Maldives: Civil Court supported the arbitrary de-registration of prominent NGO

Event
Country
  • Maldives
Initial Date
Mar 28, 2023
Event Description

On 28 March 2023, the Civil Court of Maldives ruled in favor of the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Community Empowerment (MoYSCE) upholding the decision to de-register the Maldivian Democracy Network (MDN) on 19 December 2019. MDN was arbitrarily de-registered in 2019 by the MoYSCE amid a violent smear campaign against the human rights organisation and its staff. Shahinda Ismail, woman human rights defender and Executive Director of MDN filed action before the Civil Court of Maldives challenging the arbitrary de-registration. The ruling of the Civil Court on 28 March 2023 is extremely concerning as it legitimises the arbitrary ban on MDN, and further states that the report published by MDN in 2015 that led in the ban, contained blasphemous content.

Impact of Event
1
Gender of HRD
  • Other (e.g. undefined, organisation, community)
Violation
  • Administrative Harassment
Rights Concerned
  • Freedom of assembly
  • Freedom of association
  • Right to work
HRD
  • NGO
Perpetrator-State
  • Government
  • Judiciary
Source

FLD

Monitoring Status
Pending
Event Location

Latitude: 4.4898799142296095

Longitude: 73.50215936997324

Event Location
Summary for Publications

On 28 March 2023, the Civil Court ruled in favour of the arbitrary de-registration of the Maldivian Democracy Network (MDN).

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