Africa rights panel to review Zimbabwe situation News
Africa rights panel to review Zimbabwe situation

[JURIST] The African Commission on Human and People's Rights [official website] will review alleged human rights violations committed by Zimbabwe [JURIST news archive] after African non-governmental organizations placed the issue on the agenda of ACHPR's 41st session, which began Wednesday. In an interview [recorded audio] with VOA News, Wilbert Mandinde, legal advisor to the Zimbabwe Chapter of the Media Institute of Southern Africa [advocacy website], said that the number of human rights abuses in the country has increased and called upon the commission to act. Zimbabwe Ambassador to the United Nations Boniface Chidyausiku, however, told [recorded audio] VOA News that the organizations are exaggerating the situation and misrepresenting facts.

The Pan-African Parliament (PAP) [official website] voted [press release] last week to send a fact-finding mission to Zimbabwe to investigate allegations of ongoing human rights abuses. Zimbabwe's PAP delegate expressed outrage [JURIST report] over the decision, asserting that there were more pressing issues that the PAP should be dealing with. VOA News has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

US Supreme Court ruled Indians not US citizens

On November 3, 1884, the US Supreme Court ruled in Elk v. Wilkins that John Elk, an American Indian who had tried to vote in a federal election in Omaha, Nebraska, was not a US citizen entitled to the protection of the 14th and 15th Amendments of the US Constitution. Native Americans became eligible for citizenship in 1887 under the Dawes Act, but only in 1924, under the Indian Citizenship Act, were all Native Americans born in the US made citizens.

Last public execution at Tyburn Gallows in London

On November 3, 1783, the last public execution took place at Tyburn Gallows in London, when John Austin was hanged for highway robbery. From the hanging of William Fitz Osburn in 1196 until Austin's execution, Tyburn served as London's primary location for public executions.

Learn more about the trial of John Austin.