for Human Rights; an institute committed to the advancement of legal empowerment is hosting a groundbreaking conference to examine the key concepts underpinning the legal empowerment field, illuminating how empowerment can transform access to justice and make real human rights.   There are diverse issues and interventions at stake around which experts can offer dynamic insights into legal empowerment research, with a focus on methodologies, evidence, and gaps in scholarship. Innovative community driven strategies are especially critical to hold state and corporate actors accountable for human rights violations in varying regional and political contexts.   Crucially, this gathering will not only be a forum to listen to the stories of the unprotected, as Baldwin rightly advised; it will be an opportunity to understand how legal empowerment is supporting communities across the globe to become the authors of their own justice, and through their liberation, the inspiration for more.   * Sukti Dhital is a human rights lawyer and the deputy director of the Robert L. Bernstein Institute for Human Rights at NYU School of Law.   http://www.openglobalrights.org/Reimagining-justice-human-rights-through-legal-empowerment/ http://2018.nyubernsteinconference.org/panels/ http://namati.org/ http://www.justiceforall2030.org/petition/tell-world-leaders-to-tipthescales-towards-justiceforall/   July 2018   Community Strategies and Remedies for Natural Resource Conflicts in India, Indonesia and Myanmar - Report by Centre for Policy Research (India) and the Namati Environmental Justice Program.   From the 1990s when many Asian countries and other parts of the world embraced economic liberalization, speculative business interests in land have replaced state control of land use for developmental purposes. Large-scale land conversions and land grabs have exploded in Asia following economic globalization and many point to the years of 2005 to 2008, when food prices peaked, as the period of the global land rush.   The growing demand for land by corporations and private investors has fueled several regional land rush waves, bringing them directly in conflict with communities who require these lands to continue their occupations and survival.   The following is the overview of a three-year study to scope the nature and extent of land use change in the three postcolonial Asian countries of India, Indonesia and Myanmar. It is organised as a set of three country chapters and detailed case studies from each country.   The study analyses primary data on land use approvals for mining, hydropower, industrial estates and plantations over the last three decades in these countries as these sectors have caused large-scale land transformations. The approvals have been analysed for temporal, regional and sectoral trends in land use change. The study also draws from an extensive body of land use studies done by government, academics, international donors, investor coalitions and non-governmental organisations.   This research hopes to contribute to the understanding of the conditions and consequences of land conflicts arising from land use change. What are the reasons why land conversion proposals escalate into land conflicts, what are the strategies that affected communities adopt to address these and to what outcomes, are some of the questions the study investigates. These have been done with primary data collected from land conflict cases through semi- structured interviews as well as secondary sources such as media reports and published studies.   The overall objective of the study is to understand how communities secure land and natural resources that are intrinsic to their basic human survival and livelihoods and to what effect. It aims to generate evidence and knowledge regarding the strategies and remedies extracted by affected communities in the face of project impacts and land conflicts.   * Access the report: http://bit.ly/2NE9huY
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