Category: Lifestyle

“Languages are how we communicate, and they are inextricably linked to our cultures, histories and identity”, the UN chief said, noting that 2019 also marks the International Year of Indigenous Languages.  Indigenous languages are disappearing at an alarming rate, each one taking with it a cultural and intellectual heritage. We must protect languages under threat of extinction. #IndigenousDay pic.twitter.com/GaHSKc6OKN —… Read More

Tensions started escalating at the end of January, when Juan Guaidó, head of the country’s National Assembly, challenged the legitimacy of sitting President Nicolás Maduro and was declared interim president by the National Assembly. President Maduro has been in power since 2013 and was sworn in again for a second term on 10 January. “The sanctions are extremely broad and… Read More

“Any progress will remain very frail unless accompanied by wider reforms and by measures to ensure that rights are reflected and enshrined in the constitution of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and not solely through royal decrees,” the six experts said in a joint statement. Saudi Arabia loosened some social restrictions on women in 2017. And now, by Royal decree,… Read More

UN Security Council ‘utterly failed’ Syrian detainees: a victim’s plea to ‘end impunity and stop this horror’ The Security Council has “utterly failed Syrian detainees and their families”, Amina Khoulani, co-founder of Families for Freedom, told the Security Council on Wednesday, during a meeting focused on those who have been jailed or gone missing across Syria, during years of brutal… Read More

In a rare opportunity for the Council to hear directly from family members of people forcibly disappeared, Ms. Khoulani spelled out: “It is your responsibility to protect Syrians from a system that kills, tortures and illegally detains its own citizens”.    Speaking on behalf of the women-led movement, launched in 2017 by families whose loved ones had been detained and disappeared, she painted… Read More

In an appeal to mark the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples on Friday (9 August), UN-appointed experts said that “nation-building” had been largely responsible for “ongoing discrimination” against native speakers. “Over time, such policies can undermine and effectively destroy a culture and even a people”, the experts cautioned, before insisting that indigenous languages allowed freedom of expression and… Read More

In a statement, the spokesperson noted that, during the period, the Office has verified 19 civilian deaths, and 42 injured, in districts of Taiz, Sa’ada and Aden. The majority of the deaths resulted from an attack in the Al Thabet market area of Sa’ada Governorate on 29 July, in which 14 civilians were killed and 26 injured.  In the Al-Rawdhah… Read More