Castan Centre for Human Rights Law

Category: Auslaw

  • Charlie Hebdo: the pen must defy the sword, Islamic or not

    By Sarah Joseph The slaying of the Charlie Hebdo journalists and cartoonists because of their work is the grossest attack on the value of free speech, and of course the right to life. In the deadly attack on the magazine’s office, the sword has crushed the pen: an unspeakable outrage. An attack on liberal values…

  • Four reasons why the CIA torture program should never have happened

    By Marius Smith When the US Senate Intelligence Committee released its report into the CIA’s “enhanced interrogation” program this week, the response was appropriate. People called it “shocking”, “harrowing” and “deeply disturbing”. But most of all, the Committee’s report into the horrendous affair reveals that the whole thing was normal. Normal, that is, for state-sanctioned torture. There…

  • Is there a human right to voluntary euthanasia?

    Today, we are releasing episode 4 of our new video series, “Have You Got That Right?”, a collection of videos designed to explain important human rights laws quickly and clearly. Episode 4 – Voluntary Euthanasia ​Today’s episode asks whether there is a human right to voluntary euthanasia​. The argument has been made in a series…

  • Prisons, overcrowding and human rights

    Radical changes to the parole regime in Victoria in 2013 led to a 96.2% increase in refusals of parole in one year.

  • Questioning the queue: blocking protection to asylum seekers in Indonesia

    By Maria O’Sullivan Immigration Minister Scott Morrison has announced that asylum seekers residing in Indonesia while awaiting protection will no longer obtain resettlement in Australia. This move puts into serious question the humanitarian rationale for Australia’s resettlement program and its work on a Regional Co-operation Framework for asylum seekers in Southeast Asia. Government officials constantly…

  • Freedom, the sublime and the patriotic

    Speech to Castan Centre for Human Rights Law Gala Dinner by  Keynote Speaker Dr Tim Soutphommasane, Federal Race Discrimination Commissioner During the past year or so, I have been constantly asked two questions with unerring predictability. One: Should the Racial Discrimination Act be amended? Two: How is everyone getting along at the Australian Human Rights…