The Iranian regime seems to have only one response to widespread protests across the country: brutality.

Ever since demonstrations began on September 16, following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa (Jina) Amini in the custody of the absurdly named “morality police,” the authorities have answered them with extreme violence.

HRW has documented a pattern of excessive and unlawful lethal force against protesters in dozens of instances in multiple cities. Human rights groups are currently investigating the deaths of 434 people, including 60 children.

The authorities seem unable or unwilling to understand that it’s precisely the regime’s brutality that sparked public outrage in the first place and that more brutality will likely only lead to more protests.

The outside world has been horrified by the downward spiral of violence the regime appears determined to keep driving the country into, but what can the international community do in practical terms?

Tomorrow, November 24, the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva will hold a special session on the continuing serious violations in Iran, and member countries should conclude that discussion with concrete action. Specifically, they should establish an independent fact-finding mission.

It’s a simple step but an important one.

As things stand today, there’s no accountability for the crimes being committed in Iran. The country’s authorities refuse to even investigate their own abuses, obviously, let alone hold anyone responsible for them.

This has been the long-standing pattern in Iran. Over the past four years, the country has experienced several waves of widespread protests, and the authorities have repeatedly responded with deadly force and thousands of arrests of protesters on bogus charges.

With each wave, Iranian authorities fail to conduct any credible and transparent investigations into the security forces’ serious abuses. And so, because no one is held responsible for the brutality, it keeps happening…

An independent inquiry, brought into existence by the UN Human Rights Council, could help break this cycle, delivering the much-needed investigations and a step toward holding those responsible to account.

Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

The top court in Turkey has overturned the abusively absurd convictions of the Honorary Chair of Amnesty International Turkey and three other human rights defenders.

The Court of Cassation’s ruling reverses the unfair verdicts, based on politically motivated prosecutions, against Taner Kılıç, İdil Eser, Özlem Dalkıran and Günal Kurşun – four of 11 human rights defenders convicted in July 2020.

They were originally arrested in 2017, and just the fact that this injustice could last five years tells you all you need to know about where Turkey is at the moment. For half a decade, they had to fight ridiculous, baseless allegations against them – claims completely unsupported by any evidence.

And unfortunately, though the fresh ruling is good news, the fight is still not over. Taner Kılıç’s case was quashed on the grounds of “incomplete investigation,” and referred back to the original court.

Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General, said the ruling, “brings to an end a travesty of justice of spectacular proportions. While we are hugely relieved that the convictions have finally been quashed, the fact that the court has ruled that Taner’s case requires further investigation is disappointing.”

A car bomb at a housing compound for police officers and their families in Thailand’s southern Narathiwat province devastated the building and sparked a huge fire, resulting in dozens of casualties, including 3 children.

Believed to be planted by separatist insurgents, it wouldn’t be the first time they showed grave disregard for civilian lives. There have been numerous atrocities by separatist insurgents in Thailand’s southern border provinces over the past 18 years.

The conflict in Thailand’s southern border provinces has claimed more than 7,000 lives, about 90 percent of them civilians.

International humanitarian law protects civilians and civilian structures from attack. Note that Thai provincial police in the south do not engage in counterinsurgency operations. They are civilians, not combatants, under the laws of war.

Deliberate or indiscriminate attacks on civilians are prohibited, and if carried out with criminal intent are war crimes.

Those responsible for planning, ordering, and carrying out such attacks should be brought to justice.

(compiled by Lisa Maier)

• Brazil: Jair Bolsonaro challenges election result in appeal (DW) 
• Saudi Arabia: Where is Mohammad al-Qahtani? Prominent activist’s whereabouts unknown as prison sentence ends (Middle East Eye) 
• Once again, FIFA has sold its own rules and values for money (Politico) 
• Colorado: Club Q massacre didn’t happen in a vacuum. There has been a dangerous escalation in hateful anti-LGBT rhetoric (Guardian)

Global criticism of the treatment of migrant workers building Qatar’s World Cup dream has led to a major push for policy changes. And working conditions in the garment industry elsewhere have prompted thousands of garment workers to take to the streets to demand better protection—not just on health and safety but also living wages.

Today’s Twitter Space with my colleague Birgit Schwarz: Fair Play, Fair Work: How to Ensure Ethical Labor Conditions. 

Tune in live at 14h00 CET / 08h00 ET or follow the same link for the recording later.

We sometimes see international human rights organizations calling for an “accountability mechanism,” but what exactly does that mean?

In Tuesday’s Daily Brief, as part of our irregular series on the ponderous terms  human rights wonks sometimes use, I asked readers to define, “accountability mechanism.” I also asked on Mastodon and on Twitter.

I received dozens of recommendations. Some were funny, highlighting the difficulty we all sometimes have in making clear for others the jargon that insiders use every day. But most responses were thoughtful and serious.

There were some philosophical folks who took a big-picture approach, seeing democracy itself as a kind of accountability mechanism, a way to constrain excesses of power. Fair point!

Others got more specific…

Johannes Icking, Policy Advisor on human rights at Brot für die Welt, highlighted the UN high commissioner’s description of human rights accountability: “[1] the obligation of those in authority to take responsibility for their actions, [2] to answer for them to those affected, and [3] to be subject to some form of enforceable sanction if their conduct or explanation is found wanting," then added, “Accountability mechanisms are then mechanisms to compel the accused to reckon with their misconduct.”

I like that, but it’s maybe too long?

Sam Zarifi, Secretary General of the International Commission of Jurists, offered: “A mechanism that can help establish facts of human rights violations necessary for accountability for State and/or individual perpetrator, suggest appropriate remedies and prevent reoccurrence.”

Very good – short and specific – though I know some readers will prefer a definition that doesn’t incorporate the original terms.

The official twitter account of the Permanent Mission of Liechtenstein to the UN replied: “An entity that, among other things, collects, prepares and preserves evidence in order to assist investigators and prosecutors to bring light to events, hold perpetrators responsible for their actions, provide justice to victims, and deter similar actions in the future.”

That avoids the original terms and nails it for completeness – but, yes, it’s long.

My colleague, HRW’s UN Director Louis Charbonneau, uses this when people ask him: a team that gathers and reports evidence of abuses. 

Nice and short.

But, of course, he also notes it’s not quite complete, because, as our Liechtenstein respondent mentioned: sometimes these bodies also preserve evidence and prepare cases for possible future prosecutions. Two examples of that would be the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism (IIIM) for Syria and the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar (IIMM).

OK, that’s enough for now. You get the idea: an “accountability mechanism” – at least how human rights wonks use the term – is a body that helps justice efforts when there are serious human rights abuses happening.

Thanks to all readers who responded!

If you’d like us to decode other human-rights-related jargon, please email me or contact me on Twitter or Mastodon with your suggestions.