In a look at recent initiatives to decolonialise the aid sector, humanitarian professional and STG Policy Leader Fellow Carla Vitantonio finds that big international agencies have something to learn from local organisations taking a collaborative, open approach towards language sensitivity.

Facebook and other platforms have been criticised for complying with governments that stifle dissent, under various legal guises. Policy Leader Fellow Gideon Sarpong argues that upping investments in field staff and in technology, particularly in the Global South, can do much to prevent harmful content while protecting freedom of speech and of the press.

Taking the example of civil-society mobilisation to legalise euthanasia, law researcher Mario Pagano shows how powerful courts can be in bringing sensitive issues to the political agenda, and how effective litigation can be when the time is ripe for political institutions to act.

To mark Women’s History Month, Policy Leader Fellow Yasasmin Kaviratne reminds us of the gains Afghanistan’s women have made – and recently lost – in securing their fundamental rights to health, education and freedom from discrimination.

Russia’s withdrawal from the Council of Europe will deprive the European Court of Human Rights of some of its funding, even as the caseload relating to Russia continues to grow. Law Researcher Helga Molbæk-Steensig explains the key role the Court could play in transitional justice following the war in Ukraine and calls on member states to up their contributions.

Catalonia’s merchants and towns profited hugely from the transatlantic slave trade after it was banned in the nineteenth century, as history researcher Adrià Enríquez Àlvaro documents. The good news is the recent movements to critique and reverse official amnesia, regarding public history and monuments.

Five years after the historic peace treaty in Colombia, in some places conflicts continue to simmer and a longing for change persists. PhD Researchers Wolfgang Minatti and Laura Ramírez report from their fieldwork in one region.

At a critical period in which Israel is cracking down on Palestinian civil society, the European Union can act to support the work of community building and human rights documentation before they disappear altogether, writes Tariq Azeez.

Border crises are reinforcing rather than breaking a pan-EU governmental consensus on border security, according to the Migration Policy Centre’s James Dennison and Andrew Geddes. In this post they point out the many new political problems which this focus on border protection creates.

The Taliban’s grab of power in Afghanistan also has repercussions for international justice. Law scholar and EUI alumna Sophie Duroy draws attention to a recent statement by the International Criminal Court Prosecutor that essentially lets the US off the hook for crimes committed in the war against terror.