Human Rights in Ireland is 3 years old today, and has grown at a rate which would make any parents proud. It has over 1,000 followers on facebook and over 1,500 on twitter. Most months the blog averages between 15 and 20,000 views from all over the world. Yesterday, 19 August, was the busiest day in(…)
Last week I wrote this blog-post, which was re-published in substantially shortened form here. I’ve been asked a few times now, especially in the comments to the Irish Times piece what I meant by the phrase “respectful, informed judicial engagement with the nuances of cultural justification”. I’ve been quite taken aback by what most of(…)
In an op-ed in the ‘Rite and Reason’ section of last week’s Irish Times, Dr. Kenneth Houston lauded a regional German court for ‘standing up unambiguously against’ male circumcision on behalf of ‘secular liberal values and ideas of religious freedom’. The Cologne case is in danger of becoming another data point in the ‘law vs culture’ debates.(…)
The Olympic Games have begun. The Games are traditionally presented as a bargaining chip in the context of international human rights diplomacy, but the full picture is much more complex. For those readers who are interested in the human rights aspects of the Games, there is a selection of recommended (open-access) readings after the jump.(…)
In March, in Kearney v. McQuillan Mr. Justice Ryan (pictured left) awarded damages in the amount of €450,000 to Olivia Kearney; a 60 year old woman who was subjected to a symphysiotomy by Dr. Gerard Connolly after she gave birth to her son Martin at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda in 1969 (for more about(…)
The British government has decided to supplement the forced marriage civil protection regime with additional criminal offences. This is the second time that proposals to criminalise forced marriage have been advanced by a government. They were rejected in favour of a civil protection regime under New Labour. There is a suggestion that the civil protection(…)
Live Video app for Facebook by Ustream One of the world’s leading anti-torture experts, Felice Gaer, will be in Dublin next week, only days before Ireland faces a deadline to report to the UN’s anti-torture watchdog. The 66 year-old American, who heads the Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights (New York)(…)
Labour Women are calling for a ’Yes’ vote in the Fiscal Stability Treaty Referendum. Women, they say, have something of a duty to vote in favour of the Treaty because the Treaty speaks to concerns and values peculiar to women, and important to our sense of identity as good women: Women are ‘good housekeepers’.(…)
Readers who are following the abortion debate in Ireland may also be interested in exploring the political conditions under which some reproductive rights advocates work abroad. Last week, Amnesty International issued this Urgent Action in support of Monica Roa (pictured) and her colleagues at Womens’ Link Worldwide. In 2006 Roa persuaded the Constitutional Court of Columbia(…)
One year on from Ireland’ s inaugural examination before the United Nations (UN) Committee against Torture, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) is delighted to announce that Ms. Felice Gaer, Vice-Chair of the UN Committee against Torture,* will join us to speak about the work of the Committee. Date: Monday, 28 May 2012 Time: 2pm(…)
