Recent highlights from the Human Rights Channel include citizen video from South Sudan, violence against human rights workers in the Occupied Territories, an anti-gay protest in Haiti, and the return of self-exiled opposition leader, Sam Rainsy, to Cambodia in a bid to change leadership for the first time in 28 years.
Rarely do we see video from South Sudan which faces a refugee crisis as government troops fight rebel forces. In the video below, allegedly shot by a UN peacekeeping officer in the embattled Jonglei state, we see UN officers standing by in a field of grass and watching as an endless line of people file past. The filmer states that they are making their way home from the battlefield, and the description indicates that they are members of a militia force.
In Israel, B’tselem, an organization which uses video to document human rights violations in the Occupied Territories, released two dramatic videos documenting one of their staff being hit by a rubber bullet while filming a weekly protest in a-Nabi Saleh.
The video was taken by B’tselem’s spokeswoman Sarit Michaeli who recently wrote a report on the dangers of using rubber bullets for crowd control. Watch more footage of this incident in our playlist here.
In Haiti, religious groups organized a protest against homosexuality. Community media outlet, Bri Kuori captures the sentiments of two participants, who tell the filmer they would kill gays, “because we don’t need that in our country.”
Thousands cheered the return of opposition leader Sam Rainsy from his self-imposed exile in France to make a bid for this weekend’s general election in Cambodia. However, on Monday the National Election Committee rejected his candidacy. His return, however does not ensure his participation in the elections, but is a result of receiving a ?????? Stay tuned as we monitor the response from his supporters.
This week and next, keep an eye on our Twitter feed and YouTube Channel, as we’ll be monitoring upcoming elections in Togo, Cambodia, Mali, and Zimbabwe from the perspective of citizen reporters.