The average American is a slave to technology. Although no one really knows the physical and psychological impact of this, there is a lot of discussion recently about the danger of computers and cellphones. According to several articles and books, these “gadgets” have resulted in shallower thinking, weakened concentration, reduced creativity, heightened stress, and interrupted work and family life. There are also concerns about the physical impact. One Swedish study that followed young people, who began using cellphones as teenagers, for 10 years calculated a 400 percent increase in brain tumors. Another study revealed a potential link between cellphone radiation and loss in bees’ honey production—given that bees pollinate 90% of commercial crops in the USA the side effects of this could eventually be dire. However as Maureen Dowd wrote, “even if scientists told us our computers would make our arms fall off, we’d probably keep typing.” All this recent attention to the physical and psychological impacts notwithstanding, it is people who don’t even use these “gadgets” that are at the greatest, yet far less talked about, risk. Smartphones and laptops are built from minerals—tin, tantalum, tungsten, and gold—that warlords trade and use to fund mass slaughter and rape in eastern Congo. This straightforward video by the Enough Project describes how these minerals leave a trail of destruction from the mines in Congo to the cellphone in your pocket, and what consumers can do to help end the violence.

Migrants who seek to use the Egyptian border with Israel as a staging area for illegal entry into Israel have become victims of a shoot-to-kill policy, according to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. The victims are primarily Sub-Saharan Africans – mainly from Eritrea, Sudan and Ethiopia. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, through her spokesman in Egypt, Rupert Coville, has expressed ‘acceptance’ of the idea that migrants often accidentally lose their lives during their efforts to cross remote land borders, but notes that these deaths are too numerous to be accidental and are caused by lethal weapons. The government of Egypt is being asked by the Commissioner to conduct an independent investigation into the activities and policies of the border State security forces. The use of lethal force on unarmed migrants is deemed inexcusable.

In honor of Valentine’s Day I attended a benefit production of Eve Ensler’s award-winning play The Vagina Monologues. This year the V-day global campaign focus is “Stop Raping our Greatest Resource: Power to Women in the DRC.” Over 5.4 million people have died in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) since 1998 – currently 45,000 people die each month. Thousands of women experience brutal sexual violence on a daily basis. Thankfully journalists like Nicholas Kristof are keeping the DRC in the news – most recently with this moving video of a Message for President Obama. However, as one Congolese woman says, “we speak but nothing changes.” The Enough Project highlights how our demand for conflict minerals – the material in the cellphone in your pocket – fuels this deadly war. Congolese women and men risk their lives so we can talk on our cellphones, check our email and update our Facebook status. What will we do for them?

When this woman would not be quiet in the face of her perpetrators, they shot her three times. Photo credit: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

In 2000, the United Nations General Assembly passed resolution 55/93 to recognize International Migrants Day, a day which celebrates the UN’s adoption of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families (Migrant Worker Convention) on December 18, 1990. The Migrant Worker Convention guarantees migrant workers and their families fundamental rights including: freedom from discrimination based on national or ethnic origin, race, sex, religion (or any other status) in all aspects of work; equality before the law regardless of a migrant’s legal status; and freedom from arbitrary expulsion of migrants from their country of employment.

Despite America’s rich social history of immigration, certain migrant communities, especially those of color, have faced discrimination and exclusion from basic human rights protections. “From the Chinese guest workers who built the U.S. railroad system and the Braceros, Mexican guest farm workers from 1942 to 1964, who worked under unjust and slave-like conditions, to the present day farm workers, nannies, and hotel workers, many of whom continue to endure slave-like conditions, exploitative hours, racist attitudes, and precarious conditions, the struggle for justice continues,” states Janvieve Williams Comrie in a press release by the Latin American and Caribbean Community Center.

An article in The Independent sheds light on human rights education projects that seek to highlight the injustice and struggles that Central American migrants face.

In Manila, Philippines, women march with the International Assembly of Migrants and Refugees against modern-day slavery.

Students around the country who have mobilized with the United Students Against Sweatshops are celebrating as the target of their human rights campaign, Russell Athletic, caved to public pressure on Tuesday and moved to rehire more than 1,200 workers in Honduras who had been fired for organizing a union in order to collectively bargain for their labor rights. An article in the New York Times sheds light on this victory for global student/worker solidarity.

Human rights organizations and advocates across the globe were instrumental in the establishment of the Kimberley Process, which works to certify diamonds as ‘conflict free.’ More importantly, these groups have continued to work in monitoring effective implementation of the Kimberley Process standards. However, recent evidence of Zimbabwe’s gross human rights violations in the diamond trade, and the Kimberley Process’ lack of effective response, have left many fearful that the deadly conditions in Zimbabwe’s diamond mines will continue indefinitely. What is the role of consumers in demanding human rights standards for the people who mine their diamonds, pick their produce, or sew their clothes? What can or should be done to enforce the Kimberley Process to respect its own rules? A New York Times article highlights the situation in Zimbabwe, and you can read more from Amnesty International on the history of conflict diamonds and access a guide on how to take action. (Photo by Chris Hondros/Getty Images)

This past weekend, I had the great honor of meeting Amnesty International’s Secretary General, Irene Khan. As the keynote speaker at Amnesty International USA’s Southern Regional Conference in Decatur, GA, Khan spoke directly and passionately on the intersection of poverty and human rights. Unlike many in the elite circles of humanitarian-aid or international development agencies, Khan not only highlights that human rights violations are often the underlying causes of poverty, she also argues that the cycle of poverty cannot be solved by charity or ‘economic growth’ models- rather, efforts to end poverty must be grounded in human rights and the empowerment of communities, so that they themselves can demand access, security, and the means to self-determination. Her book, “The Unheard Truth” is available worldwide and a must-read for anyone interested in the solutions to global poverty and inequality.