Human Rights

2021: a grim year for Free Speech as hundreds of Journalists are arrested in an increasingly authoritarian World

By Dina Matar | – Hundreds of journalists killed or arrested, rising numbers of female media workers targeted, floods of misinformation and hate speech and ineffectual or hostile governments unable or unwilling to protect the public’s right to know. The 2021 press freedom index released recently by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) makes for grim reading. […]

Dissent

US-Backed Al-Sisi’s Gov’t in Egypt Unjustly Sentences Dissidents to Years in Prison for “Spreading False News”

Human Rights Watch

( Human Rights Watch – An emergency court sentenced Alaa Abd al Fattah to five years in prison, and Mohamed al-Baqer and Mohamed “Oxygen” Ibrahim to four years each on charges of “spreading false news.” “The egregious miscarriage of justice handed down by this exceptional court to punish peaceful expression reveals how Egypt’s justice system […]

Human Rights

Abusive and Discriminatory Policing by Israel of Palestinian-Israelis in Lod During May Hostilities

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch – (Jerusalem) – Israeli law enforcement agencies used excessive force to disperse peaceful protests by Palestinians in Lod (al-Lydd) during civil unrest in the city in May 2021, Human Rights Watch said today. At times the police appeared to act half-heartedly and unevenly to violence against Palestinian citizens of Israel committed by […]

Afghanistan

Afghanistan: heroin and human trafficking are the only two sectors of the economy still thriving

The Conversation

By Jonathan Goodhand and Jan Koehler | – In the frontier town of Zaranj on Afghanistan’s border with Iran, young men jostle one another as they cram into pickups that leave at regular intervals to be smuggled across the border. Human trafficking is one of the few sectors of the Afghan economy that is thriving. […]

Bangladesh

The perils of the digital age: How Facebook failed to protect Persecuted Rohingya Muslims

Middle East Monitor

By Elif Selin Calik | – ( Middle East Monitor ) – Rohingya refugees and victims are suing Facebook for $150 billion. They allege that Facebook played a key role in the brutal crackdown against Muslims in Myanmar by promoting anti-Rohingya posts. This online hate turned into real-world violence, according to the lawsuit. As stated […]

censorship

Justice: French arrest Man they believe to be Top Saudi Assassin of Journalist Jamal Khashoggi

Juan Cole

Update: French authorities have released the individual they apprehended on Tuesday. Read on for the significance of this attempted arrest of al-Otaibi. Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Rick Noack and Sarah Dadouch at The Washington Post report that French authorities arrested a Saudi man they believe to be Khalid Aedh al-Otaibi, a member of the […]

censorship

Yemeni journalist accused of spreading atheism is jailed for 15 years in Saudi Arabia

Brian Whitaker

( Al-Bab.com) – A Yemeni journalist has become the latest victim of Saudi Arabia’s laws against religious disbelief. Thirty-year-old Ali Muhsin Abu Lahoum worked in Sana’a for the Yemen Times before moving to Saudi Arabia in 2015 and taking up a job with a TV station. More recently he is said to have been working […]

Displaced and Refugees

Urgent UN Action needed on Yemen Atrocities to end “Pandemic of Impunity”

Human Rights Watch

Human rights Watch – (New York) – The United Nations General Assembly should act swiftly to establish an investigative mechanism to gather and preserve evidence of serious human rights abuses and violations of the laws of war in Yemen, a coalition of more than 60 organizations said. Failure to act would not only be a […]

Displaced and Refugees

Channel deaths of Middle Easterners: the UK has clear legal responsibilities towards people crossing in small boats

The Conversation

By Mariagiulia Giuffré | – At least 27 people have drowned in the English Channel attempting to cross in a small boat. There were three children, seven women, one of whom was pregnant, and 17 men. Although a joint search and rescue operation was seemingly launched in the narrow maritime area between the UK and […]