A number one UN human rights professional has expressed dismay after the US authorities failed to reply to questions in regards to the legal crackdown on peaceable local weather protesters.
Mary Lawlor, the UN particular rapporteur on human rights defenders, on Tuesday revealed a letter despatched to US authorities elevating issues in regards to the potential violation of worldwide human rights regulation after two local weather activists, Alex Connon and John Mark Rozendaal, had been charged with crimes that carried prolonged jail phrases.
Connon, director of the Cease the Cash Pipeline coalition, and Rozendaal, an expert cellist, had been amongst a whole bunch of local weather activists arrested outdoors Citibank’s headquarters in New York Metropolis over the summer season, throughout a sequence of non-violent protests calling for an finish to financing the fossil gas trade.
On Twitter/X, Lawlor wrote that she was “very disenchanted” to haven’t obtained a response from US authorities to the letter despatched on 30 September.
The letter was signed by 4 UN human rights specialists – Lawlor and the particular rapporteurs on the suitable to a wholesome and sustainable surroundings, local weather change, and the suitable to protest. It’s customary to provide states 60 days to reply privately earlier than communications are shared publicly.
Within the letter, which was despatched to the US diplomatic mission on the United Nations in Geneva, the UN specialists raised issues in regards to the factual foundation of an assault cost in opposition to Rozendaal and Connon, ensuing from a criticism by a member of Citibank’s safety employees.
After collaborating in one other peaceable protest, the 2 activists had been additionally charged with legal contempt which carries a seven 12 months most sentence.
The assault costs had been dropped after the safety guard didn’t submit a deposition. The contempt costs had been resolved by the pair pleading responsible to “disorderly conduct” – referring to Rozendaal enjoying the cello in a public plaza outdoors Citibank HQ and Connon sheltering him from the rain with an umbrella.
The letter mentioned that they feared the contempt cost was “with out basis” and seemed to be a punishment for collaborating in peaceable protests on the local weather disaster and human rights.
“Please point out what steps have been taken and measures put in place to make sure that all human rights defenders taking peaceable motion to advertise measures to mitigate local weather change and a simply transition can perform their work free from concern of menace, violence, harassment or retaliation of any type,” the UN specialists wrote.
The US authorities didn’t reply.
Amid ongoing fossil gas enlargement, activists within the US and world wide have turned to protests and non-violent civil disobedience reminiscent of blocking roads and chaining themselves to bushes and gear as a strategy to decelerate development, increase public consciousness and press for extra pressing local weather motion by governments, companies and financiers.
“They’re all being met with criminalisation, as on this [Connon and Rozendaal] case,” mentioned Lawlor.
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The crackdown in opposition to activists has intensified amid growing dying and destruction from excessive warmth, floods, drought and sea stage rise, with mounting proof of collusion between company lobbyists, lawmakers and state safety forces.
Lawlor added: “Authorities needs to be listening to defenders, however they don’t seem to be. The local weather disaster is a human rights disaster, however states aren’t responding as they need to. They should change course and begin actually listening in any other case they’re going to lock us right into a future the place the rights of big numbers of individuals world wide shall be in danger.”
Additionally on Tuesday, environmental activist and educator Rachel Berkrot was spared jail time after last-minute plea deal by which the important infrastructure cost was dropped by prosecutors. Berkot was amongst eight local weather activists charged beneath West Virginia’s controversial important infrastructure regulation, after collaborating in non-violent protests in opposition to the Mountain Valley fossil gasoline pipeline. Dozens extra have been charged and face civil lawsuits.
“This escalation in repression is a part of an extended legacy of collusion between the state and the fossil gas trade to silence resistance,” mentioned Berkrot, who obtained a $500 fantastic after pleading no contest to trespass and obstruction costs.
A minimum of 22 states have handed anti-protest legal guidelines often known as important infrastructure legal guidelines punishing civil disobedience with felonies, fines and lengthy jail sentences because the 2016 Indigenous-led non-violent rebellion in opposition to the Dakota Entry oil pipeline on the Standing Rock Indian reservation.
The state division didn’t reply to the Guardian’s request for remark.
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