Tracking-based advertising undermines fundamental rights and furthers the economic interests of Big Tech platforms at the expense of other businesses. The amendment to the Digital Services Act on tracking-based advertising – as voted in IMCO in December 2021 – falls far short of addressing these systemic harms.
As the French government prepares to assume the Presidency of the Council of the European Union (EU), Amnesty International calls to ensure that human rights are at the forefront of its mandate. The French presidency comes at a time of increased challenges in Europe, including the backsliding on the rule of law, the growing anti-gender movement, the continuing lack of solidarity and adequate protection of asylum seekers and the lack of adequate regulation of the cyber-surveillance industry.
Asylum-seekers and migrants trying to enter the EU from Belarus and facing pushbacks and other human rights violations on the Polish border, are subjected to horrific torture or other ill-treatment, inhumane conditions, extortion and other abuse at the hands of Belarusian forces, new evidence gathered by Amnesty International reveals.
Civil Society Organisations letter ahead of the General Affairs Council on 14 December when EU affairs ministers will hear from the European Commission on the latest developments and take stock of the situation regarding respect for EU values in Hungary and Poland as part of the Article 7 (1) TEU procedure. The briefing by the European Commission is bound to include several highly problematic developments in both countries since the last Article 7(1) Council discussions in June, following years of proceedings. These developments include bold defiance of the authority of the Court of Justice of the EU and the European Court of Human Rights by the governments of both Poland and Hungary. The failure to respect, let alone comply with, judgments of these courts constitute a further degradation of the rule of law within the EU that must be halted as a matter of urgency.
Amnesty International would like to express concern over the European Commission’s proposal for a Council Decision on provisional measures for the benefit of Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. Amnesty International considers the derogations allowed under the instrument unjustifiable and dangerous on many accounts.
Civil society organisations writing to the President of the European Commission to raise their strong concerns about the new delay to the publication of the planned Commission proposal on a Sustainable Corporate Governance (SCG)
Croatian authorities have consistently assaulted refugees and migrants and denied them access to asylum, in contravention of European and International law, said Amnesty International, in response to a damning report released by the Council of Europe’s Committee on Prevention of Torture (CPT) today.
Responding to the decision by a majority vote of the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers to begin the formal process of infringement against Turkey for failing to release human rights defender, Osman Kavala, Amnesty International’s Europe Director Nils Muižnieks said:
Asylum-seekers staying in a new EU-funded refugee camp on the island of Samos are being detained illegally by Greek authorities following a yet unpublished decision from the Greek Minister for Migration and Asylum, based on information received by Amnesty International.
In response to today’s proposals from the European Commission which would allow Latvia, Lithuania and Poland to derogate from EU rules, including by holding asylum-seekers and migrants at the border for 16 weeks with minimal safeguards, Eve Geddie, Director of Amnesty International’s European Office said:
At its London headquarters, Amnesty International has a large sign emblazoned in a hallway encouraging you to “Take Injustice Personally”. For activists, this means not becoming hardened or cynical, but allowing the suffering of others to touch us personally. It is this personal sense of injustice that should motivate us to speak out on behalf of people whose human rights are violated the world over.
The European Union institutions have taken a globally-significant step with the proposal for an Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA). Insofar as Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems are increasingly used in all areas of public life, it is vital that the AIA addresses the structural, societal, political and economic impacts of the use of AI, is future-proof, and prioritises the protection of fundamental rights and democratic values.