TABNAK, Dec 15: The report titled, “Violation of human rights by UK” in 2024 was issued on Saturday, cataloguing a litany of the violations such as the country’s arms sales to the Israeli regime amid Tel Aviv’s ongoing genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, and its crackdown on pro-Palestinian protests.
Additionally, it raised concerns about the alarming rate of violation of migrant rights, racial discriminations, femicide, and child abuse in the country among other things.
The report cited the British government’s issuing “more than 100 arms export licenses” to the Israeli regime since October 7, 2023, when Tel Aviv launched the war that has so far claimed the lives of more than 44,900 Palestinians, mostly women and children.
“Currently, there are a total of 345 licenses for the sale of weapons to the Zionist regime, including licenses to send weapons before October 7,” it said, adding, “Statistics confirm that no arms export license application was rejected or canceled” during the brutal Israeli military onslaught.
The ministry considered London to be an “accomplice” in the Israeli atrocities in light of the military support, saying the support came despite the catastrophic situation in Gaza and the International Court of Justice’s recent call on the regime to “immediately halt its military offensive.”
It also highlighted the British mission to the United Nations’ vetoing the resolutions that had been tabled at the world body’s Security Council towards mandating a ceasefire in Gaza as well as London’s suspending its aid to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.
The report, meanwhile, pointed to the British government’s branding pro-Palestinian demonstrations as “hate marches” and indications of anti-Semitism.
Elsewhere, it singled out the government's immigration policies, particularly the controversial "Rwanda plan," which allows deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda, despite objections from the UK Supreme Court and the UN.
The report reminded that the UK had additionally funded the French maritime police to deter migrants, sometimes through violent means.
The policies were marked by other instances of racial discrimination too, especially against people of African descent, it noted. The report also pointed to the Windrush scandal that continued to impact Caribbean communities through wrongful detentions and denial of rights, and lashed out against immigration laws that allow automatic deportation and revocation of citizenship.
Women’s rights were also under threat in the UK, with 3,000 daily incidents of sexual and domestic violence recorded in England and Wales this year, the report stated.
It added that femicide rates remained high in the country, with an average of 140 women killed annually often by intimate partners.
Women in the country were facing other instances of misogyny too as well as widespread harassment on public transport and systemic abuse within the military, the ministry lamented, besides regretting that Muslim women had also reported heightened safety concerns.
Additionally, the report noted, children’s rights were being compromised as a result of rising police violence and inadequate responses to child exploitation.
Around 87,000 cases of child sexual violence had been recorded across the country this year, and children reported feeling unsafe in public spaces, it said.
The ministry further decried the country’s continuing application of the Northern Ireland Troubles Act 2023 and the Overseas Operations Act 2021 that offered conditional immunity for military-related human rights violations such as the British army's alleged involvement in sexual violence in Kenya.
