Freedom of religion
Shia Muslims are constantly at risk of being targeted with violence online and offline for their religious belief. And when Shia women and queer folks go online, they find themselves at risk of being targeted with abuse from multiple fronts as their two identities combine.
The Association for Progressive Communications is outraged by the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in Iran as well as deeply alarmed by the ensuing violent crackdown on protests, violations of women’s rights, and widespread internet shutdowns across the country.
Online hate speech has become a fixture of our lives, especially across Africa. We talked to experts in our network and beyond about this crisis, its tricky challenges and ways to counter it, including APC’s recent campaign on International Day for Countering Hate Speech.
In Iran, women are protesting to demand bodily autonomy and their right to live, in the wake of the state-backed murder of a 22-year-old Mahsa Amini by the morality police. The government is responding by killing more women, attacking protestors and censoring the internet to contain the information.
This joint civil society submission focuses particularly on digital rights including freedom of expression, the protection of human rights defenders (HRDs), including women human rights defenders, violence against women and misinformation.
This report captures the first results of a project aimed at creating generative processes and spaces for discussions in Bangladesh around free speech and hate speech and their implications which could continue beyond the scope and timeline of the project.
The Human Rights Council (HRC) held its 49th session in Geneva from 28 February to 1 April. During a long session that covered five weeks, the Council discussed important country situations and thematic issues on the intersections between human rights and technology.
After six years with APC, Asia policy coordinator Gayatri Khandhadai is closing a cycle. In this interview, she takes stock of the learnings gained while coordinating policy-related initiatives and analyses the evolution of critical digital rights issues and spaces in the region.
APC welcomes the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief's focus on the use of hateful rhetoric in digital spaces to incite violence against religious minorities, which is of particular concern in India, where women especially are subjected to hate speech and threats online and offline.
This research report seeks to draw out the analytical category of "hated speech" by looking at experiences and observations of what it means to speak truth to power and receive hate as it is manifested through varying degrees of violence, across a variety of instances.
Association for Progressive Communications (APC) 2022
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