Aden — The recent escalation of fighting in Yemen has led to growing numbers of wounded people, adding pressure to a health system already stretched thin, and forcing thousands of families to flee their homes.
Since 10 September, over 60 injured patients from the west coast have been admitted to Al-Gamhouria hospital in Aden. Many of them require urgent operations, blood transfusions, close monitoring, and long periods of care. This has put significant pressure on the hospital’s emergency room, operating theatres, wards, blood bank, medical stock, and staff.
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has expanded our support to the emergency room in response. Our team is helping hospital staff assess the condition of incoming patients quickly, so the most critical are treated first. They are also supplying the emergency room, operating theatres, and wards with emergency medicines and materials. In coordination with health authorities, MSF has also supported hospitals in Hodeidah with medicines and materials to treat people wounded in the fighting. We have also provided trauma kits to Taiz, Al-Bayda and Al-Jawf hospitals.
Needs are likely to grow as the situation develops. Hospitals need the capacity to absorb sudden increases of wounded patients, while continuing the everyday care that people in Yemen depend on. More than 90,000 people have been newly displaced, according to the International Organization for Migration. Families who have been displaced have little access to food, clean water, shelter, sanitation services, and medical care.
This escalation risks pushing Yemen’s health system past the point of recovery. Years of funding cuts have already left health facilities with little capacity to absorb a new wave of conflict. Sustained and flexible funding for Yemen remains essential, so women, children and the communities already bearing the heaviest burden are not left without care.
MSF has supported the orthopaedic department at Al-Gamhouria hospital in Aden since June 2026. The support covers training nurses, infection prevention and control, microbiology laboratory testing, and the safe use of antibiotics, and a plan for responding when large numbers of wounded people arrive at the same time.
This followed our handover of the Aden trauma centre in 2025, which ended 12 years of treating and rehabilitating thousands of people severely injured by the war in Yemen.
Meanwhile, in Mocha, on the west coast, a small MSF team is still supporting the continuity of essential care in the maternity and paediatric units of the General hospital, despite the severe shortage of health professionals remaining in the city. We are working to identify solutions to reinforce the team and secure supplies of essential medicines and anaesthetics, while also seeking assurances that the medical mission will be respected and that we will be able to operate fully in accordance with our principles of action.
As of Sunday, 13 September, 23 patients were still receiving care in this facility, including 10 babies in the neonatal intensive care unit.
BANGKOK, THAILAND (15 September 2026) — Reacting to speeches delivered today by Japanese government officials, including Tetsuya Azuma, Director at Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), at the Japan Energy Summit during Gastech 2026 in Bangkok, Greenpeace East Asia condemns Japan’s push to position fossil gas and fossil-fueled vehicles as drivers for regional growth and energy security.
Greenpeace warns that this strategy, anchored in initiatives like Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s “POWERR Asia” (Partnership on Wide Energy and Resources Resilience Asia) and the continued subsidization of polluting internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles, represents a dangerous climate trap that threatens global decarbonization targets and undermines international commitments under the Paris Agreement.
During the summit, government officials admitted to severe energy vulnerabilities, noting Japan’s extreme 93% reliance on crude oil passing through the Strait of Hormuz, severe market disruptions in downstream products like naphtha, and the need to subsidize transport costs to bypass Middle Eastern supply bottlenecks. Yet, rather than accelerating a shift toward clean energy and zero-emission electric vehicles (EVs), the Japanese government reaffirmed its commitment at Gastech to using “POWERR Asia” to expand overseas oil stockpiles and fossil gas infrastructure. At the same time, despite acknowledging the global EV surge sweeping China, Southeast Asia, and Europe, officials defended the government’s decision to push dirty combustion engines in Japan and the U.S. while promoting biofuels as a false climate solution.
Greenpeace asserts that Japan’s strategy, combining overseas fossil fuel expansion with a slow-walk on EV electrification, is a politically driven decision rather than one grounded in environmental science or economic reality. Driven by short-term industrial politics and vested corporate interests, Japan is choosing to export fossil reliance and delay auto decarbonization by propping up high-emitting, obsolete vehicle technology. In doing so, it risks driving up global emissions, locking developing economies into stranded asset risks, and setting back the worldwide transition away from fossil fuels.
Japan remains one of the world’s largest public financiers of fossil fuels, funneling US$93 billion in public finance for overseas oil and gas projects from 2013 to 2024, nearly four times the US$24.5 billion directed to clean energy, while gas-only projects accounted for 60% of that total [1]. Public agencies like the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) generate attributable emissions exceeding 400 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent annually, larger than the national emissions of the UK or France [2].
Domestically, Japan’s extreme fossil fuel dependence creates severe economic vulnerability. As the world’s fifth-largest energy market and second-largest LNG importer, Japan imported almost 65 million tonnes of LNG in 2025 [3]. Around 90–95% of Japan’s crude oil comes from the Middle East, with roughly 70–93% of those shipments transiting the Strait of Hormuz, leaving the economy hyper-exposed to supply shocks, currency depreciation, and imported inflation [4].
Despite attempts by government officials to frame regional oil stockpiling, downstream subsidies, and unproven solutions like biofuels as paths to resilience, Greenpeace asserts that doubling down on imported fossil fuels, nuclear restarts, and polluting combustion vehicles is an unsafe, globally damaging policy.
Kazue Suzuki, Climate & Energy Campaigner at Greenpeace Japan, said:
“METI’s vision locks Japan and the entire Asia region into expensive, imported gas at the exact wrong time. With supply routes through the Middle East becoming increasingly unstable, the plan raises energy bills and multiplies risk for households and businesses. Gas is not a bridge to growth but a financial trap. Nuclear power is costly and unsafe, and technologies like ammonia co-firing and CCUS are distractions. Japan needs to stop financing fossil gas overseas and put its money into solar and wind that actually deliver energy independence. Ultimately, the country needs a swift, decisive phaseout of all fossil fuels, starting with coal.”
Manun Wongmasoh, Climate and Energy Campaigner at Greenpeace Thailand, said:
“Southeast Asia does not need more fossil gas or Japanese financing for new gas infrastructure. Thailand and Japan should end their LNG cooperation MOU and avoid locking the region into decades of fossil fuel dependence. Our region has abundant renewable energy potential. What we need is investment in renewables, not new pipelines and LNG terminals that lock countries into volatile fossil fuel prices and risk becoming stranded assets. Doubling down on gas and nuclear, including Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) in the name of ‘energy security’ is reckless. It makes energy more expensive and leaves countries exposed to global market shocks, and leaves people across Southeast Asia to pay the price ”
Greenpeace East Asia calls on the Japanese government and financial institutions to immediately end all public financing for overseas fossil gas and oil infrastructure, phase out support for internal combustion engines, and commit to a just, renewable- and EV-led energy transition worldwide.
Algeria’s authorities must immediately abandon any plans to expand the scope of the death penalty or resume executions after more than three decades without carrying one out, said Amnesty International as the government examines amendments to the penal code that would broaden the use of the death penalty. The organization calls on Algeria’s authorities to immediately establish an official moratorium as a first step towards fully abolishing the death penalty. It also urges the authorities to adopt a human-rights centred response to the recent devastating wildfires, including by ensuring effective investigations into all factors that led to the tragic loss of life and accountability without resort to the death penalty.
On 30 August, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune instructed the Minister of Justice to amend the Penal Code by 15 September to “reintroduce” the death penalty for intentionally starting or instigating fires. He stressed that anyone sentenced to death would face execution as soon as they have exhausted their right of appeal. The directive came in the wake of deadly wildfires that erupted between 26 and 30 August, wiping out entire villages across the Kabylie region and other parts of northeastern Algeria. On 6 September, the government started examining the proposed draft amendments to the Penal Code and the president indicated that they would further introduce the death penalty for “child abductors and abusers”.
“The devastation and loss of life caused by these fires is a profound tragedy and should spur the Algerian authorities into taking immediate steps focusing both on prevention and accountability. But walking back from over 30 years without executions is a deeply retrograde response that runs counter to respect for the right to life,” said Nadege Lahmar, Algeria Researcher.
“It is also at odd with Algeria’s international human rights obligations, in addition to its consistent support to UN General Assembly resolutions calling for a moratorium on executions with a view to abolishing the death penalty.”
Amnesty International considers the death penalty to be a violation of the right to life and the ultimate cruel, inhuman, and degrading punishment; which does not have a unique deterrent effect on crime and perpetuates a cycle of violence.
In addition to drawing from previous research into politically motivated trials in Algeria, Amnesty International reviewed public statements from the Algerian government as well as media reports since the eruption of the fires and analyzed relevant legal provisions relating to arson. On 7 September Amnesty International shared its concerns and recommendations with the Algerian authorities. No response has been received at the time of writing.
Over the past decade, the conflict in Mali between the armed forces and their allies and various non-state armed groups has forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their country, including to Mauritania.
Certain armed groups, in particular the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (GSIM), also known as Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), and the Islamic State – Sahel province (ISSP), violate the right to religious freedom, and plunder civilians’ goods and resources. They are also driving people out of their villages, particularly in the Ségou, Timbuktu, and Mopti regions.
In July 2026, 290,000 Malian refugees were registered by the UNHCR in the wilaya [region] of Hodh Ech-Chargui, in southeastern Mauritania, near the Malian border.
Amnesty International visited them in 2025 and 2026 as part of a research about abuses committed by the parties to the conflict in Mali.
By Naomi Bernaldez, Campaigner on Amnesty International’s Central America team
Naomi took part in the Write for Rights campaign for Juan López and created a collage using fragments from more than 15,000 letters sent from around the world.
In this article, she reflects on what it meant to carry a sample of that solidarity to Honduras and to meet Juan’s family and fellow activists.
BANGKOK, THAILAND, 14 September 2026 – Greenpeace Thailand activists unfurled a 17-by-7-meter banner with the message “YOUR GAS DEAL, OUR LOSS” at the opening of Gastech 2026 in Bangkok, calling out the Thai government and fossil fuel industry while challenging their promotion of fossil gas and LNG expansion as a solution for energy security, economic growth and the climate crisis.
At the same time, Greenpeace Thailand campaigners and representatives from communities in Chachoengsao, Prachinburi and Rayong provinces attempted to deliver an open letter directly to Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, calling on the Thai government to reconsider its approach to fossil gas expansion. The communities have previously raised their concerns with the authorities, the communities have yet to see meaningful dialogue or response. At Gastech 2026, they were again not given the opportunity to hand the letter directly to the Prime Minister.
More than 200 community members from the three eastern provinces gathered in front of BITEC Bangna to highlight environmental and social impacts they have experienced from fossil gas development, and demanded a just transition towards clean and renewable energy.
As the host of Gastech 2026, the Thai government, led by the Ministry of Energy, alongside major state-owned and major energy companies, has brought together global fossil fuel executives, investors and policymakers. At the conference, fossil gas and LNG are being promoted as essential to meeting growing energy demand, including emerging demand from AI and data centres, strengthening energy security and driving economic growth, while technologies such as Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) are presented as part of the response to the climate crisis.
Greenpeace organisations across Southeast Asia, East Asia and Australia Pacific together with their allies, reject this framing, warning that false climate solutions such as CCS could prolong fossil gas expansion rather than delivering a genuine just energy transition. New gas infrastructure and long-term contracts would deepen reliance on fossil gas and expose Thailand and other Asian economies to volatile global markets, while delaying investment in renewable energy and resilient power systems.
For communities in eastern Thailand, these impacts are already a lived reality. Across Rayong, Prachinburi, and Chachoengsao, residents face the expanding footprint of LNG terminals, gas transmission pipelines, and gas-fired power plants. These developments have sparked widespread concerns among local communities about the impacts of fossil gas development on the environment, natural resources, safety, livelihoods, and quality of life. Their experiences expose the disconnect between the benefits of fossil gas promoted at Gastech 2026 and the environmental and social impacts experienced by communities on the ground.
The impacts of fossil gas extend beyond Thailand. Across the Asia-Pacific, the fossil gas industry is exposing communities to serious health impacts, rising energy bills, and climate disasters like heatwaves and floods. A vast amount of this gas comes from Australia, where fossil gas companies like Woodside Energy and Santos are pushing for new destructive projects, like the Browse project that would see up to 57 oil and gas wells drilled at Scott Reef, which risks a pristine marine ecosystem, and would emit 1.6 billion tonnes of climate pollution over its lifetime. These multinational gas corporations use exports to Asia as a key justification to pursue their destructive drilling.
As major gas financiers across the Asia-Pacific, Japan and South Korea continue to prop up regional fossil fuel markets through extensive public and private investments, long-term LNG commitments, and bilateral fuel-swap frameworks. Public finance from Japan remains a dominant driver of regional gas expansion, locking in fossil infrastructure under the guise of energy security. Meanwhile, in South Korea, surging electricity demand from AI data centers and semiconductor manufacturing is straining an overstretched power grid. Across the region, this rapid growth in AI-driven energy demand is increasingly weaponized as a pretext to expand gas-fired power, deepening fossil gas dependence and delaying the urgent shift to renewable energy.
Greenpeace organisations across the Asia-Pacific are calling on governments and energy companies attending Gastech 2026 to stop further fossil gas expansion and accelerate a just transition to renewable energy, directing investment towards renewable power, energy efficiency, storage and modernised power grids while ensuring that affected communities have a meaningful role in decisions about their energy future.
END
Quotes from Greenpeace and Local Communities Across the Asia Pacific:
Manun Wongmasoh, Climate and Energy Campaigner at Greenpeace Thailand, said:
“This conference could pave the way for even more Fossil Gas deals. Thailand’s draft power development plan 2026, presented by the Thai government just ahead of Gastech, clearly proposes 9,100 MW of new gas-fired power capacity within the first 10 years, partly to meet growing electricity demand from data centers and AI. This would inevitably drive further expansion of fossil gas infrastructure and long-term LNG import contracts, risking locking Thailand into fossil fuels and volatile global fuel markets for decades to come. Real energy security means reducing dependence on imported fossil gas and accelerating investment in renewable energy, storage and modernised power grids, in line with Thailand’s transition towards net zero. The government has a choice to make: it must choose a clean and just renewable energy future that puts people at the center and prioritises the public interest over the interests of the fossil fuel industry.
Yeonho Yang, Senior Climate & Energy Campaigner at Greenpeace East Asia, said:
“Exploiting global geopolitical instability to push long-term gas contracts is a false security trap. We’re now seeing AI-driven energy demand used to make the same case for more gas, but that’s a shortcut, not a fix. True regional energy security across Asia Pacific cannot be built on imported, volatile fossil fuels that drive climate breakdown. When investors and energy companies from South Korea and Japan finance and lock in LNG expansion across Southeast Asia, they compound climate risks and delay our collective transition to cheap, local renewable energy grids.”
Joe Rafalowicz, Head of Climate and Energy at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said:
“From toxic chemical emissions to climate pollution and nature destruction, Australian gas exports threaten the lives and livelihoods of communities along the supply chain. While the world is clearly ready to move away from volatile, expensive, dirty gas, multinational gas corporations like Woodside Energy, which are speaking at Gastech, have different plans: they want to hook in new customers across Asia, and lock us into a future of climate disasters, nature destruction and pollution. There’s no future in gas. Our shared future is in clean, cheap renewable energy, and a safe, healthy environment where the places we love are protected.”
Gun Tattiyakul, representative of the Chachoengsao REPower Network and Fossil Free Thailand, said:
“Our community is facing growing risks from the 600 MW Burapha fossil gas power plant, which is currently under construction. For more than two years, we have opposed the project and called for it to be suspended, yet our concerns have not been meaningfully addressed. We remain deeply concerned about its environmental and climate impacts, as well as growing competition over water, especially during droughts and El Niño events. Water is central to our livelihoods and agriculture, from rice farming toNam Dok Mai mango orchards, an important GI product of Chachoengsao. Chachoengsao is part of the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC), where communities are already facing continued industrial expansion, yet we have not seen a comprehensive assessment of the cumulative impacts on pollution, water resources, health, and local livelihoods. Development should not allow businesses to reap the benefits while local communities are left to bear the costs of pollution, environmental risks, and the loss of the resources we depend on.
Lamom Boonyong, Chairperson of the Pak Nam Ban Rao Local Fishers’ Organization, Mueang Rayong District, Rayong Province, said:
“Communities in Rayong have lived alongside industrial development for decades and have experienced repeated environmental impacts, from industrial pollution to oil spills. For fishing communities, damage to the marine environment and declining marine resources directly affect our livelihoods and household income. The expansion of LNG terminals and related infrastructure, including land reclamation, adds further pressure to a sea that is already under stress. We are concerned that continued fossil gas expansion will only add to the burden carried by our communities.”
Oracha Chandej, Representative of the Prachinburi Strong Network, said:
“Prachinburi is already surrounded by energy and industrial infrastructure, including gas pipelines crossing agricultural land, biomass power plants, and industrial waste-to-energy facilities. The push to include Prachinburi in the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) has raised even greater concerns among communities that the expansion of industries and corporate investment without strong environmental governance could further worsen the pollution and toxic contamination that local people are already facing.Between 2017 and 2025, more than 30 incidents of illegal wastewater discharge and industrial waste dumping were reported in Prachinburi. For organic farmers who depend on clean water and healthy, fertile soil for their livelihoods and agriculture, our concern is that increasing pollution could cause us to lose these vital resources in the future. Industrial development, particularly the expansion of the fossil fuel industry, should not generate profits for businesses while leaving local communities to bear the pollution, loss of natural resources, and environmental costs for the rest of their lives.”
Amnesty International welcomes the Guatemalan judiciary’s decision to close the criminal proceedings against four Indigenous authorities charged with unlawful association, terrorism, obstruction of justice, sedition and obstruction of criminal prosecution following their participation in peaceful protests during the national strike in October 2023.
The ruling concerns Luis Pacheco, Héctor Chaclán and Basilio Puac, from the 48 Cantones of Totonicapán, and Esteban Toc, from the Indigenous Mayor’s Office of Sololá, who faced unfounded criminal proceedings in retaliation for their work defending human rights and the rule of law.
“This unfounded prosecution and all the human rights violations it led to should never have happened. Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán should never have been imprisoned. This ruling is a first step towards ending the arbitrary actions against them,” said Astrid Valencia, Amnesty International’s Deputy Research Director for the Americas.
Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán should never have been imprisoned. This ruling is a first step towards ending the arbitrary actions against them.”
Astrid Valencia, Amnesty International’s Deputy Research Director for the Americas.
In May 2026, Amnesty International named Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán prisoners of conscience. They spent more than 15 months in pretrial detention, unjustly separated from their families and communities. The organization also warned about the misuse of criminal offences to punish Indigenous Peoples’ forms of organization and deter them from exercising their rights to peaceful protest and freedom of expression, in violation of international human rights standards.
“The criminalization of Indigenous authorities for participating in peaceful demonstrations not only affects those accused, but also threatens Indigenous Peoples’ forms of community organization and systems of representation in Guatemala. We urge the Guatemalan authorities to ensure that no one is again subjected to arbitrary criminal proceedings for peacefully exercising their rights,” added Astrid Valencia.
“The criminalization of Indigenous authorities for participating in peaceful demonstrations not only affects those accused, but also threatens Indigenous Peoples’ forms of community organization and systems of representation in Guatemala.”
Astrid Valencia, Amnesty International’s Deputy Research Director for the Americas.
Finally, we call on the authorities to ensure that Luis, Héctor, Basilio and Esteban receive full reparation for the harm caused to them, their families and communities. This must include ensuring that those suspected of responsibility for misusing the criminal justice system to harass them are investigated and prosecuted.
For more information or to arrange an interview, please contact [email protected].
In Yemen, the escalation of the conflict and the rapid advance of Ansar Allah forces on the western coast have had a profound impact on Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) activities. From Aden, Lou Cormack, MSF Country Coordinator in Yemen, explains the situation.
“Our teams have been present in Mocha and the surrounding area since 2018. Our work focuses on improving access to paediatric and maternal healthcare, a lifeline for many women and children in an area where access to such care is a daily challenge.
In Mocha, we support the General hospital through the direct presence of MSF teams, as well as through broader support to the hospital and Ministry of Health staff. Outside the city, we also support maternal and paediatric healthcare in two healthcare centres in the region: Mafraq, east of Mocha, and Khawkhah, to the north. In these two facilities, our support includes funding, training, medical equipment, and supplies. We do not have permanent MSF teams based there.
The rapid evolution of the situation this week, including the swift advance of Ansar Allah forces and their control of most of the western coast, has had a major impact on both medical activities and the needs of people in recent days.
Just a few days ago, our teams in Mocha were preparing to reopen our former field hospital in the city to treat patients, including providing trauma stabilisation, in response to the fighting taking place east of Mafraq and the gradual arrival of displaced people in Mocha.
We had already started providing water to displaced people arriving in the city, as well as finalising the setup of cholera isolation and treatment units in Khawkhah and Mocha. We were also increasing our ambulance fleet to refer critical patients to Aden, as hospitals there were at capacity.
The rapid advance of Ansar Allah forces has fundamentally changed the situation. Within hours, the hospitals providing trauma services on the western coast were evacuated, while large numbers of people fled Mocha towards the south and Aden, including healthcare workers from the city’s hospitals. The General hospital in Mocha was no exception.
Our team remained in Mocha, but we had to scale back and reorganise our activities and focus on one immediate priority: doing everything possible to keep essential medical services at the General hospital running.
So far, thanks to the commitment of Yemeni doctors, gynaecologists, nurses, and other healthcare workers, we have been able to maintain a minimum level of essential care, including deliveries, emergency care, and intensive care. As of today, around 30 healthcare workers remain present at the hospital. This may not seem like many, but their work is saving lives.
When the city was taken, dozens of patients were still hospitalised in the maternity and paediatric wards. It was essential to maintain their care while continuing to receive patients requiring urgent treatment. On that day [Thursday 10 September], hospital teams cared for two patients who arrived in the paediatric and maternity emergency departments, performed two emergency caesarean sections, and continued caring for seven patients in intensive care and 10 babies in the neonatal intensive care unit, in addition to dozens of other patients and babies in the regular wards.
The situation remains extremely challenging. As of 11 September, almost all other healthcare facilities in the city had stopped functioning, largely because their staff had left. There is currently no possibility of referring patients, either within the city or to Aden.
The medical needs were already enormous before the latest escalation. They are even greater now.
We are looking for ways to reinforce our team in Mocha, but this is not straightforward. The situation remains highly stressful for both people and our teams. There were further bombardments overnight, and there is still considerable uncertainty about what may happen in the coming hours and days.
For us to continue providing care, our medical and humanitarian mission must be respected. Medical facilities, vehicles and staff must be protected so that people can safely access the care they need. This is also essential to allow patients in critical condition to be referred safely when the treatment they need is not available locally. Any threat to the medical mission puts the provision of essential healthcare at risk and may jeopardise our ability to continue working in Mocha. Without these basic guarantees, we simply cannot do our job: treating people and saving lives.
We do not know what will happen next. What we do know is that medical needs are enormous and go far beyond trauma care. We will continue to do our utmost to support the community and maintain access to essential healthcare for as long as we can.”
Responding to reports that the Zambian authorities have cancelled the passports of former Zambian Ambassador to Ethiopia and former Permanent Representative to the African Union Emmanuel Mwamba, historian and academic Dr Sishuwa Sishuwa, former opposition Members of Parliament Binwell Mpundu and Emmanuel Jay Banda, former State House Special Assistant Kaizer Zulu, and blogger Lillian Mutambo on 11 September, Vongai Chikwanda, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for East and Southern Africa said:
“The arbitrary cancellation of passports by Zambian authorities is a violation of international human rights law. By weaponizing citizenship documents to target dissidents, activists, or political opponents, authorities explicitly breach the right to freedom of movement enshrined in Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ICCPR.
The arbitrary cancellation of passports by Zambian authorities is a violation of international human rights law. By weaponizing citizenship documents to target dissidents, activists, or political opponents, authorities explicitly breach the right to freedom of movement enshrined in Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ICCPR.
Vongai Chikwanda, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for East and Southern Africa
“This is deeply concerning, particularly given the wider post-election crackdown on dissent, including arbitrary arrests and detention of members of the opposition and other government critics.
“The decision to cancel these passports effectively strips these individuals of their legal and social identity and traps them in a state of de facto statelessness. It undermines their dignity and basic civil protections.
The decision to cancel these passports effectively strips these individuals of their legal and social identity and traps them in a state of de facto statelessness. It undermines their dignity and basic civil protections.
Vongai Chikwanda
“Amnesty International calls on the Zambian authorities to revoke these passport cancellations, restore these individuals’ passports and remedy any harm resulting from this unlawful decision.”
Background
Amnesty International has documented a rapid deterioration in the human rights situation in the country in the run-up to, during and after the general elections, marked by arbitrary arrests and detention, as well as attacks and intimidation targeting human rights defenders, activists, journalists and opposition political party members. As electoral tensions intensified, these violations were followed by further arrests of opposition members. The killing of former Cabinet Minister Mutotwe Kafwaya during a security operation marked a further escalation of the crackdown.
On 11 September, the Zambian authorities issued a notice cancelling passports belonging to several government critics “in the interest of national security.”
Under Zambia’s Passports and Citizenship legislation, the cancellation of a passport is permitted only on specified grounds, including loss of citizenship, obtaining a passport through fraud or misrepresentation, certain forms of passport fraud, specified convictions and death. Political criticism or opposition to the government is not, in itself, a stated ground for cancellation.
HONOLULU, HAWAIʻI (September 11, 2026) – As Hawaiʻi faces growing interest from the fossil fuel industry and potential plans to expand liquefied natural gas (LNG) infrastructure and exports, a new documentary is bringing the human and environmental costs of fossil fuel development into focus.
GASLIT, a documentary featuring Academy Award-winning actor and activist Jane Fonda, sold out its free screening at the Honolulu Museum of Art on September 11th from 7:00 p.m – 9:00 p.m. HST. A second screening is scheduled for September 12th, at Patagonia Haleʻiwa from 6:30 p.m – 9:30 p.m HST. This showing will also include a silent auction benefiting the Lāhui Foundation’s Post-Flood Recovery Efforts.
Following both screenings, a panel discussion with Wayne Chung Tanaka, Executive Director, Sierra Club of Hawaiʻi; Pāhonu Coleman, youth plaintiff in the historic Navahine climate lawsuit and settlement, and Melanie Oldham, Executive Director of Better Brazoria Clean Air & Water, will take place.
These screenings come as communities across the country continue to push back against new fossil fuel infrastructure and question whether LNG expansion is compatible with a safe climate future. For Hawaiʻi, the conversation is particularly important as the state works toward a clean energy transition while facing pressure from fossil fuel interests.
“We know the threats that importing this planet-killing fossil fuel will pose to our pocketbooks, public safety, public health, and local environment, ” said Sierra Club Executive Director, Wayne Chung Tanaka. “This film helps us to understand the deep harms inflicted on those living on the other end of the LNG pipeline.”
Since 2023, the U.S. has become the world’s largest exporter of LNG, and oil and gas companies are simultaneously fueling a massive boom in plastics production, doubling down on petrochemicals to secure their long-term future. GASLIT is both a call to action and a reflection on the decades-long struggle between the survival of frontline communities and fossil fuel encroachment.
“GASLIT is a visual representation of the people fighting tooth and nail for their lives every day in Texas and Louisiana, but their stories resemble that of so many others across the country,” said Katie Camosy, Director of GASLIT. “We want people to support the folks in the film, and we also want them to leave the theater ready to talk to their neighbors. We hope they consider what polluting industries might be doing in their own backyards.”
Although Hawaiʻi has long been recognized for its leadership on clean energy, the state remains a potential target for expanding LNG infrastructure and markets throughout the Pacific. Advocates have been raising concerns that a recent LNG proposal for Oʻahu could lock communities into decades of additional pollution and dependency on imported fossil fuels, while putting public health, climate goals, local ecosystems, and the local economy at risk.
Tickets to the remaining GASLIT screenings and discussions are free and can be reserved directly from here.
GASLIT SYNOPSIS:
In GASLIT, Academy Award-winning actor and activist Jane Fonda embarks on a road trip through Texas oil fields and Gulf Coast communities, meeting the people who are fighting back against the oil and gas extraction boom. This boom, which has led to the United States becoming the world’s biggest liquefied “natural” gas (LNG) exporter, is also fueling a massive expansion of plastics production, as fossil fuel companies double down on petrochemicals to secure their future. These are the stories of the shrimpers, cattle ranchers, former oil workers, families, members of faith communities, community organizers, self-described “reluctant activists,” and people across political and cultural spectrums who have come together in defense of the communities and coastlines they love. Join Fonda as she travels across Texas and Louisiana bearing witness to the decades-long struggle between fossil fuel profiteering and the lives of everyday people.
Media interested in reserving a spot at either screening and/or interviewing GASLIT director Katie Camosy or panelists Wayne Chung Tanaka and Melanie Oldham should contact: Leeza Jackson, Greenpeace USA Communications Specialist, [email protected]
ABOUT GREENPEACE USA:
Greenpeace USA (Greenpeace Inc.) is an independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest, creative communication, public advocacy, and lobbying to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green, just, and peaceful future. Greenpeace USA has been bearing witness to and demanding action on climate change for most of its nearly five decades of campaigning. Having partnered with communities on campaigns in the Permian Basin and the Gulf South for decades, Greenpeace USA forged strong relationships with the grassroots movements working hard to push back against the expansion of polluting fossil fuel and petrochemical infrastructure in the best interest of local communities. These local ties — along with the relationships actor and activist Jane Fonda has established through Greenpeace USA’s Fire Drill Fridays collaboration — uniquely positions Greenpeace USA, as part of the Greenpeace global network, to tell the stories of how actionstaking place in the Gulf South and the Texas Permian Basin have an impact well beyond U.S. borders.
