Border Violence Monitoring Network
The Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN) is a coalition of over 14 organizations founded in 2016 whose stated goal is "documenting illegal pushbacks & police violence by EU uropean Unionmember state authorities in the Western Balkans and Greece ". The organization was founded in 2016 and is regarded as an authoritative source on pushbacks and refugee protection. In 2018, BVMN recorded video footage of pushbacks along the Croatian–Bosnian border, which was widely circulated online. In 2019, it reported 3,251 pushbacks either from Croatia to Bosnia and Herzegovina or from Greece to Turkey. To date, BVMN has documented over 1281 pushbacks from 16 countries. Key Publications Black Book of Pushbacks In December 2020, it published the ''Black Book of Pushbacks'', a two-volume work that documents the experiences of 12,654 migrants who suffered from human rights violations while traveling on the Balkan route in the previous four years, in collaboration with the United Le ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Non-profit Organization
A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in contrast with an entity that operates as a business aiming to generate a profit for its owners. A nonprofit is subject to the non-distribution constraint: any revenues that exceed expenses must be committed to the organization's purpose, not taken by private parties. An array of organizations are nonprofit, including some political organizations, schools, business associations, churches, social clubs, and consumer cooperatives. Nonprofit entities may seek approval from governments to be tax-exempt, and some may also qualify to receive tax-deductible contributions, but an entity may incorporate as a nonprofit entity without securing tax-exempt status. Key aspects of nonprofits are accountability, trustworthiness, honesty, and openness to eve ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Non-governmental Organization
A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active in humanitarianism or the social sciences; they can also include clubs and associations that provide services to their members and others. Surveys indicate that NGOs have a high degree of public trust, which can make them a useful proxy for the concerns of society and stakeholders. However, NGOs can also be lobby groups for corporations, such as the World Economic Forum. NGOs are distinguished from international and intergovernmental organizations (''IOs'') in that the latter are more directly involved with sovereign states and their governments. The term as it is used today was first introduced in Article 71 of the newly-formed United Nations' Charter in 1945. While there is no fixed or formal definition for what NGOs are, they are genera ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Human Rights
Human rights are Morality, moral principles or Social norm, normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of human behaviour and are regularly protected in Municipal law, municipal and international law. They are commonly understood as inalienable,The United Nations, Office of the High Commissioner of Human RightsWhat are human rights? Retrieved 14 August 2014 fundamental rights "to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being" and which are "inherent in all human beings",Burns H. Weston, 20 March 2014, Encyclopædia Britannicahuman rights Retrieved 14 August 2014. regardless of their age, ethnic origin, location, language, religion, ethnicity, or any other status. They are applicable everywhere and at every time in the sense of being Universality (philosophy), universal, and they are Egalitari ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Activism
Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in Social change, social, Political campaign, political, economic or Natural environment, environmental reform with the desire to make Social change, changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range from Mandate (politics), mandate building in a community (including writing letters to newspapers), petitioning elected officials, running or contributing to a political campaign, preferential patronage (or boycott) of businesses, and demonstrative forms of activism like Demonstration (protest), rallies, Demonstration (people), street marches, strikes, sit-ins, or hunger strikes. Activism may be performed on a day-to-day basis in a wide variety of ways, including through the creation of art (artivism), computer hacking (hacktivism), or simply in how one chooses to spend their money (economic activism). For example, the refusal to buy clothes or other merchandise from a comp ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pushback (migration)
Pushback is a term that refers to "a set of state measures by which refugees and migrants are forced back over a border – generally immediately after they crossed it – without consideration of their individual circumstances and without any possibility to apply for asylum". Pushbacks violate the prohibition of collective expulsion of aliens in Protocol 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights and often violate the international law prohibition on non-refoulement. Pushback is contrasted with "pullback", a form of extraterritorial migration control the country seeking to repel asylum seekers arranges with a third country to prevent them from leaving. Definition Neža Kogovšek Šalamon considers that there is no single, recognized definition of a pushback, but in general they can be characterized as "informal collective forced returns of people who irregularly enter the country back to the country they entered from, via procedures that take place outside legally defined rules ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Police Violence
Police brutality is the excessive and unwarranted use of force by law enforcement against an individual or a group. It is an extreme form of police misconduct and is a civil rights violation. Police brutality includes, but is not limited to, beatings, shootings, "improper takedowns, and unwarranted use of tasers." History The origin of modern policing can be traced back to 18th century France. By the 19th and early 20th centuries, many nations had established modern police departments. Early records suggest that labor strikes were the first large-scale incidents of police brutality in the United States, including events like the Great Railroad Strike of 1877, the Pullman Strike of 1894, the Lawrence Textile Strike of 1912, the Ludlow Massacre of 1914, the Great Steel Strike of 1919, and the Hanapepe Massacre of 1924. The term "police brutality" was first used in Britain in the mid-19th century, by '' The Puppet-Show'' magazine(a short-lived rival to ''Punch'') in Septem ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Western Balkans
The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the whole of Bulgaria. The Balkan Peninsula is bordered by the Adriatic Sea in the northwest, the Ionian Sea in the southwest, the Aegean Sea in the south, the Turkish Straits in the east, and the Black Sea in the northeast. The northern border of the peninsula is variously defined. The highest point of the Balkans is Mount Musala, , in the Rila mountain range, Bulgaria. The concept of the Balkan Peninsula was created by the German geographer August Zeune in 1808, who mistakenly considered the Balkan Mountains the dominant mountain system of Southeast Europe spanning from the Adriatic Sea to the Black Sea. The term ''Balkan Peninsula'' was a synonym for Rumelia in the 19th century, the European provinces of the Ottoman Empire. It had a geopolitic ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Left In The European Parliament – GUE/NGL
The Left in the European Parliament – GUE/NGL is a left-wing political group of the European Parliament established in 1995. Before January 2021, it was named the European United Left/Nordic Green Left (french: link=no, Gauche unitaire européenne/Gauche verte nordique, GUE/NGL). The group comprises political parties of democratic socialist, communist and eurosceptic orientation. History In 1995, the enlargement of the European Union led to the creation of the Nordic Green Left group of parties. The Nordic Green Left (NGL) merged with the Confederal Group of the European United Left (GUE) on 6 January 1995, forming the Confederal Group of the European United Left/Nordic Green Left. The NGL suffix was added to the name of the expanded group on insistence of Swedish and Finnish MEPs. The group initially consisted of MEPs from the Finnish Left Alliance, the Swedish Left Party, the Danish Socialist People's Party, the United Left of Spain (including the Spanish Communis ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts European legislation, following a proposal by the European Commission. The Parliament is composed of 705 members (MEPs). It represents the second-largest democratic electorate in the world (after the Parliament of India), with an electorate of 375 million eligible voters in 2009. Since 1979, the Parliament has been directly elected every five years by the citizens of the European Union through universal suffrage. Voter turnout in parliamentary elections decreased each time after 1979 until 2019, when voter turnout increased by eight percentage points, and rose above 50% for the first time since 1994. The voting age is 18 in all EU member states except for Malta and Austria, where it is 16, and Greece, where it is 17. Although the E ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Cornelia Ernst
Cornelia Ernst (born 30 November 1956) is a German politician and Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Germany. She is a member of The Left Party, part of the European United Left–Nordic Green Left. She was elected to the European Parliament in 2009, prior to which she had been a member of the Parliament of Saxony from 1998. From 2007 till 2009 she had been the regional chairman of the Left Party in Saxony. On 15 February 2014 she got voted on place 3 of the group of nominated candidates of the Left party for the European Parliament and was re-elected to the European Parliament in 2014. Life and work After graduating from secondary school in 1974 and her entry into the SED she finished her degree/diploma in education science in 1979. Ernst got her PhD in 1983 at Leipzig University with the thesis on ''"Zur Geschichte des Internationalen Frauentages in der Übergangsperiode vom Kapitalismus zum Sozialismus auf dem Gebiet der DDR (1945/46 - 1961)" (English: The history ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Open Society Foundations
Open Society Foundations (OSF), formerly the Open Society Institute, is a Grant (money), grantmaking network founded and chaired by business magnate George Soros. Open Society Foundations financially supports civil society groups around the world, with a stated aim of advancing justice, education, public health and independent media. The group's name was inspired by Karl Popper's 1945 book ''The Open Society and Its Enemies''.. As of 2015, the OSF had branches in 37 countries, encompassing a group of country and regional foundations, such as the Open Society Initiative for West Africa, and the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa; its headquarters are at 224 West 57th Street in New York City. In 2018, OSF announced it was closing its European office in Budapest and moving to Berlin, in response to legislation passed by the Hungarian government targeting the foundation's activities. As of 2021, OSF has reported expenditures in excess of $16 billion since its establishment ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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European Cultural Foundation
The European Cultural Foundation (ECF) is a Netherlands-based independent cultural foundation. Its mission is to “make a tangible impact on civil society, citizen initiatives, public opinion and policy proposals to combat the fragmenting forces jeopardising peace and social progress in Europe”. Organisation The European Cultural Foundation was set up in Geneva in 1954 by the Swiss philosopher Denis de Rougemont.Autissier, Anne-MariA Brief History of ECF Retrieved 23 November 2017 ECF’s first President was Robert Schuman, one of the principal architects of the European Economic Community, which later evolved into the European Union. From the start, ECF focused on implementing a European grants programme, based on the idea of putting culture at the intersection of education, social sciences and history. In 1960, ECF moved to Amsterdam at the initiative of Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, who was ECF’s President from 1955-77. Since then ECF’s programme has evolved wit ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |