Amnesty International annual report warns of violations of international law
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The world is witnessing a near-breakdown of international law, Amnesty International has warned in its annual report.
Pointing to flagrant rule-breaking in Gaza and Ukraine, a proliferation of armed conflict, the rise of authoritarianism and huge rights violations in Sudan, Ethiopia and Myanmar, the human rights organisation said the most powerful governments must shoulder much of the blame.
The report's authors write that the US, Russia and China together have led a global disregard for international rules and values enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, with civilians in conflicts paying the highest price.
Agnes Callamard, Amnesty's secretary general, said the level of violation of international order witnessed in the past year was “unprecedented.”
“Israel’s flagrant disregard for international law is compounded by the failures of its allies to stop the indescribable civilian bloodshed meted out in Gaza," she said. “Many of those allies were the very architects of that post-World War Two system of law.”
The report highlights the US's failures to denounce rights violations committed by Israel and its use of veto power to paralyse the UN Security Council on a cease-fire resolution in Gaza, as well as Russia's ongoing aggression in Ukraine.
It also points to China's arming of military forces in Myanmar and the way Beijing has shielded itself from scrutiny over its treatment of the Uyghur minority.
“We have here three very large countries, superpowers in many ways, sitting on the Security Council that have emptied out the Security Council of its potentials, and that have emptied out international law of its ability to protect people,” she told The Associated Press in London.
The report, which details Amnesty's assessment of human rights in 155 countries, underlines an increasing backlash against women's rights and gender equality in 2023.
It cites the brutal suppression of women's protests in Iran, the Taliban's decrees “aimed at erasing women from public life” in Afghanistan, and legal restrictions on abortion in the US and Poland, among others.
The rights organisation also warns about the threat of new technologies if left unchecked, saying the rapid advancement in artificial intelligence and mass surveillance tools could be deployed to stoke conflict, encroach on rights and freedoms and sow discord in a landmark election year.
Unregulated tech advances “can be weaponised to discriminate, misinform and divide,” Callamard said.
