Publication Feb 15, 2018 Navalny Website Blocked In Russia Over ‘Rybkagate’ Report (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) – Internet service providers in Russia began blocking access to opposition politician Aleksei Navalny’s website on February 15 following an order from the country’s communications regulator,…
Press Release Feb 12, 2018 HRF Mourns the Passing of Leading Pakistani Lawyer Asma Jahangir NEW YORK (February 12, 2018) — The Human Rights Foundation (HRF) mourns the passing of Asma Jahangir, a leading Pakistani lawyer who dedicated her career to defending the rights of…
Publication Feb 7, 2018 Tajik Election Law Changes Seen Favoring President’s Son (Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty) – The lower chamber of Tajikistan’s parliament has approved amendments to the laws on presidential and parliamentary elections — lowering the eligibility age from 35…
Publication Feb 6, 2018 Azerbaijani Opposition Coalition To Boycott Early Election (Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty) – The head of Azerbaijan’s opposition National Council of Democratic Forces says the coalition will boycott an early presidential election that has been scheduled for…
Publication Feb 5, 2018 Azerbaijan Schedules Snap Presidential Election In April (Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty) – Long-ruling President Ilham Aliyev has brought the date of Azerbaijan’s presidential election forward by more than six months, to April 11, in a move…
Media Feb 1, 2018 Asia does not have a single ‘fully democratic’ state In the latest edition of The Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2017 Democracy Index, there are 19 “fully democratic” countries in the world. None of them are located in Asia. At best,…
Media Jan 30, 2018 European Court Says Russia Violated Rights Of Bolotnaya Protesters (Radio Free Europe) – The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that Russia violated the rights of three men who were jailed in connection with a protest on…
Media Jan 23, 2018 Sweden Wants Answers About Its Seized Citizen. China Isn’t Giving Any. BEIJING — China on Tuesday publicly rebuffed demands by Sweden for information on the fate of a Swedish citizen who was snatched off a train in China by plainclothes officers…
Media Jan 23, 2018 Chechnya’s Dictator, Recently Hit With US Sanctions, Blames NGOs (Gizmodo) – The leader of the Russian republic of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, was recently hit with US sanctions over human rights abuses such as his government’s torture and “purge” of…
Media Jan 22, 2018 Russian Court Closes Foundation of Kremlin Critic Aleksei Navalny A Moscow court on Monday ordered the closing of a foundation supporting the activities of Aleksei A. Navalny, the country’s leading opposition politician, moving quickly in a case filed only this month by the Justice Ministry.
Media Jan 17, 2018 Russian human rights group has offices torched after leader’s arrest (The Guardian) – Masked men have torched the offices of a prominent human rights organisation in Ingushetia in southern Russia, days after the head of its operations in neighbouring Chechnya…
News Jan 12, 2018 Azerbaijani Journalist Gets Six-Year Sentence (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) – A court in Azerbaijan has sentenced journalist Afqan Muxtarli to six years in prison after convicting him of smuggling and other crimes in a politically…
News Jan 11, 2018 Turkey’s top court rules that two jailed journalists be released (Reuters) – Turkey’s Constitutional Court ruled on Thursday that jailed journalists Mehmet Altan and Sahin Alpay be released, saying their rights have been violated, broadcaster CNN Turk reported. There was…
News Jan 10, 2018 Rights Groups Condemn Chechnya Activist’s ‘Abduction’ (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) – Human rights groups in Russia and abroad are condemning the detention of a leading activist in Chechnya on a narcotics charge they contend was fabricated,…
News Jan 9, 2018 Turkmenistan dictator bans black cars because he likes white ones (Times of Malta) – Gurbanguly Berdimukhamedow, the dictator of the oppressive central Asian nation, has decided to ban black cars from the capital city Ashgabat.
News Jan 8, 2018 Hungary fines main opposition party over billboards (Reuters) – Hungary’s State Audit Office (ASZ) has fined the main, nationalist opposition party Jobbik 331.66 million forints ($1.29 million) for an anti-government billboard campaign funded by a wealthy adversary of Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
News Jan 5, 2018 Kyrgyz Opposition Politician Jailed For Corruption (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) – A court in Bishkek has sentenced Kyrgyz opposition politician Kanatbek Isaev to 12 years in prison on corruption charges.
Press Release Jan 4, 2018 UNWGAD Affirms HRF Petition on Detention of 18 Turkmen NEW YORK (January 4, 2018) — Last Friday, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (UNWGAD) published a decision calling for the immediate release of 18 Turkmen individuals who were arrested for exercising their freedom of association in the fall of 2016.
News Dec 19, 2017 Uzbekistan Forces State Workers to Subscribe to State-Run Newspapers (Radio Free Europe) – In Uzbekistan, where media has remained tightly controlled by the government even decades after the breakup of the Soviet Union, public-sector workers say they still don’t have the freedom to choose whether to subscribe to state-run newspapers.
News Dec 7, 2017 Hungary’s Jobbik party says fine risks making it insolvent (Reuters) –Hungary’s main opposition party would be unable to compete at an election next April if state auditors impose a heavy fine in a campaign finance case, a vice chairman for the nationalist Jobbik party told Reuters on Thursday.
