Publication Mar 22, 2018 China Sets up State Monitoring Agency With Sweeping Powers to Detain (RFA) – The law passed by the National People’s Congress (NPC) will set up nationwide supervisory commissions to monitor the conduct of staff in the ruling Chinese Communist Party, People’s…
Publication Mar 21, 2018 Chinese Dissident, Official Trade Barbs at UN Rights Body GENEVA — A Chinese diplomat repeatedly interrupted a speech by a prominent Chinese dissident to block him from addressing the U.N. Human Rights Council, a failed attempt that bared China’s…
Publication Mar 20, 2018 U.N. calls for Turkey to end state of emergency, halt violations (Reuters)–The United Nations called on Turkey on Tuesday to end its 20-month-old state of emergency and accused Ankara of mass arrests, arbitrary sackings and other abuses that in some cases…
Publication Mar 20, 2018 European Rights Court condemns Turkey over journalist jailings (Deutsche Welle) – The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled on Tuesday that Turkey had acted illegally in detaining two journalists despite the Supreme Court issuing an order for…
Publication Mar 20, 2018 Telegram Loses Bid to Stop Russia From Getting Encryption Keys (Bloomberg) – Telegram, the encrypted messaging app that’s prized by those seeking privacy, lost a bid before Russia’s Supreme Court to block security services from getting access to users’ data,…
Publication Mar 20, 2018 Putin Rigs Another Presidential Election NEW YORK (March 19, 2018) — On Sunday, March 18, Russian president Vladimir Putin secured a fourth presidential term in a rigged election that was neither free nor fair. The…
Publication Mar 19, 2018 Sisi’s only challenger lays low ahead of Egyptian election (Reuters) – Days ahead of Egypt’s presidential election, Moussa Mostafa Moussa, the only candidate standing against incumbent Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, is avoiding the limelight. Moussa’s presidential bid seemed to come…
Publication Mar 13, 2018 ‘Freedom!’: the movement that brought Ethiopia to a standstill (The Guardian) – Today, Desalegn is a banker. But once he was a Qeerroo: a young, energetic and unmarried man from Ethiopia’s largest ethnic group, the Oromo, bound by what…
Publication Mar 12, 2018 Russia tries to entice voters to polls to prop up Putin’s legitimacy In the Siberian region of Krasnoyarsk, political activists are raffling a car, while in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar, the prize is an iPhone X. In Berdsk, the best…
Publication Mar 12, 2018 In Egypt, a strongman’s only challenger is barely campaigning (The Washington Post) –The election billboards of President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi are everywhere in this bustling capital. They read: “Yalla Sissi” — “Go Sissi” in Arabic — urging him on…
Publication Mar 9, 2018 Turkey’s highest court rules Dundar should get stiffer sentence (Reuters)–Turkey’s highest court overruled a five-year jail sentence against prominent journalist Can Dundar on Friday, saying he should face up to 20 years in prison on espionage charges, the state-run…
Publication Mar 8, 2018 Congo presidential election on course for December (Reuters) – An election in the Democratic Republic of Congo to replace President Joseph Kabila remains on course for late December, the central African country’s Prime Minister, Bruno Tshibala, has…
Publication Mar 8, 2018 Egyptian prosecutors seek death sentence for photographer Shawkan (IFEX) –Prosecutors have requested a death sentence for Mahmoud Abou Zeid, an Egyptian photojournalist known as Shawkan who has been held for four and a half years. Reporters Without Borders…
Publication Mar 6, 2018 ‘Oh My God’ Turns to ‘Yay Me’ as Saudi Women Practice Driving (The New York Times)–“O.K. Come drive now,” said the trainer. “Oh my God,” the architecture student replied. She climbed into the driver’s seat, put on her seatbelt, found the pedals,…
Publication Mar 5, 2018 Protests as Myanmar parliament debates new curbs on demonstrations (Reuters)– Hundreds of people marched through Myanmar’s largest city Yangon on Monday to oppose changes to a protest law being discussed in parliament which activists warn would limit free speech….
Publication Mar 5, 2018 Russians forced to attend Putin’s star-studded election rally Vladimir Putin, flanked by cheering supporters, strode on to a stage in the centre of Moscow’s colossal Luzhniki Stadium and urged a crowd of tens of thousands of flag-waving Russians…
Publication Mar 5, 2018 UN begins aid distribution in Syria’s Ghouta area amid shelling (The Washington Post) – A United Nations convoy carrying lifesaving assistance entered the besieged Syrian enclave of Eastern Ghouta on Monday, reaching civilians for the first time in weeks amid…
Publication Mar 2, 2018 Egypt’s Sherine sentenced to prison over Nile joke (BBC) – Egyptian singer Sherine Abdel Wahab has been sentenced to six months in prison for joking about the cleanliness of the River Nile. Sherine, one of the country’s most…
Publication Mar 1, 2018 Can Venezuela Be Saved? There’s a page in a book in a stack on the floor at the house of Leopoldo López that I think about sometimes. It’s a page that López revisits often;…
Publication Feb 28, 2018 Report: China Bans Letter ‘N’ From the Internet to Stop Xi Dissent (Daily Beast) – You can’t spell dissent without an N—and that was literally the case in China, which temporarily banned the letter from internet searches in a mysterious move to…
