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For Immediate Release

PHR Congratulates President Obama on His Reelection, Urges Administration to Strengthen US Human Rights Policies in Second Term

Media Contact

Stephen Greene

Senior Communications Advisor
Tel: 917-679-0110

Cambridge, Mass. - 11/07/2012

PHR congratulates President Obama on his reelection. A second term provides an opportunity for the administration to strengthen US policies on a variety of important human rights issues, thereby fulfilling obligations incumbent upon the administration and completing the unfinished work of the first term. PHR looks forward to continued engagement from the administration on several priority areas, and offers the following policy recommendations for future human rights advances:

  • Shape domestic policies that respect international human rights law.
    • Eliminate the use of detention for asylum applicants, and strictly limit the use of immigration detention to individuals who pose a threat to public safety. Close immigrant detention centers where abusive practices against detainees persist and further develop alternatives to detention for immigrants in removal proceedings. Immediately end the use of solitary confinement in immigration detention. Resist calls to expand the scope of immigration detention through contracts with private corporations.
    • Fulfill the promise to close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay. Reject indefinite detention as a permanent solution to national security concerns.
    • Remove Appendix M of the Army Field Manual to ensure that US interrogation methods do not involve torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.
    • Announce the results of the administration’s landmine policy review and work with the Senate to ratify the Mine Ban Treaty.
  • Promote human rights internationally through bilateral relations with other countries.
    • Continue US support for measures that combat sexual and gender-based violence, including in areas of armed conflict. Promote the rights of human rights defenders, including medical professionals, who protect and care for victims of sexual and gender-based violence.
    • Support the rights of human rights defenders, civilian protesters, and medical professionals in Bahrain, who have suffered violent attacks, harassment, and discrimination at the hands of the Bahraini government. Use diplomatic ties between the US and Bahrain to encourage Bahraini officials to comport with international human rights obligations. Withhold arms sales until the Bahraini government makes measurable and sustainable progress on recommendations listed in the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry report.
    • Press the Government of Burma for more substantial reforms, including ending abuses against ethnic minorities, releasing remaining political prisoners, holding perpetrators of mass crimes accountable, and ensuring civilian control over the military. Withhold military assistance or other concessions until the Burmese authorities make measurable progress on these matters. Establish and enforce strict accountability measures on US companies that invest in Burma to prevent and punish complicity in human rights violations.
  • Respond to mass atrocities and promote accountability for perpetrators.
    • Fully resource the Atrocities Prevention Board that was established last year so that it can respond promptly to emerging situations of genocide and other mass atrocities, and integrate the prevention of mass crimes into all relevant departments of the administration.
    • Strengthen the US resolve to bring perpetrators of mass atrocities to justice. Increase US support for the International Criminal Court as well as regional and local international justice initiatives.
    • Call on President Kagame of Rwanda and President Kabila of the Democratic Republic of the Congo to arrest indicted war criminal Bosco Ntaganda, one of the most culpable perpetrators of mass rape and other crimes in eastern Congo.

Advocates around the world are hopeful that principled human rights policies will be the hallmark of a second term of the Obama Administration. PHR looks forward to collaborating with the administration in implementing effective measures to promote human rights in the United States and internationally.

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) is an independent organization that uses medicine and science to stop mass atrocities and severe human rights violations against individuals. We are supported by the expertise and passion of health professionals and concerned citizens alike.

Since 1986, PHR has conducted investigations in more than 40 countries around the world, including Afghanistan, Congo, Rwanda, Sudan, the United States, the former Yugoslavia, and Zimbabwe.

  • 1988 — First to document Iraq’s use of chemical weapons against Kurds
  • 1996 — Exhumed mass graves in the Balkans
  • 1996 — Produced critical forensic evidence of genocide in Rwanda
  • 1997 — Shared the Nobel Peace Prize for the International Campaign to Ban Landmines
  • 2003 — Warned of health and human rights catastrophe prior to the invasion of Iraq
  • 2004 — Documented and analyzed the genocide in Darfur
  • 2005 — Detailed the story of tortured detainees in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantánamo Bay
  • 2010 — Investigated the epidemic of violence spread by Burma’s military junta
  • 2011 — Championed the principle of noninterference with medical services
                  in times of armed conflict and civil unrest during the Arab Spring
  • 2012 — Trained doctors, lawyers, police, and judges in the Democratic Republic of
                  the Congo, Kenya, and Syria on the proper collection of evidence in
                  sexual violence cases
  • 2013 — Won first prize in the Tech Challenge for Atrocity Prevention with MediCapt,
                  our mobile app that documents evidence of torture and sexual violence

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