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First things first: what is “sportswashing”?

Two very unscientific social media polls I ran this week (here and here) both suggest a fair number of people are unfamiliar with the term, so let me explain.

“Sportswashing” is when a government tries to use a major international sporting event to burnish its global image, in particular trying to downplay, cover-up, or whitewash – hence, “sportswash” – its human rights abuses.

They’re saying in effect: What atrocities? Look, sportsball!

Can you give an example?

Loads, but this week, the buzz is about the hosting of the 2034 World Cup in men’s football.

With Australia pulling out of the running, it looks certain now world football federation FIFA will award Saudi Arabia with the hosting honor.

You might think, given Saudi Arabia’s appalling human rights record, FIFA wouldn’t be overly keen. On paper, FIFA has a Human Rights Policy, after all. But FIFA has shredded its own rules on this time and time again.

For his part, Saudi ruler Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman openly confesses to sportswashing, even using the very term itself.

But does sportswashing work?

I’m not sure it does, in fact. Governments spend millions to try to distract people from their human rights abuses, but sometimes, all a major event seems to do is draw more global attention to those abuses. As I think Qatar found out with its recent World-Cup-related reputation hit: Money can’t buy you love.

FIFA may cynically ignore its own rules (and basic human dignity) in awarding the hosting of the World Cup to Saudi Arabia, but most of the world will only be reminded of Saudi Arabia’s appalling human rights record every time they hear of it.

Bonus Question: How bad is Saudi Arabia’s human rights record?

Awful. And things have deteriorated under Mohammed Bin Salman’s rule.

Here are a few links for you to explore on Saudi Arabia’s systematic repression of women, torture and imprisonment of peaceful critics, mass executions, and mass murder at the border. Sex outside marriage, including same-sex relations, is a crime, with punishments including death. 

Recall, too, the slaughter and dismemberment of critical journalist and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in a Saudi consulate.

Saudi Arabia’s human rights record is so egregious, I really don’t think a sports tournament is going to make the world forget about it. You’re reading this, after all.

Environmental defenders and anti-fossil fuel activists in Uganda have been raising concerns over a planned oil pipeline in East Africa.

Authorities are responding with harassment, threats, and unjustified arrests.

The planned East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) is one of the most significant fossil fuel infrastructure projects under development globally, and one of the most controversial fossil fuel projects in the world. It will include hundreds of wells, hundreds of kilometers of roads, camps and other infrastructure – and a pipeline stretching 1,443 kilometers.

Of course, just from the perspective of the climate crisis alone, any such project is a bad idea. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world’s leading authority on climate science, and others have warned against any new fossil fuel projects if the world is to reach Paris Agreement goals and limit the worst impacts of climate change.

Activists in Uganda have been drawing attention not only to these global concerns but also to local ones. More than 100,000 people in Uganda and Tanzania will lose their land for the oil developments.

But those who protest both the construction of the pipeline and the treatment of people caught up in its path, have faced the wrath of those in power. Ugandan authorities have routinely detained and arrested activists and human rights defenders on politically-motivated charges.

This harassment is not just wrong in itself - there are other impacts too. Activists says the constant threats from local government and security officials make it more difficult to provide support to those who have lost land.

The French fossil-fuel giant TotalEnergies is the operator and majority shareholder of the project, alongside China National Offshore Oil Company, and the state-run Ugandan and Tanzanian oil companies. However, financing for the pipeline is apparently yet to be finalized.

Given the grave environmental and human rights risks in the pipeline’s construction and operation, financial institutions and insurance companies should avoid supporting it.

A year ago in this newsletter, we looked with cautious hope at news of a peace deal that might possibly bring to an end the devastating conflict in northern Ethiopia, between the federal government and Tigrayan authorities.

Yet, as we’ve had to report since, fighting and serious rights abuses persist in the region.

During the past year, warring parties have continued to commit human rights abuses in Tigray. Eritrean forces have carried out killings, sexual violence, abductions, and pillage. They have also obstructed humanitarian assistance.

In the Western Tigray Zone, which remains largely inaccessible to humanitarian agencies, the authorities and Amhara regional forces and militias known as Fano have continued an ethnic cleansing campaign and forcibly expelled Tigrayans.

We have been calling on the international community to keep its attention on the situation, despite strong lobbying by the Ethiopian government not to.

As my colleague and expert Laetitia Bader summarizes:

“While the Ethiopian government and its international partners tout the tremendous progress made in the past year, civilians in conflict areas are still bearing the brunt of atrocities. Fighting has intensified in other regions of the country, as past violators repeat patterns of abuses without consequences.”

Governments cannot afford to look away.

(compiled by Emily Palomo)  

• Switzerland decides to suspend funding for rights defenders in Israel, Palestine (HRW) 
• Iranian mother jailed for 13 years after denouncing death of son shot at protest (The Guardian) 
• Canada caps immigration target amid housing crunch, inflation (Reuters) 
• Ukraine reports most extensive Russian shelling of its settlements this year (ABC News) 
• Malaysia Introduces 'Kill Switch' at Concerts to Safeguard Cultural Integrity (bnn.network) 
• Mali: Islamist armed groups, army target civilians (HRW) 

Is it Thursday already? Well, then, that means it’s time for you to test your knowledge on the week’s human rights news with our 5-question quiz.

We are now working with a number of publications that are republishing stories from this newsletter in various news outlets around the world. We’re particularly happy to see translations in other languages.

There’s no charge for our material. It’s free. All we ask is that you credit Human Rights Watch and the author, and link back to the original page.

If you’re working at a media outlet and would like to know more, please email me.

- Andrew

Dear Readers, 

We send this newsletter to you four times a week, Monday through Thursday. 

If you’d like to hear from us on Fridays as well, then I can highly recommend you also subscribe to the Week in Rights, a weekly newsletter by my colleague, Paul Aufiero. 

Thanks!

Andrew