vilification

• Civil society fights back as smears and vilification intensify

  By Andrew Firmin and Inés Pousadela

  The pattern is now clear. In country after country, those who seek to limit rights attack civil society. Alongside tactics such as censorship and misuse of the criminal justice system, a weapon in growing favour is smearing and vilification.

• Philippines: Indigenous rights activists at risk after being tagged as ‘terrorists’

  The government in the Philippines has officially labelled a number of local indigenous rights activists, as well as a United Nations Special Rapporteur, as “terrorists”.