December 2024 Human Rights Newsletter: Major report on Mexico disappearances & more from the University Network

Written By Emily Wilder

In this edition:

  • UNHR and Fundar release major report on the crisis of disappearances in Mexico 

  • Our efforts to end abuses continue more than one year into genocide in Gaza

  • Applications open for LL.M in Human Rights Advocacy at Nova Law School in Lisbon

  • Meet our new staff members

  • Students complete semi-annual human rights simulation training, prepare for upcoming fact-finding trips

  • Community win: Ex-military officers convicted in killing of Brazilian human rights defender Marielle Franco

  • See UNHR’s collaboration with Greta Thunberg on COP29

  • Photos: Presentations at Harvard, Columbia highlight findings and continued advocacy for justice in Nagorno-Karabakh 

  • Photos: Executive Director Jim Cavallaro outlines international standards in event on academic freedom at Trinity College

  • UNHR in the news


UNHR and Fundar release major report on the crisis of disappearances in Mexico

In October, the University Network for Human Rights and Centro de Análisis e Investigación (Fundar)published Las Desapariciones en México: Impunidad activa, y obstáculos en materia de justicia y búsqueda(“Disappearances in Mexico: Active impunity and obstacles to justice and searches”). This report, representing the findings of investigations in collaboration with families of victims of disappearances, calls for the creation of a hybrid mechanism for justice made up of national and international actors.

Disappearances in Mexico constitute the major human rights crisis in the region. There are over 119,938 disappeared people in Mexico as of December 2024, according to Mexico's National Registry of Disappeared Persons.  For almost two decades, Mexico has been immersed in a severe human rights crisis, which stems mainly from the violence associated with the militarized security strategy and the fight in the so-called “war on drugs.” The crisis has been exacerbated by active impunity and the lack of an effective response from the State to confront it. 

“We have prepared this report as a tribute to the hundreds of thousands of direct and indirect victims of disappearances in Mexico, and in recognition of their tireless work. We acknowledge their work and the impact of their struggle against absence and oblivion,” said Sofía Galván, the report's lead author.

Read the report

Our efforts to end abuses continue more than one year into genocide in Gaza

It has been 14 months since Israel began its genocidal assault on the Palestinians of Gaza. The University Network has worked to expose and seek accountability for the grave violations of law and wholesale slaughter. 

Our research and advocacy efforts have included:

We will continue until the genocide ends and those responsible are held accountable. Read more about our ongoing work online.

Applications open for LL.M in Human Rights at Nova Law School

Apply today to our master’s program in Human Rights Advocacy, run jointly with Nova Law School in Lisbon, Portugal. The program, combining rigorous study under experts in the field with hands-on training and engagement, provides students with a multidisciplinary understanding of human rights standards and their applications and equips them to challenge abuses.

 Read more about the LL.M and apply

Meet our new staff members

UNHR proudly welcomed several new team members this fall: Salma Waheedi, Legal Advisor on the Middle East; Kristy DeRemer, Clinical Supervisor; and Ram Bhandari, Associate in Nepal. Read their bios at the links below.

Salma Waheedi, Legal Advisor on the Middle East

Read more

Kristy DeRemer, Clinical Supervisor

Read more

Ram Bhandari, Associate in Nepal

Read more

Students complete semi-annual human rights simulation training, prepare for upcoming fact-finding trips

Fourteen students from Wesleyan and Wellesley participated in our Fall Semester human rights fact-finding and advocacy simulation, a week-long intensive and immersive training. On site in rural Connecticut, over 40 actors played parts in a simulated human rights abuse scenario. Students practiced interviewing and investigation skills, as well as learned advocacy strategies for engaging with media, government officials, and other stakeholders regarding their human rights findings and recommendations.

Read more about our flagship simulation exercise.

With this training successfully completed, students will soon participate in fact-finding trips across the globe in January. These trips, in collaboration with community organizations fighting rights abuses, will build on our human rights projects on climate displacement from the Marshall Islands; enforced disappearances in Nepal; and Indigenous land rights of the Mapuche in Patagonia, Argentina.

 

Community win: Ex-military officers convicted in killing of Brazilian human rights defender Marielle Franco

In November 2024, a Rio de Janeiro court convicted former military police officers in the 2018 killing of Marielle Franco, a human rights defender and city council person, alongside her driver, Anderson Gomes.

"Marielle's greatest legacy is to show that women, Black people, and slum dwellers deserve to live in their places. When they killed my sister, they couldn't have imagined how strongly the country and the world would react. Today is a response; justice has begun. But what we wanted was not to be here because real justice would be to prevent bodies from being dumped. … We need to end the normalization of violence against Black people, children who are victims of stray bullets, and murdered public figures. We will hold our heads high for Marielle, Anderson, and the right to a dignified life." - Anielle Franco, Marielle’s sister, Minister of Racial Equality (Brasil de Fato)

The University Network is proud to have contributed to the efforts of the Global Justice Center and the family members of Marielle Franco in their fight for justice. Jointly with Justiça Global, we submitted a brief urging access to public records in the official investigation of her killing in April 2023.

Read more about the project. 

 

See UNHR’s collaboration with Greta Thunberg on COP29

As the international community gathered in Baku, Azerbaijan, for the 2024 United Nations Climate Change Conference, known as COP29, the University Network for Human Rights collaborated with environmental justice advocates Greta Thunberg and Arshak Makichyan to amplify pleas for accountability for Azerbaijan’s abuses.

Click the link below to see the post.

Photos: Presentations at Harvard, Columbia highlight findings and continued advocacy for justice in Nagorno-Karabakh 

Photos: Executive Director Jim Cavallaro outlines international standards in event on academic freedom at Trinity College 

Emily Wilder
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Greta Thunberg amplifies UNHR’s urgent plea during COP29