23 May 2024
Nigeria as a Safe Country of Origin?
On May 7th 2024 Italy updated its list of safe countries of origin (SCO) for the second time after the introduction of the notion in the national legal system in 2019. Notably, the latest update retained the most contentious addition to the list from last year, Nigeria. Until then, only Cyprus considered Nigeria as generally safe. The legal issues underlying this designation illustrate how country of origin information (COI), largely provided to Member States by the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA), is (mis)used to produce policy-based evidence rather than evidence-based policies. Continue reading >>
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13 May 2023
Restitution, light?
Wieder einmal wird über die sogenannten Benin-Bronzen debattiert. Die problematische Herkunft der in einem kolonialen Raubzug erbeuteten Kunstartefakte und die Frage ihrer Restitution sorgten bereits in der Vergangenheit für Diskussionen. Als die Bundesregierung letztes Jahr schließlich die ersten Bronzen an den nigerianischen Staat übergab, schien die Auseinandersetzung beendet. Happy End für alle: Die Deutschen wagen einen Schritt Richtung kolonialer Wiedergutmachung und die Nigerianer erhalten wertvolles Kulturerbe zurück. Nun aber bekommt das Bild der Win-Win-Situation Risse. Continue reading >>28 November 2022
Inequality of Harms, Inequality of Arms
On November 8th 2022 Channa Samkalden, lawyer for Esther Kiobel and three other widows of executed Nigerian community leaders, announced that her clients would be ending their lawsuit against Shell. Uncertainty about the outcome, combined with the fact that the case had already been (unsuccessfully) going on for over 20 years in multiple fora, had made the four widows decide to withdraw the appeal, “not without disappointment and frustration”. In this blog, I discuss this case's remarkable procedural history and why it, set against the particular facts of the case, illustrates the fundamental procedural unfairness between large corporations and victims trying to hold them to account. Continue reading >>
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21 May 2022
Enabling Digital Authoritarianism in the Name of Counterterrorism
Nigeria's transition to a digital economy is in full swing. As terrorism and violent extremism are ravaging certain parts of the country, the mounting insecurity has necessitated huge budgetary allocations to national security, giving way to a new kind of digital authoritarianism. Serious concerns have been raised regarding the misuse of collected data and arbitrary surveillance, which undermine human rights and civic freedoms. Continue reading >>
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