Category: MIL-OSI

Source: Médecins Sans Frontières –

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has launched a comprehensive general and specialist healthcare programme in the East Wollega and West Wollega zones of Ethiopia’s Oromia region.

We aim to restore access to essential services for host communities and internally displaced people in hard-to-reach rural areas, while strengthening the capacity of key health facilities.

In these rural zones, limited movement of patients, staff and supplies – along with shortages of medicines and medical equipment, financial barriers and weak referral systems – have made it harder to deliver timely, quality healthcare. Some facilities have operated at reduced capacity or faced temporary interruptions. 

As a result, communities have experienced untreated illness, challenges in sustaining immunisation and maternal health services, a high burden of malaria along with a greater risk of disease outbreaks, and increased pressure on the health facilities that remain functional. 
Despite the scale of need, the presence of humanitarian organisations in these zones remains limited, leaving significant gaps in both general and specialist care.

“The area has unmet health needs,” said Dr Sigrid Lamberg, MSF country director in Ethiopia. “Communities often lack routine care, while referral facilities have had little support to strengthen infection control, staff capacity and essential services.”

“The limited presence of international organisations in this area has created significant and growing gaps in essential health services,” says Dr Lamberg. “These gaps mean that people often delay seeking care or travel long distances when they become ill.”

In response, we started running mobile clinics that bring healthcare directly to areas with limited access in East Wollega and West Wollega. These mobile teams provide outpatient consultations, routine nutrition assessments, health promotion activities, and essential medicines with a strong aim to reduce preventable deaths. In West Wollega, MSF is providing targeted specialist-level support to Begi hospital, which serves a larger catchment of approximately 1 million people.

Our team focuses on strengthening infection prevention and control systems and building the capacity of health workers. This support is being rolled out in phases, beginning with the maternity department, with the aim of gradually reinforcing broader hospital functions. 

In July, the first month of operations, the mobile clinics provided outpatient care and essential services to 4,243 people; during the same period, at Begi hospital’s maternity department, our team supported 137 deliveries in collaboration with hospital staff.

By combining outreach with support to a key referral facility, our activities seek to create a more continuous and resilient pathway of care. Throughout the implementation of the programme, MSF has been working in close partnership with the Ministry of Health, local health authorities, and local communities.

“Communities in East Wollega and West Wollega have faced prolonged disruptions to basic health services,” said Dr Lamberg. “Our goal is to reinforce the capacity of selected facilities and outreach services so that quality care can be delivered closer to the communities who need it most.”

“It’s a collaborative approach to ensure that our support strengthens existing health structures rather than creating parallel systems,” they conclude.

Source: Greenpeace Statement –

SYDNEY, Thursday 20 August 2026 — Commenting on the release of the government’s final nature law standards made today, including for Matters of National Environmental Significance, the following lines can be attributed to Glenn Walker, Head of Nature at Greenpeace Australia Pacific: 

“Ultimately the test of the new nature law standards will be whether they materially bring down Australia’s shockingly high rates of deforestation caused by bulldozing for beef and logging of native forests.

“Deforestation severely threatens the forest homes of some of Australia’s most threatened species including the koala, greater glider and swift parrot. In Queensland the bulldozing of forests is causing mass erosion and the run off of hundreds of thousands of tonnes of muddy soil on the Great Barrier Reef each year.

“Unless these standards deliver protection for the Great Barrier Reef from deforestation runoff and ensure the healthy recovery of wildlife under threat then they will have failed. 

“There’s clear improvement on the draft standards that were released, which we welcome, but what we have today still falls well short of what would be optimal. In particular, the heavy reliance on offsets and the failure to address the cumulative impacts of hundreds of instances of deforestation–death by a thousand cuts–create serious ongoing weaknesses in the way the standards work. The acid test will now be in the operation: will the standards succeed in stopping deforestation, or not.

“The effectiveness of the nature law reforms hang heavily on these standards. We will be watching closely as they are implemented and raising the alarm on any failure to curb deforestation.”

-ENDS-

Source: Amnesty International –

The offshore detention of migrants and asylum seekers under the Italy-Albania Agreement is jeopardizing people’s safety, liberty and human rights, Amnesty International said in a briefing published as events in Ceuta continue to expose the dangers of long-standing European Union (EU) migration policies that centre on exclusion and containment.

Italy: Extraterritorial migration detention and human rights obligations analyzes the 2023 agreement to establish two migration facilities in Albania run by Italian authorities, which has led to the forcible transfer of hundreds of people who face being locked up, many unable to access legal help. The conditions there and harmful human costs of Italy’s offshore policies have driven several individuals to self-harm or attempt suicide.

“Offshore detention is ultimately aimed at deterrence and trying to shift and evade both the responsibilities of responding to people migrating and the obligation to provide asylum to those who need it. Italy’s deal with Albania shows yet again the unavoidable human rights costs of this approach,” said Eve Geddie, Director of Amnesty International’s European Institutions Office.  

“Just before the deal entered into force, Amnesty International sounded the alarm on the harmful impact it would inevitably have on the rights of people in distress at sea, and of people transferred to Albania. Clearly, these concerns have now materialized.”  

Amnesty International believe its findings must serve as a warning to the EU about the disastrous impact of migration policies that seek to increasingly rely on countries outside its borders to manage migration, at the expense of expanding safe and regular pathways.

Unnecessary cruelty

Between October 2024 and January 2025, Italy carried out three maritime operations and forcibly transferred 74 people directly from international waters to Albania under the Agreement. Following numerous Italian court rulings which overturned detention orders for these people, Italy stopped the transfers to Albania from the high seas.  

However, in March 2025, the Italian government amended the Agreement to allow for the detention in Albania of men with expulsion orders in Italy. As a result, hundreds (reportedly over 500) predominantly racialized men have been forcibly transferred to the Albanian detention centre in Gjadër over the past 15 months. 

Between 11 April and 16 May 2025, 42 critical incidents were recorded in the Gjadër centre, including at least two attempted hangings, a protest where three people were injured from shattered glass, and various self-harm incidents.

The Italian government has obstructed independent monitoring of the Agreement’s implementation, including by restricting parliamentary oversight and bypassing ordinary legislative processes. By limiting access and oversight by independent rights observers, what happens in the Albanian detention centres remains largely shrouded in secrecy. 

Whilst people detained in Albania fall under Italian jurisdiction, their physical distance from Italy combined with limited access to lawyers, courts and other safeguards, significantly undermines the effectiveness of the right to seek asylum and to access justice.

A lawyer interviewed by Amnesty International said he had been unable to meet his client before their hearing and had no time to adequately prepare the defence. In his view, the minutes of asylum hearings showing people answering questions in monosyllables was a sign they had been intimidated.

People detained in Albania are understandably traumatized.  What they are forced to undergo is an intolerable and unnecessary cruelty

Eve Geddie, Director of Amnesty International’s European Institutions Office

“People detained in Albania are understandably traumatized. They may have crossed the desert, been detained and abused in Libya, survived the sea crossing on unseaworthy boats, and then, following interception by the Italian authorities, spent days travelling to Albania. Others, transferred from detention in Italy, are ripped from their lives, leaving behind communities and support networks and are expected to suddenly contend with new surroundings, screenings, paperwork – all from a place of isolation. What they are forced to undergo is an intolerable and unnecessary cruelty,” said Eve Geddie.

Undermining the rule of law

Italian courts and the Court of Justice of the EU have found Italian rules and practice around asylum applications filed by people from countries designated by Italy as “safe” (the basis for fast tracking applications) to be inconsistent with the applicable EU law, and without sufficient safeguards for applicants.  

Despite repeated Italian court rulings ordering people’s release from detention in Albania, the Italian government has pushed ahead with implementing the deal. It has tried to limit courts’ scrutiny over the designation of “safe countries” by resorting to legislation intended for situations of urgency without providing reasons to undermine the rule of law.  

Individuals with expulsion orders in Italy and already in detention there, have also been subject to unlawful extraterritorial transfers, outside of provisions in domestic and European law.

“It is abundantly clear that the Italy-Albania model is impossible to implement in line with Italy’s human rights obligations. This reality must be a wake-up call for the EU to put any future plans to expand the use of offshore detention and other externalization tools, firmly on ice,” said Eve Geddie. 

“Italian authorities must immediately end the agreement with Albania, implement alternatives to migration detention, which under international law must remain the last resort, and ensure access to effective and non-discriminatory asylum procedures and dignified reception on Italian territory to all people seeking international protection. All refugees and migrants should be able to access effective legal safeguards and benefit from independent monitoring.” 

Background 

The Italy-Albania Agreement entered into force on 23 February 2024 and is set to remain in force for five years, after which time it will be automatically renewed. The Italian government is reported to have set side over €670 million for its operation until 2028.  

As the Italian Ministry of Interior repeatedly denied Amnesty International’s requests for access to the detention centres in Albania, citing security and public order reasons, the research is based on correspondence with the Ministry of Interior and a review of court documents, information exchanged within the Tavolo Asilo e Immigrazione civil society network, reports from parliamentarians and ombudspersons, interviews with UN agencies and with two lawyers of people detained in Gjadër.

Source: Médecins Sans Frontières –

Jelle Krings

Marx Stanley Léveillé/MSF

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Source: Amnesty International –

The expanded use of surveillance technologies in Argentina during the first two years of the Javier Milei’s administration has served to expand states surveillance capabilities, profiling and reprisals in the country, creating a chilling effect on rights to privacy and freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association, Amnesty International said in a new report today. 

The report, Sensing the Surveillance State, documents how the government implemented sweeping institutional reforms to expand its intelligence capabilities and therefore surveillance mechanisms, through executive decrees and resolutions. Between 2024-2025, it also acquired technologies worth at least US$1.2 million, including social media monitoring tools, facial recognition, and aerial surveillance tools. Together, these policies and technologies amount to a system of mass surveillance. 

“Pervasive surveillance is being used against Argentinians in both physical and digital spaces, to devastating effect. These technologies have become an integral part of the infrastructure of state control, targeting dissent, deterring protest movements, and harassing marginalized groups, among other authoritarian practices,” said Paola Garcia Ray, Deputy Director, Amnesty International Argentina.

“When powerful people don’t want accountability, they attack those who ask questions and use whatever is at their disposal to monitor, control and repress.”  

The report is based on interviews with 21 people including journalists, activists, pensioners, young people and human rights defenders; analysis of scores of procurement documents and data related to acquired surveillance technologies; and information obtained through freedom of information (FOI) requests. 

Source: Oxfam –

Commenting at the close of the EU council meeting where leaders agreed on a new EU 2030 climate target and discussed the EU’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Evelien van Roemburg, head of Oxfam’s EU advocacy office said:  

Climate 

“The new, more ambitious, EU 2030 target still falls short of what is needed and what is fair. The EU must take urgent practical steps to deliver above and beyond this target.  

“It won’t be possible to deliver on the new climate target if governments don’t cut the emissions of the richest 10% of Europeans who are responsible for more than a quarter of EU emissions. We need a fair European Green Deal that tackles luxury carbon emissions and confronts inequality. This means ending subsidies for fossil fuels, introducing taxes on aviation fuel, and banning SUVs. Revenues should be invested in housing renovation and public transport that will deliver millions of jobs, clean air, and warm homes for everyone.” 

Covid-19 

“EU leaders’ talk of a ‘shared spirit of global solidarity to defeat the pandemic’ rings hollow given that they are actively blocking proposals at the World Trade Organisation that would force big pharma to waive their monopolies and patents on vaccines – a move that could boost vaccine production and end this pandemic faster. We need a People’s Vaccine, not a profit vaccine.” 
 

Source: Oxfam –

Oxfam reports every six months against its Safeguarding and Culture Improvement Plan. The latest report highlights Oxfam’s new Global Case Management System that allows for enhanced data analysis and oversight of safeguarding and other management compliances, along with improved mechanisms for reporting to donors and authorities. Oxfam is adapting its safeguarding guidance to teams to help them adjust to the realities of increased virtual working as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. This included participating in a confederation–wide real time evaluation into how we are supporting countries to respond to the coronavirus emergency, identifying and socializing best practises. The report includes Oxfam’s latest safeguarding disclosure data over the period covered, that shows the organization managed 88 safeguarding cases, closing out half of them including 21 as being upheld with appropriate actions taken. 
 

Source: Oxfam –

Source: Oxfam –

Source: Amnesty International –

Reacting to the sentencing of Lev Shlosberg, deputy chair of the Yabloko party — the only registered Russian political party which has consistently opposed Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and campaigned for a ceasefire and diplomacy — to 11 years and one month in prison, Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia Director, said:

“For nothing more than taking part in an anti-war debate and sharing a social media post, Lev Shlosberg faces more than 11 years behind bars. His arbitrary prosecution and sentencing are blatant reprisals for exercising his right to freedom of expression to call for peace.”

“The Yabloko party’s disqualification from running in the September State Duma election is further proof that political pluralism and anti-war expression have no place in Russia today.

“The Russian authorities must immediately and unconditionally release Lev Shlosberg and quash his conviction. They must repeal legislation criminalizing peaceful anti-war expression, end the persecution of Yabloko members and supporters, and respect the rights to freedom of expression, association, peaceful assembly and political participation for all Russians.”

In his final statement in the trial, Lev Shlosberg described how “thousands and thousands” of individuals have been targeted in Russia for their “peaceful, non-violent, and humanistic” beliefs. He concluded: “In reality, in this courtroom I am the Russian Federation, which has been put in a cage and which they want to force into silence.”

Background

On 17 August, the Pskov City Court sentenced Lev Shlosberg, a veteran Russian politician, journalist and deputy chair of Yabloko party, to 11 years and one month in a penal colony. He was prosecuted under Article 280.3(1) of the Russian Criminal Code for “repeated discreditation of the Russian Armed Forces,” and Article 207.3(2)(d) for “dissemination of deliberately false information about the Russian Armed Forces.” The charges relate to his participation in an online debate about the war against Ukraine and sharing on social media of a publication featuring a Daily Mirror front page showing Vladimir Putin and a blood-covered Ukrainian woman.

Lev Shlosberg’s trial ended amid mounting pressure on Yabloko. On 10 August 2026, Russia’s Supreme Court barred the party from running in the next State Duma election. Yabloko appealed the decision, and at least 30 of its supporters were detained outside the Supreme Court in Moscow on the day of appeal hearing on 17 August.