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MeToo-style sexual abuse rampant across North Korea

Andrew Salmon

By: Andrew Salmon.

Human Rights Watch details pervasive rape culture, but says it could be easily fixed – and slams Seoul for ignoring human rights as it engages regime

Rape by government officials is endemic across North Korea, particularly as the marketization of the economy provides a field for sexual abuse on a vast scale.

However, many of the victims have become so conditioned to it, they accept the situation as a normal part of life in the closed-off state.

These are among the findings in a damning new report published on Thursday by prominent NGO Human Rights Watch, or HRW, entitled: “You Cry at Night, but Don’t Know Why.”

HRW said that contributing factors include deeply embedded patterns of gender inequality, a lack of sex education and awareness about sexual violence. In turn, these issues are exacerbated by a lack of rule of law and stigmatization toward victims of sexual violence.

Yet, HRW officials state that the problem is – unlike other human rights abuses in North Korea – easy to correct if the political will existed.

“Ending rape does not mean regime-change,” HRW Executive Director Kenneth Roth said in a meeting with foreign reporters on Wednesday, prior to the report’s release. “This is something that the government can solve without jeopardizing itself.”

At a time when South Korea is emerging as North Korea’s main interlocutor in global affairs, HRW officials slam Seoul for failing to address human rights while it upgrades cross-border relations and seeks to denuclearized the hardline state.

Alleging that South Korean President Moon Jae-in is “accepting Kim Jong Un’s negotiating terms,” Roth said: “I have no trouble with engagement; I object to the Moon administration’s one-dimensional approach to the problem.”

Roth insisted that for both political and commercial reasons, the North Korean nuclear issue cannot be de-linked from human rights issues.

The HRW report was compiled over a two-and-a-half year period. Given the lack of data published by North Korea, the report relies largely on interviews conducted with 106 North Koreans and North Korean defectors, in China and South Korea. Of the 106 people interviewed, 76 were females.

While the hideous experiences of North Koreans who have suffered in labor, prison and re-education camps have been widely publicized internationally, HRW believes its latest report shines a broader light on North Korean society overall.

“This is a completely under-reported side of North Korea,” Roth said. “One way to enable [international empathy] is to describe the lives of average North Koreans. We think this is a good window into North Korea.”

Male officials take the seats while female market traders sit on the floor; one official fondles a women. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/ Courtesy HWR

Male officials take the seats while female market traders sit on the floor; one official fondles a women. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/Courtesy HRW

A culture of sexual abuse

Since the collapse of North Korea’s socialist-style distribution mechanisms in the 1990s, many state officials have been extracting not only official payments and taxes from citizens, but have also been forced to provide for themselves.

As a result, power abuse has suffused society. And with the majority of officials being male, sexual abuse has become a major subset in a vast sea of corruption.

”Female traders like my wife, workers and especially women in prison must do anything their superiors, like police, party officials, investigators or guards, ask them to do,” said a male interviewee, Kim Chul Kook. “Agreeing to whatever request will be followed by potential benefits, and denial by certain loss and unknown retribution.”

In a state where political power is paramount, and the rule of law for citizens is weak or non-existent, victims have no recourse when they are abused by government representatives.

“Having sex with men who have power over you or letting them touch all over your body is a necessity to survive,” said female interviewee Choi Dal Mi. “It never occurred to me that I could or would do anything about it.  It was just how things are.”

Nevertheless, victims suffer psychological torment. The testimony of one, Oh Jung Hee, provided the title for the HRW report: “Sometimes, out of nowhere, you cry at night and don’t know why,” she said.

Prisoners are the most vulnerable population. “Every night some woman would be forced to leave with a guard and be raped,” a former prisoner, Yoon Mi Hwa, who had been captured after trying to escape to China, told HRW interviewers. “Click, click, click was the most horrible sound I ever heard. It was the sound of the key to the cell of our prison room opening.”

Women in detention in a pre-trial facility fear to meet the eyes of their guard. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/ Courtesy HWR

Women in detention in a pre-trial facility fear to meet the eyes of their guard. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/Courtesy HRW

Sexual abuse is prevalent not only in prisons, but in everyday life.

A key development in recent years has been the marketization of the North Korean economy – a process that has been surging across the formerly communist economy since the mid-1990s. As it is a bottom-up force for change that promotes economic efficiencies, helps eradicate poverty and empowers traders and entrepreneurs, while further eroding the power of the state distribution system, it has largely been viewed as benign.

However, the prominence of female traders – who are not required to do military service – in the markets offers new opportunities for sexual abuse by officials.

“On the days they felt like it, market guards or police officials could ask me to follow them to an empty room outside the market, or some other place they’d pick,” Oh – a former North Korean market trader who said she has been forced to have sex multiple times – told HRW researchers. “What can you do? They consider us [sex] toys. We [women] are at the mercy of men.”

In this corrupt universe, a deeply sexist paradigm has taken root, with males complaining that while they have to pay substantive or monetary bribes, female competitors have an unfair advantage – their bodies.

“Many of our fellow male traders tell us that we [women] are lucky to have this weapon. They say ‘now, smart women must use this weapon as much as they can to maximize our advantage’,” said interviewee Lee Boom Soon. “I never replied. I just felt bitter inside.”

“It is ironic that women were the greatest beneficiaries of the economic changes, but have become more vulnerable as they encounter more officials,” said HRW’s Roth. “The culture of corruption fuels rape.”

A government official checks to see if a female market trader has hidden "anti-socialist" materials. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/ Courtesy HWR

A government official checks to see if a female market trader has hidden ‘anti-socialist’ materials. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/Courtesy HRW

Slamming Seoul’s silence

The timing of the report may prove uncomfortable for Seoul, which is now engaged in a fragile process of engagement with Pyongyang.

HRW Executive Director Roth visited Seoul to launch the report, but although he met with South Korea’s foreign minister and deputy unification minister, he was “disappointed” not to meet President Moon, saying it was common for him to meet national leaders. He cited a recent meeting with Germany’s Angela Merkel.

Moon has a background as a human rights lawyer, who actively resisted the authoritarian governments in South Korea during the 1970s and ’80s.

“Moon should know better. His thinking is solving nuclearization, then getting to human rights,” Roth said. “I think this is short-sighted, as the nuclear issue cannot be solved without the human rights issue.”

Calling North Korea “a poor country that diverts resources [to strategic weapons] and the people have no say,” Roth said that if human rights were respected by the regime, that situation would never have been possible.

Moreover, there are sound economic reasons for Moon to push North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on human rights, Roth stated, given that engagement by major, global South Korean enterprises is almost certain to become part of the cross-border engagement process at some point.

“North Korea can trade with Russia and China, but a South Korean company cannot build a factory in North Korea if their human resources are slaves, or if there are women being raped in a back room,” Roth said. “No company with a global reputation can afford complicity with human rights violations.”

A terrified woman is interrogated by a state security official. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/ Courtesy HWR

A terrified woman is interrogated by a state security official. Painting: Choi Seong Guk/Courtesy HRW

A shift of course?

North Korea is, surprisingly, open to international pressure in some areas. For example, following international publicity about the human rights abuses committed there, it closed down the notorious Yodok Labor Camp and has accepted aid-monitoring demands made by NGOs, including the UN’s World Food Program.

HRW insists that if North Korea is truly serious about reforming and opening up to the mores of international society, sexual abuse would be an easy issue for the regime to start with.

“This is not like saying, ‘Everyone has a right to protest’,” said Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division. “If they are going to reform, this is an easy one. I would like to see some reform on sexual abuse, and that could open space for other discussions.”

Even so, Roth anticipated a barrage of denial. “In North Korea, you face stigma if you complain,” he said. “So, they can claim there has been no problem of sexual violence in North Korea, because nobody complains.”

With neither Moon nor Trump apparently willing to ask the hard questions of Kim, who will champion the issue with Pyongyang is another question, Roberston admitted.

Across the region, he said he hoped Japan and Malaysia – which has been taking a more robust stance on human rights under the new Mahathir administration – would take the lead on the governmental front. ASEAN’s Committee on Women and Children might also take up the cudgel.

And with Seoul officialdom reluctant to raise human rights with Pyongyang, he suggested South Korean civil society – which features an active “MeToo” movement, and a parallel movement protesting against spy camera pornography – promote the cause, pressuring their own government to shift its stance and raise the issue with North Korea.

“I would hope that a number of women’s rights advocacy groups in South Korean would take this up,” Robertson said. “It is ready-made for South Korean women – conservatives and liberals.”

Source of the article: http://www.atimes.com/article/metoo-style-sexual-abuse-rampant-across-north-korea/

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Reeducation Camps for Muslims’? The Truth About Islam in China

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Asia/ China/ 15.09.2018/ Source: sputniknews.com.

The Trump administration is considering sanctions against China for its alleged violations of human rights in the form of so-called «reeducation centers» for the predominantly Muslim Uyghur minority in northwestern China. But what’s the real situation like for Chinese Muslims? Do ‘reeducation camps’ for Muslims really exist? Sputnik explores.

Along with Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism and Protestantism, Islam is one of the five religious denominations in China with the status of a «major religion,» with freedom of worship officially protected under the Chinese Constitution of 1982.

Earlier this year, the Chinese government published a white paper entitled «China’s Policies and Practices on Protecting Freedom of Religious Belief,» laying out state policy toward religion, including Islam. In this document, it’s estimated that China has a Muslim population of over 20 million, with 57,000 clerical personnel serving in 35,000 mosques throughout the country, as well as 10 Islamic religious schools.

The white paper emphasizes that Muslim customs, including those «regarding food and drink, clothing, festivals, marriages and funerals,» are fully respected, and that the Islamic Association of China, the official representative organ of Chinese Muslims, organizes pilgrimages to Saudi Arabia each year, with over 10,000 participants sponsored over the last decade.

Opposition to Religious Extremism & Foreign Interference

Pointing to efforts to combat religious extremism, the document emphasizes that China’s «Islamic community focuses on interpreting the thoughts in its religious doctrine of patriotism, peace, unity, tolerance and the Middle Path, serving to form correct belief, discerning right from wrong, opposing secession, and resisting religious extremism.» Multiple religious and academic seminars and conferences have been held with these issues in mind in recent years.

Finally, and crucially, the white paper notes that while the Chinese government «supports and encourages» religious organizations to develop ties with religious groups overseas, it will «resolutely oppose» any attempts to «interfere in China’s religious affairs» or «subvert the Chinese government and socialist system under the guise of religion.»

Ethnic Breakdown

About half of China’s Muslim population (or about 10.5 million people) consists of the Hui – ethnic Han Chinese and descendants of Arab and Persian merchants integrated into Chinese society and culture but practicing the Islamic faith, and concentrated in the provinces of Ningxia, Gansu and Yunnan in the country’s north and south.

The Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group concentrated in the country’s northwest, mainly in Xinjiang province, are the second-largest Muslim group, with an estimated population of about 10 million (although some estimates suggest it to be higher).The remainder of China’s population of Muslims consists mostly of settlers from Central Asia, including ethnic Uzbeks, Kazakhs and Tajiks, as well as immigrants from the Middle East and Africa, with the latter concentrated in China’s major cities.

In the years immediately following the communist victory in the Chinese civil war in 1949, all of China’s Muslim groups, like worshipers from all other religions, were subjected to repression, including violence, arrests, and the closure and destruction of mosques and Islamic schools. However, starting in 1978, two years after the death of Mao Zedong, the country’s leadership began to adopt a variety of acts guaranteeing human rights, including the freedom of worship.

The Uyghur Issue

In connection with the persistent threats of terrorism and separatism in Xinjiang motivated by Pan-Turkic and Uyghur nationalism as well as Islamist fanaticism, the Chinese government has taken a number of measures which some Uyghur activists and Western human rights organizations have deemed excessive.

From time to time, both in Xinjiang and other areas of China, Uyghur separatism and Islamism have spilled out into violence involving gun, bomb, knife and car ramming attacks. In 2009, Uyghur demonstrations and violence in Xinjiang’s capital of Urumqi over a civil disturbance by Uyghur factory workers in the south Chinese city of Shaoguan ended in over 1,500 arrests and at least 197 deaths. In the years before and since, China has faced a number of other terrorist incidents, including the 1992 and 1997 Urumqi bombings, the 2010 Aksu bombing, the 2011 Hotan attack, the 2011 Kashgar attacks, the 2014 Urumqi attack, the 2015 Guangzhou attacks, and the 2016 car ramming attack against the Chinese Embassy in neighboring Kyrgyzstan. In the war in Syria, an estimated 10,000 Uyghur Salafist jihadists, allied to the Nusra Front,* have been involved in the war against the Syrian government and its allies.

‘Reeducation Camps?’

In late 2017, an investigation by the Associated Press concluded that thousands or even tens of thousands of Uyghurs had been sent to detention camps for extremism, with such imprisonment lasting between three months and two years, during which time Uyghurs are forced to learn Mandarin (China’s lingua franca), as well as the principles of «ethnic unity, de-radicalization and patriotism.»Last month, a UN survey citing «credible reports» and expertise by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the exiled World Uyghur Congress, and other groups, expanded the claims against China, estimating that over one million Uyghurs have been detained, and charging Beijing with racism and the unequal treatment of ethnic minorities.

According to the UN report, these «re-education camps for Muslims» subjected detainees to «brainwashing,» extreme surveillance, and even torture.

Chinese officials have refuted the report, telling the UN Panel on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination that the claims were «completely untrue» and emphasizing that there was no such thing as «reeducation centers» in China.

Officials did acknowledge that individuals who had been «deceived by religious extremism» were given mandatory vocational training, language, cultural, ideological, and legal lessons, as well as psychological counselling. However, it’s crucial to distinguish between efforts to rehabilitate those afflicted by extremism, and claims of a widespread discriminatory campaign specifically directed against Muslims. Furthermore, with Islamist and separatist extremism being issues which traditionally affect only a tiny minority of a given community, the idea that Chinese authorities could detain upwards of ten percent of the entire Uyghur population is absurd.

Last month, a Sputnik investigation revealed that the organization responsible for the creation of the initial UN report, the Uyghur Human Rights Project, was founded by the Uyghur American Association in 2004 with a supporting grant from the National Endowment for Democracy. The latter group, chaired by Arizona Senator John McCain from 1993 until his death in 2018, has been the vanguard of US-sponsored regime change, according to independent journalist Stephen Lendman. Other organizations contributing to the UN report, such as Human Rights Watch, have received donations from Hungarian-American billionaire George Soros, with other contributors, including Radio Liberty, being directly associated with the US government and intelligence services including the CIA.

Source of the notice: https://sputniknews.com/analysis/201810141068875304-islam-in-china-analysis/

 

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Nepal: Barries to Inclusive Education

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Asia/Nepal/25.09.18/Source: www.hrw.org.

Children with disabilities in Nepal face serious obstacles to quality, inclusive education, Human Rights Watch said today.

Despite progress in law and policy, the government segregates most children with disabilities into separate classrooms. It has yet to train teachers to provide inclusive education, in which children with and without disabilities learn together. Tens of thousands of children with disabilities remain out of school.

“Despite several new policies to promote disability rights, including for access to education, many children with disabilities in Nepal are not getting a quality, inclusive education,” said Alpana Bhandari, disability rights fellow at Human Rights Watch. “Public schools should provide adequate support for children with disabilities to learn in classrooms with other children and not segregate them.”

Based on research conducted in May 2018 in 13 public schools in five districts across Nepal, Human Rights Watch found that segregating children with and without disabilities has denied many children with disabilities their right to education. Human Rights Watch interviewed 80 children with disabilities, their families, representatives of organizations for people with disabilities, teachers, principals, government officials, and United Nations staff.

Human Rights Watch report “Futures Stolen: Barriers to Education for Children with Disabilities in Nepal,” which found many children with disabilities in Nepal faced barriers in accessing schools and obtaining a quality education. Since that time, Nepal has improved laws and policies regarding access to education for children with disabilities, and some children have benefited. Thousands of children with disabilities continue to face significant obstacles to education, however.

Based on UN and World Health Organization estimates, Nepal has 60,000 to 180,000 children ages 5 to 14 with disabilities. In a 2011 report, Human Rights Watch estimated that at least 207,000 children in Nepal have a disability. In 2016, UNICEF found that 30.6 percent of children with disabilities, or approximately 15,000 to 56,000 children, ages 5 to 12, did not attend school.

Very few mainstream public schools enroll children with disabilities. Out of more than 30,000 schools in Nepal, just 380 have what they call “resource classes,” where children with a particular disability, such as children who are blind or who have an intellectual disability, are grouped with others with a similar disability. In the schools Human Rights Watch visited, children in resource classes ranged in age from 7 to 17, with some even in their 20s. Children often remain in these classes for years, although some may move to mainstream classrooms in the higher grades, with limited support.

Nepal has no academic curriculum for children with intellectual disabilities, including children with Down Syndrome. Those who do attend school learn only basic skills, largely focused on self-care. Denying education based on a child’s disability is discriminatory, Human Rights Watch said.

In 2010, Nepal ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), which guarantees the right to inclusive, quality education. Children with and without disabilities should learn together in classrooms with adequate support in an inclusive environment. Research shows that an inclusive approach can boost learning for all students and combat harmful stereotypes of people with disabilities.

“Sunita,” 15, who is deaf, attends a resource classroom in a public school in Lalitpur. “I have never been to a regular class,” she said. “I want to learn together with others. It is more fun learning together with friends.”

Most mainstream schools visited also lack teachers trained in how to use accessible learning materials, such as braille and audio equipment, and how to make testing accessible. The classrooms lack accessible infrastructure.

A principal at a public mainstream school in the Gorkha district in western Nepal said that one former student with a physical disability crawled on his hands and knees to get from one classroom to another for the seven years he attended the school, because the school was not wheelchair accessible.

Since 2011, the Nepali government has introduced reforms to strengthen the rights of people with disabilities and to expand educational opportunity. The 2015 constitution says that education is a fundamental right and provides for free and compulsory primary education and free secondary education, as well as the right to free education through braille and sign language.

In 2017, Nepal adopted the Disability Rights Act and an Inclusive Education Policy for Persons with Disabilities. The policy says that children should be able to study, without discrimination, in their own communities, but also allows educating for children with disabilities separately.

The government is also developing an inclusive education master plan to create disability-friendly educational infrastructure and facilities, improve teacher training, and develop a flexible curriculum by 2030. However, the government has yet to articulate in law or policy a clear understanding of what quality, inclusive education in line with international standards requires and how to provide it.

Nepal’s major education reform, the School Sector Development Plan for 2016 to 2023, covers pre-school through high school education. The budget for the first five years is estimated at US$6.46 billion. Eleven percent of the cost is provided by international donors, including the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and the European Union. The program builds on a previous reform plan, which the government acknowledged did not do enough to ensure education for children with disabilities.

The government should ensure schools are accessible for all children, children with disabilities are taught in mainstream classrooms, and all teachers are trained to provide inclusive education, Human Rights Watch said.

 

The overnment should also provide reasonable accommodations to support individual learning. This can include braille textbooks, audio, video, and easy-to-read learning materials; instruction in sign language for children with hearing disabilities; and staff to assist children with self-care, behavior, or other support needed in the classroom.

“Nepal’s government and its international partners have made education a clear priority, including for children with disabilities, but they need to do much more to make this vision a reality,” Bhandari said. “Support for children to study in mainstream classrooms, teacher training, and a flexible curriculum are essential to make sure children with disabilities aren’t left behind.”

Nepal’s Education System for Children with Disabilities

Until early July 2018, mainstream schools could apply to the Education Ministry for funding to teach children with disabilities. As of August 28, schools apply to local authorities instead. However, funding is only allocated if a school has a set minimum number of children with a specific type of disability. Because of the funding structure, children are compartmentalized into classrooms based on their disability. And if a school has funding for one type of disability, it may not have the resources to teach children with other disabilities.

Problems of Grouping Classes by Disability

The principal of one school in the Gorkha district told Human Rights Watch that his school has a resource classroom for children with intellectual disabilities and is not physically accessible, nor can it accommodate children with hearing and visual disabilities. Similarly, the principal of a public school in Mahottari, which has a resource class for children who are blind or have low vision, said that his school cannot enroll students with intellectual or hearing disabilities because the school does not have the necessary accessible learning materials, sign language interpreters, or trained teachers.

A teacher at a different public school in Mahottari said that the school has 10 students with visual disabilities. One girl is blind and has a mental health disability, which causes the student to frequently move around the classroom. The teacher said that she did not have the training and skills to teach this student, who was not making academic progress as a result.

If a neighborhood school doesn’t offer instruction for a child with a particular disability, the child may be forced to study and live in a school that does, in some cases as far as 500 kilometers from their home.

Ten-year-old Sita, who is blind and attends a school in Mahottari, said:

I live in a hostel … I go to school… I miss home, but I love school. There is no school near my home [that can educate blind children]. My mom says you cannot learn anything at home, and I must go to school to learn.

Shyam, who has cerebral palsy, attended a neighborhood school near his home in Kathmandu in the early grades. However, at the end of sixth grade, the teachers encouraged his parents to place him in another school because seventh grade and other upper grades were on upper floors. Shyam now travels with his father up to two hours each way by bus to attend a public mainstream school in Jorpati that enrolls children with cerebral palsy, Down Syndrome, and physical disabilities.

Segregation

Some schools that Human Rights Watch visited had children in different grades together in one resource classroom. Others had children in different grades in separate resource classes. In resource classrooms, children with hearing disabilities learn sign language and children with visual disabilities learn braille.

Human Rights Watch interviewed children who expressed their desire to study with children in mainstream classrooms, rather than to remain segregated. Sunita, the 15-year-old girl who is in a resource classroom for deaf students in a public school in Lalitpur, said:

I study in grade 5 … I have never been to a regular class. I want to learn together with others … It is more fun learning together with others. After grade 6, I would want to study together with friends. I [would] get a chance to teach sign language to other kids in the regular class and I can communicate with them. I want to be a teacher when I grow up because I want to teach children with hearing disabilities.

An Education Ministry official involved in developing an inclusive education policy said resource classes should be preparatory environments for younger children who should move to a mainstream classroom around grade six. However, based on interviews with principals, teachers, disability rights advocates, and parents of children with disabilities, children do not consistently move into mainstream classrooms as they get older, due to the lack of accessibility and reasonable accommodations.

Some older children remain in resource classrooms for their entire basic education, through grade 8. Some parents said that when their children did not move to the older grades in mainstream schools, they felt compelled to place their children in other segregated environments, such as a special school or vocational training program. Few older children studied in mainstream classrooms in the schools Human Rights Watch visited.

Gita, who is 16 and attends school in Lalitpur, was able to move into a mainstream classroom. She said: “I am 16 years old. I am in grade 10. … I am deaf. I joined the regular classroom in grade 7. I like studying together with others because learning together becomes fun, and we learn from each other.” A sign language teacher supports Gita’s learning in the mainstream classroom.

Lack of Physical Accessibility

Most schools visited had limited physical access for students with disabilities, including at school entrances, classrooms, and toilets. In some cases, this means that children who use wheelchairs cannot remain in school. The father of a 20-year-old man with cerebral palsy who uses a wheelchair said:

I enrolled my son in a public secondary school [in Kathmandu] for one year and he     passed grade 6. But then the teachers said, “Your child is disabled, your child does not fit         with children without disabilities. Take your child to a               school where children with disabilities attend. The seventh grade is on the third floor, and your child will not be able      to reach it.

Out of the 13 schools that Human Rights Watch visited, including two that were recently constructed after the 2015 earthquake, only one, in Jorpati, Kathmandu, was accessible for children who use wheelchairs. The school has an accessible entrance, no internal stairs, an accessible toilet, and a flat playground that allowed children who use wheelchairs to move freely. The school has 354 students, of whom 27 use wheelchairs. The principal said the school does not provide specific, individualized support for children in the classroom, such as an aide who can provide direct support in personal care, moving around the school, or other tasks. Instead, teachers encourage other students to support their peers who have physical disabilities.

Disability rights activists confirmed most schools lack physical accessibility. A disability rights activist and representative of the National Federation of the Disabled Nepal, who lives in the Gorkha district, said he is not aware of any public schools out of roughly 450 primary and secondary schools in the district that are accessible for students who use wheelchairs.

Under international human rights and Nepal law, public buildings – including schools – should be accessible for people with disabilities based on Universal Design principles. Universal Design means the design of products, environments, programs, and services should be usable by everyone to the greatest extent possible, without adaptation or specialized design. This should include assistive devices for particular groups of people with disabilities, as needed. Nepal’s Disability Rights Act of 2017 establishes accessibility standards for the construction of buildings, including educational institutions, housing, workplace, road, and transport facilities that are intended for public use, while the National Building Code requires public buildings and facilities to be accessible for people with disabilities.

The 2015 earthquake destroyed or damaged 92 percent of public schools, leaving many children, with and without disabilities, out of school across the country, according to a 2017 Asian Development Bank report. Newly built or renovated schools should adhere to Nepal’s National Building Code and Accessibility Guidelines and comply with accessibility obligations under the CRPD.

However, the two newly built schools that Human Rights Watch visited did not comply with national building codes and universal design principles. One, in the Gorkha district, had stairs at the entrance and no ramp or lift, and stairs inside as the only way to reach upper floors. In Lalitpur, the principal of a public school admitted the school does not meet national physical accessibility standards, and an additional building under construction is slated to have only an entrance ramp and only stairs internally to reach the upper floors.

Lack of Reasonable Accommodations

Human Rights Watch visited some schools where children with disabilities studied in a regular classroom with children without disabilities. However, most of the schools Human Rights Watch visited did not provide sufficient reasonable accommodations to ensure children with disabilities receive a quality education.

Schools do not have a full range of textbooks in braille, or material in audio or easy-to-read formats. Schools lacked adequate staff, such as aides to support children’s participation in mainstream education. The aides, who are not fully licensed teachers, can constructively address behavioral challenges, provide personal care assistance, or take on other support roles.

Typically, schools who teach deaf children only have one sign language teacher, who works in the resource classroom. The instruction is limited to approximately 5,000 words in sign language, a fraction of the spoken vocabulary taught in mainstream schools.

The lack of vocabulary, as well as the absence of visual materials, means that even deaf children in a mainstream classroom may not receive a full education. One sign language teacher at a school that Human Rights Watch visited said,

There are 46 students in the class, one of whom is deaf. It is difficult to teach children who are deaf due to a lack of visual materials and a limited sign language vocabulary. When the teacher teaches in the class and new words come up during a lesson, it becomes difficult to describe and explain the lesson.

Samjhana, an 18-year-old deaf student there, described her experience:

Sometimes it is difficult to understand lessons that are taught in the class. I ask my [sign language] teacher when I do not understand. The teacher tries to explain, but I do not understand the words. The learning is more fun and easier with something you can see and understand.

Children who are blind or have low vision learn braille in resource classes, but a limited number of textbooks are available in braille and very few, if any, materials are available in audio or digital formats. One 17-year-old girl, who is blind, described her experience in a mainstream classroom in Lalitpur:

The challenge I have is that I am not able to see and follow what is written on the blackboard. I depend on other students to understand what is written on the blackboard. Not many braille books are available. In this school, children who are blind do get the opportunity to learn, teachers are helpful and so are my friends.

In Kathmandu, Suman, 14, who is blind, attends a mainstream classroom in a school with a teacher who knows braille to support children with visual disabilities. Suman used technology at home to learn, though, since none was available at the school:

I got my digital tablet from an NGO … I also use my mobile telephone at home. I read books with the tablet. … The app has a voice, and I can read by listening. I spoke with my teachers about digital learning, and teachers say they are hoping to adopt that.

The lack of reasonable accommodations, such as aides, can also place serious burdens on families. Some family members may feel compelled to give up employment and the care of their other children to accompany their child with a disability at school. Hari, the father of an eighth grader with cerebral palsy who uses a wheelchair in Kathmandu, said he had to quit work when his son was 8 to accompany him in school all day. The public school Shyam attends does not provide an aide to help him move between classes and feed him. His father said:

My son is big. Who would care for him? I come to school every day to support my son in the school. The school does not provide assistance to support my child. … He can fall any time.

The school principal said the staff encourages Shyam’s classmates to help him with homework and classwork.

Lack of Reasonable Accommodations for Examinations

The schools Human Rights Watch visited provide few accommodations for students with disabilities during exams, though most are mandatory for passing to the next grade or for enrolling in high school or a university. The accommodations provided – such as a writing assistant for students with visual disabilities – are often ineffective. The assistant is often another child, typically from a lower grade, who is not paid.

In one example, there are no options for children with visual disabilities to take math and science tests in an accessible format. Tests often require description of diagrams or pictures, which blind children cannot see.

Nisha, in grade 10, who is blind and attends a public school in Mahottari, said:

The writing assistant helped me take my tenth grade exam. The writing assistant would read me the questions, and I would answer, and then the writing assistant would write down the answers for me. … I wish I could take exams on my own, not with the help of a writing assistant. It’s difficult to perform math and science exams because they have questions related to geometry and questions with drawings, and I cannot see them.

Furthermore, the family of the student taking the exam must pay for the transportation and meals for the assistant. Teachers and disability advocates said exams are not modified for children who are deaf who have been instructed in a limited vocabulary.

Children with Intellectual Disabilities

Children with intellectual disabilities do not receive an academic education and have few if any opportunities to enroll in secondary education or a university. Under the Disability Rights Act of 2017, a person is considered to have an intellectual disability if their “intellectual development does not progress with their age and therefore has difficulty performing activities based on age and environment.” The Education Ministry’s Curriculum Development Center created a curriculum for children with intellectual disabilities in 2015. The curriculum limits children with intellectual disabilities to learning practical life-skills in resource classrooms or special schools for up to 10 years. It includes tasks like personal hygiene, brushing teeth, going to the toilet, getting dressed, and eating independently. Children who are 14 and 15 years old can learn vocational skills such as candle-making, sewing, or origami.

A teacher in the resource classroom at a public school in Mahottari, said:

The school has not received any curricula for children with intellectual disabilities from the government. I teach children with intellectual disabilities using pictures. It would be possible to teach children with intellectual disabilities by using simplified curricula that suits their learning style.

Lack of Trained Teachers

Nepal’s 2017 Disability Rights Act (section 23.2) provides for special training for teachers who educate children with disabilities to promote their access to quality education, but does not mention training for teachers in inclusive education. Training is focused on developing specialized teachers, rather than training all teachers in inclusive methods that will benefit diverse learners. One mainstream classroom teacher said the only training she had on children with disabilities was a one-week program focused on discipline and classroom management conducted by a non-governmental organization.

 

The Education Ministry’s Center for Education and Human Resource Development, formerly the National Center for Education Development (NCED), is responsible for teacher training. The agency’s deputy director, Upendra Dahal, told Human Rights Watch the government provides one month of professional development training to special education teachers who work in resource classes or in special schools. He told Human Rights Watch the center is currently not offering the five-day refresher training that exists. Occasionally, the agency holds training sessions of a day or two for specific disability-related topics, such as teaching children with autism.

Human Rights Watch found some resource teachers had received less than a month of training. Kumar, a resource teacher for children with intellectual disabilities at a public school in Gorkha, said:

I have been a resource teacher for three years. I only received nine days of training from the Department of Education [Now the Center for Education and Human Resource Development]. Otherwise, I have received training from the local nongovernmental organization, Blind Association Gorkha. I do not know how to teach children with intellectual disabilities. I want to teach these students, but I do not know how to impart knowledge to them.

Monitoring

Until early 2018, federal, district, and regional authorities were responsible for monitoring schools. In mid-2018, with the decentralization of education funding to municipal and village authorities, local education offices will have that responsibility.

An Education Ministry official said monitors examine schools’ budget implementation, student attendance, teaching methods, uniforms, school sanitation, food quality, and quality of accommodations in residential schools.

For schools with resource classes, monitoring also examines whether schools have met requirements for a resource classroom. Those include the presence of a full-time, permanent teacher and of the required minimum number of children, and the “minimum enabling conditions,” which include a separate classroom, separate toilet for girls, a ramp at the school entrance, and a disability-friendly classroom, although there is no clear definition for this.

Recommendations

The government of Nepal should:

  • Guarantee quality, inclusive education for children with disabilities in community mainstream schools on an equal basis with others, in line with the CRPD
  • Ensure maximum inclusion of children in mainstream classrooms and avoid segregation of children with disabilities in separate classrooms. Education should be delivered in the most appropriate languages and modes and means of communication for the individual, and in environments which maximize academic and social development, in line with the CRPD.
  • Ensure reasonable accommodations for children with disabilities, based on individual learning requirements. These can include braille textbooks and other materials; digital, visual, audio, and easy-to-read learning materials; instruction in sign language for children with hearing disabilities; and aides to assist students with behavior, self-care, and other considerations.
  • Ensure children who require individual support, or support for small group coursework, are fully included in the school environment with other students.
  • Ensure all schools are physically accessible. Ensure all schools renovated or newly built adhere to Nepal’s building codes and Universal Design Principles.
  • Ensure the examination and assessment system is flexible and responsive to the needs and academic progress of individual learners, based on their individual learning requirements.
  • Mandate the Education and Human Resource Development Center to provide adequate pre-service and ongoing training in inclusive education for all teachers, including on how to address all children’s diverse learning needs.
  • Ratify the Marrakesh Treaty, which permits the reproduction and distribution of published works in formats accessible to people with visual disabilities.
  • Strengthen monitoring and oversight to ensure children with disabilities are enrolled in school and they receive reasonable accommodations to receive a quality education on an equal basis with other children in mainstream classrooms.
  • Collect data on the total number of children with disabilities in the country, including the number of children in and out of school, disaggregated by disability-type, location, and other demographic markers. Formulate educational policies, plans, and programs based on data.

Multilateral and Bilateral Donors should:

  • Ensure the government of Nepal prioritizes the inclusion of children with disabilities in schools across the country and provide adequate resources to ensure they can study in mainstream classrooms with flexible curricula, reasonable accommodations, and trained teachers and other staff
  • Support the government to improve systematic data collection on children with disabilities by age, gender, d

 

Source of the notice: https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/09/13/nepal-barriers-inclusive-education

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African Union Shouldn’t Tolerate Banning Pregnant Girls from School

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Africa/14.08.18/Source: www.hrw.org.

In June, Burundi joined a small group of African countries that ban pregnant girls from continuing with formal education in government schools. Burundi’s Education Ministry  banned the boys who get the girls pregnant as well as the girls themselves from going to public or private school.Burundi’s ban is contrary to the country’s constitution and many domestic laws, and undermines the state’s education goals. Indeed, Burundi’s law against gender discrimination protects girls’ right to go back to school and clarifies school officials’ obligation to respect this right and protect teenage mothers from stigma and social exclusion. Burundi also has an international legal obligation to provide all children with an education, without discrimination.

Human Rights Watch recently reported that thousands of pregnant girls and teenage mothers across Africa are excluded from school. Burundi was then still among 26 African countries with supportive laws or policies protecting girls’ right to education regardless of pregnancy, or their marital status or motherhood.

So, this new policy is a backward step, joining Equatorial Guinea, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, and Togo in applying a punitive and discriminatory school policy against pregnant girls and teenage mothers. These policies effectively deny these girls an education.

In these countries, officials and lawmakers have insisted on punitive measures for girls they accuse of being “moral failures.” Yet Burundi’s government also points out that these girls are “victims” of pregnancy or child marriage. The government is right in that respect so it would seem that these girls need support, not punishment. Although statistics are hard to come by, child rights activists say many girls in Burundi have unwanted and forced pregnancies, often as a result of sexual violence.

Despite this harmful move by the Burundian government, there is broad support among African countries for keeping pregnant girls and teenage mothers in school. Some governments facing high pregnancy rates among students have adopted very pragmatic policies to support the girls’ education, while tackling the root causes of teenage pregnancies.

Countries such as Gabon, Kenya, and Malawi have school “continuation” or “re-entry” policies. “Re-entry” policies require pregnant girls and young mothers to drop out of school but provide avenues to return, provided that the girls fulfill certain conditions. On the other hand, “continuation” policies allow pregnant girls to remain in school for as long they choose to, and do not prescribe a mandatory absence after giving birth.

But even in these countries, many teenage mothers are not in school because of poor implementation of laws and policies, and weak monitoring of adolescent mothers’ re-entry to education. Our research found that teen mothers may stay out of school due to lack of awareness among girls, teachers, school officials and their communities that girls can and should go back to school. Girls are most often deeply affected by financial barriers, the lack of support from their families or communities, and stigma in communities and schools alike. Punitive and harmful aspects of some re-entry policies – such as long periods of maternity leave and complex re-entry requirements like medical certification, as in Senegal, or letters to various education officials requesting school placement, as in Malawi – can deter adolescent mothers from returning to school or catching up with learning.

Across the African continent, girls face unique challenges in educational attainment due to structural and systematic gender inequalities. The African Union through its Agenda 2063 – a continent-wide economic and social development strategy – has committed to build Africa’s “human capital,” which it terms “its most precious resource,” through sustained investments in education, including “elimination of gender disparities at all levels of education.”

Isolating female students from school just because they are pregnant or married denies them the opportunity to learn and acquire gainful skills to develop their families, countries, and the continent. As one of the poorest countries in the world, Burundi should be enabling its girls, not preventing them from achieving.

The African Union, as well as countries in the region, should urge Burundi to reverse this ban. The African Union should call on Burundi and all AU member countries to end pregnancy-based discrimination in schools and adopt policies to ensure that all pregnant teens and young mothers are supported to stay in school.

Pregnancy and child bearing are significant life-changing events for young girls. Many pregnant teens are stigmatized or rejected, with little to no support from the family or school. They are condemned by government officials, face economic hardship, and sometimes abuse and violence.

Banning them from schools only adds to their unnecessary suffering and should not be tolerated.

Source of the notice: https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/07/19/african-union-shouldnt-tolerate-banning-pregnant-girls-school
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New European Parliament resolution on Indigenous Peoples stresses the high relevance of Access to education

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Europe/30.07.18/Source: www.right-to-education.org.

the European Parliament adopted a resolution on the violation of rights of Indigenous Peoples around the world. The Resolution 2017/2206(INI) stresses the importance of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with regards to Indigenous Peoples, including SDG 4.5 on access to education, and reiterates that Indigenous Peoples around the world suffer disproportionately from violations of human rights and insufficient access to education, among other fundamental rights.

The text calls on all states to commit to ensuring that Indigenous Peoples have ‘genuine access to health, education, employment and economic opportunities’, and urges all states to promote ‘the inclusion of intercultural public policies and indigenous languages, history and culture in their school programmes or to offer supplementary extracurricular classes to preserve, revitalise and promote indigenous peoples’ culture at both national and international level’.

The European Parliament resolution is available here.

For more information on the right to education for Indigenous Peoples, please visit our thematic page.

Source of the notice: http://www.right-to-education.org/news/new-european-parliament-resolution-indigenous-peoples-stresses-high-relevance-access-education

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Rise in women travelling from Northern Ireland to England for abortions

Jake Tapper

By James Tapper

Campaigners say having different abortion laws on either side of Irish border breaches Good Friday agreement

The number of women travelling from Northern Ireland to have an abortion in England has jumped dramatically since the government set up a special hotline in March.

A total of 342 women and girls – including at least one 12-year-old – went to England for a termination through the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) in the three months since March: a significant increase on the 190 women who travelled to use the same service in the previous nine months.

The figures have been released as pressure mounts on the government to repeal 19th-century legislation that prevents women from having an abortion in Northern Ireland. It is now the only part of Europe apart from Malta where abortion is illegal, after the Irish referendum in May.

On Wednesday, Theresa May will meet Leo Varadkar, the taoiseach, for the first intergovernmental conference between Britain and Ireland since 2007.

A letter to the leaders, signed by 173 parliamentarians from every major political party in Ireland and the UK, calls for the repeal of sections 58 and 59 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. In England, Wales and Scotland, the legislation has been superseded by the Abortion Act 1967 and other legislation, but it does not apply in Ulster.

Campaigners including Stella Creasy, the Walthamstow MP, who is one of the letter’s signatories, say that having different abortion laws in Ireland and Northern Ireland is a breach of the Good Friday agreement, which commits both governments to having equivalent legislation on both sides of the border.

Creasy called the letter an unprecedented intervention. She said: “We cannot let the human rights of women of Northern Ireland be forgotten. Our duty under the Good Friday agreement is to protect them, not let Theresa May sacrifice them to the political expediency of having the DUP prop up her government.

“Without action it’s clear hundreds of women and girls as young as 12 who are UK citizens are being forced to travel overseas for healthcare – and many more may be forced to continue an unwanted pregnancy as a result. The government must name the date when parliament can repeal this cruel legislation or else risk making a rape victim having to take them to court to vindicate the basic human rights of Northern Irish women.”

On 6 March the Department of Health and Social Care set up a central booking system so that women in Northern Ireland could call a phone number to make an appointment through BPAS. The figures show that an average of 28 women a day crossed the Irish Sea for an abortion through BPAS between March and May, with more than half drawing income support or having an income of less than £15,276 a year.

In 2017, 919 Northern Irish women travelled to England for an abortion, most using clinics run by BPAS or Marie Stopes.

In June, the supreme court said the abortion law in Northern Ireland was not compatible with the European convention on human rights.

 

Source of the article: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/21/women-travelling-from-northern-ireland-to-england-for-abortions

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África: Gender Parity is Key for Better Education Outcomes

Reseñas

África/ 18.06.2018/ By: Zachary Donnenfeld / From: allafrica.com.

Seventy years ago, the world agreed on the importance, and right of all people, to education. Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted in 1948, states that ‘[e]veryone has the right to education’, and that elementary education shall be compulsory and free.

Yet according to the most recent data, we are far from achieving universal access to free, compulsory education – even at primary (or elementary) level. In 2015, the average person in high-income countries had nearly 12 years of education, against fewer than five years in low-income countries.

The number of average years of education is an important measure of the overall level of education in a population and is strongly correlated with more productive economic activity.

Globally, the discrepancy in levels of educational attainment remains large. Figure 1 demonstrates this inequality by showing the average years of education in the adult population for select regions over a 40-year period.

People in Europe and Central Asia have historically had much higher levels of education than those in other regions, though the gap has begun to shrink over time. That said, some regions are catching up faster than others. Sub-Saharan Africa has been particularly slow to progress in terms of educational attainment. At fewer than six years of education per adult in 2015, the region has yet to attain the minimum standard envisioned by the United Nations 70 years ago.

A common way to measure equality of access to education by sex is ‘gender parity’. This method measures the number of female students participating in a given level of education (for example primary or secondary school) relative to the number of male students at that same level.

Figure 2 shows gender parity in primary enrolment for the same regions as Figure 1 (excluding Europe and Central Asia). It highlights the relative exclusion of females from educational opportunities in sub-Saharan Africa, compared to other regions.

Gender parity in sub-Saharan Africa has improved – from about 80 female pupils enrolled for every 100 male students in 1980 to about 95 females per 100 male students in 2015. By comparison however, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), and East Asia and Pacific, have moved much quicker towards gender equality. One way of interpreting Figure 2 is that in 2015, five out of every 100 girls in sub-Saharan Africa were not expected to set foot in a primary school classroom.

Between 1980 and 1995, sub-Saharan Africa experienced a modest increase (about 8%) in gender equality in primary enrolment. By contrast, women in MENA countries became about 20% more likely to enrol in primary school over that same period. Sub-Saharan Africa remains stuck, with higher levels of gender inequality in primary enrolment than any other region. This is reflected in a population that remains less educated than those in other developing regions.

The ability of MENA countries to make their education systems more gender-inclusive supported the expansion of educational attainment in that region. While MENA is not typically thought of as a particularly progressive region regarding gender, in 2015, women in MENA countries were about 5% more likely to enrol in primary school than women in sub-Saharan Africa.

The exclusion of women and girls from educational opportunities in sub-Saharan Africa is one of the factors contributing to the region’s struggle to improve overall educational attainment levels. Conversely, improvements in MENA between 1980 and 2000 in both primary and secondary enrolment (not shown here) supported the region’s significantly faster increase in average education years relative to sub-Saharan Africa, demonstrated in Figure 1.

Education is inherently valuable for a number of reasons. A better educated population offers wider social benefits, like improved health outcomes (for example a lower propensity to smoke), increased levels of civic participation and reduced fertility rates. Better educated parents tend to have fewer children, which can help reduce the pressure on governments in Africa to deliver basic services by shrinking the absolute size of the population.

In other words, there are strong knock-on effects from educating women and girls. Other research suggests that educating women and girls can play a role in poverty reduction, and even in post-conflict reconstruction by including conflict-resilience education within existing curricula.

If Africa hopes to close the gap in economic and human development outcomes between itself and the rest of the world, then improving the average levels of education of women and girls is fundamental.

Historically, it has taken decades for countries to improve the average levels of education and to achieve gender parity between women and men. Technology may be accelerating those timelines, according to a recent United Nations Children’s Fund report. But that report also points out that access to technology may exacerbate (or maintain) existing levels of discrimination against women.

Whether or not the digital revolution changes the nature of education for women and girls, improving the overall level of education in Africa is paramount to promoting more rapid economic growth and improving livelihoods. Ensuring that 100% of Africa’s citizens can enrol in primary school, regardless of their sex, should be the first step towards achieving that brighter future.

From: http://allafrica.com/stories/201806150191.html

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