The Role of NGOs in the International Human Rights System: A Case Study—IJM in Thailand

International human rights have been codified in a number of declarations and conventions, but these rights are not always enforced. This paper will examine the right to citizenship and the other essential rights linked to it. When national governments are unable or refuse to grant citizenship to a group of people it results in a violation of international human rights norms. Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) play a key role in enforcing human rights standards in three ways: first, NGOs with lawyers on staff can work through national legal systems to ensure that rights, such as citizenship, are granted. Second, NGOs can bring human rights violations to the attention of the general public in order to pressure national governments to take action. Third, the human rights violations can be brought to the attention of international organizations such as the UN to put pressure on the offending nation. This paper will explore how International Justice Mission implemented all three of these measures in order to influence the Thai government to grant citizenship to the Karen people, a hill tribe in northern Thailand. International Justice Mission’s efforts were successful in bringing international attention to the plight of the Karen as well as navigating the Thai legal system to assist in the citizenship process

SMA CO(2-1) Observations of CG30: A Protostellar Binary System with a High-Velocity Quadrupolar Molecular Outflow

We present interferometric observations in the 12CO (2-1) line and at 1.3 mm dust continuum of the low-mass protostellar binary system in the cometary globule CG30, using the Submillimeter Array. The dust continuum images resolve two compact sources (CG30N and CG30S), with a linear separation of ~8700 AU and total gas masses of ~1.4 and ~0.6 M_sun, respectively. With the CO images, we discover two high-velocity bipolar molecular outflows, driven by the two sources. The two outflows are nearly perpendicular to each other, showing a quadrupolar morphology. The northern bipolar outflow extends along the southeast (redshifted, with a velocity up to ~23 km/s) and northwest (blueshifted, velocity up to ~30 km/s) directions, while the southern pair has an orientation from southwest (blueshifted, velocity up to 13 km/s) to northeast (redshifted, velocity up to ~41 km/s). The outflow mass of the northern pair, driven by the higher mass source CG30N, is ~9 times larger than that of the southern pair. The discovery of the quadrupolar molecular outflow in the CG30 protobinary system, as well as the presence of other quadrupolar outflows associated with binary systems, demonstrate that the disks in (wide) binary systems are not necessarily co-aligned after fragmentation.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures, to be published by ApJL in October 200

The Spitzer c2d Survey Of Nearby Dense Cores. VII. Chemistry And Dynamics In L43

We present results from the Spitzer Space Telescope and molecular line observations of nine species toward the dark cloud L43. The Spitzer images and molecular line maps suggest that it has a starless core and a Class I protostar evolving in the same environment. CO depletion is seen in both sources, and DCO(+) lines are stronger toward the starless core. With a goal of testing the chemical characteristics from pre- to protostellar stages, we adopt an evolutionary chemical model to calculate the molecular abundances and compare with our observations. Among the different model parameters we tested, the best-fit model suggests a longer total timescale at the pre-protostellar stage, but with faster evolution at the later steps with higher densities.NSF AST-0307250, AST0607793NASA NNX07AJ72GNational Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) government (MEST) 2009-0062865KOSEF R012007- 000-20336-0Astronom

IRAS 11590-6452 in BHR 71 - a binary protostellar system?

New AAT near-infrared and SEST 12CO J=2-1 observations are combined with existing ISO mid-infrared and ATCA cm radio continuum observations to examine the protostellar content of the Bok globule BHR 71. Together with observations of Herbig-Haro objects, these data show: (1) Two protostellar sources, IRS1 and IRS2, with a separation of ~17 arcsec (3400 AU) are located within BHR 71. (2) Each protostar is driving its own molecular outflow. The outflow from IRS1 is much larger in extent, is more massive, and dominates the CO emission. (3) Both protostars are associated with Herbig-Haro objects and shock excited 2.122 micron H2 v=1-0S(1) emission, which coincide spatially with their CO outflows. (4) IRS1 is associated with cm continuum emission, with a flat or rising spectrum which is consistent with free-free emission, a signpost of protostellar origin.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures (colour), accepted by ApJ Letters. See also http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~bourke