States Still Show a 'Lack of Awareness' Over Torture

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October 24, 2006

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UN News: States are still showing a "lack of awareness" over the seriousness of torture, despite the fact they are obligated to criminalize the practice, an independent United Nations expert said today, warning that few cases are ever brought to justice and where they are, the perpetrators generally get away with minor sentences.

"What is always strange to me if I go on a country mission and then speak to high Governmental officials, speak to the heads of prisons, of police stations etc, [is] a lack of awareness that torture is one of the most serious human rights violations," the UN Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, Manfred Nowak, told reporters in New York.

Posted by Dispatcher at 8:18 AM

November 12, 2008

Taking the Fight Against Malaria to the Front Lines

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Six weeks before his election on November 4, President-elect Barack Obama made a promise to the one million people around the world who die from Malaria each year. "When I am President," he said, "We will set the goal of ending all deaths from Malaria by 2015. The United States will lead."

This may sound like a typical grandiose promise made by a candidate seeking election. But to those in the public health community it offered validation that ending Malaria deaths is not some pie in the sky dream--but a goal that can be achieved in the here and now. Following through on this commitment, however, means that the fight against Malaria must be taken to where the disease is most destructive and most difficult to contain: refugee camps in Africa.

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