Human Rights

( 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 […]

censorship

Apple Sues Israeli gov’t-backed NSO Spyware Company: “Notorious Hackers – Amoral 21st C. Mercenaries”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Apple is suing the NSO group, which produced the spyware that Israel uses to keep under surveillance the 5 million Palestinians it holds in thrall to its Occupation. The NSO group is believed to be close to the Israeli state. They have sold their hacking tools to repressive governments around […]

Authoritarianism

For First Time, US joins Brazil and India as “Backsliding Democracy”: GOP is making US a Third World Country

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Sweden’s International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance finds this year that the United States of America has joined the ranks of “backsliding democracies,” joining India, Brazil, Hungary, Poland and Slovenia. The IDEA institute notes, “Democratic backsliding, namely the sustained and deliberate process of subversion of basic democratic tenets by […]

censorship

Turkish Online Censorship Ramps up, Targeting Sites Critical of the Government or the President

Global Voices

By Arzu Geybullayeva | – ( Globalvoices.org) – Written in 1953, the dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury is about a future where books are burned in an oppressive society. A new report titled Fahrenheit 5651: The Scorching Effect of Censorship, uses the well-known book to explain how a series of amendments made to […]

Entertainment

Justin Bieber and Others Should Speak Out on Human Rights at Saudi Arabia’s Grand Prix

Human Rights Watch

Jason Derulo, A$AP Rocky Also Among Celebrities Slated to Perform

Corruption

All Trump’s Cover-Ups: From Syria Airstrike on Civilians to US COVID Genocide

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The US Founding Fathers had a cynical side. They did not think people in government could be trusted to do the right thing. They thought people often do what they can get away with. The point of James Madison’s checks and balances was not just to guard against tyranny but […]

Death Penalty

Letter to President Biden on Failures of Administration’s Human Rights Policy Toward the Middle East

Human Rights Watch

By Kenneth Roth | Executive Director | – President Joseph R. Biden 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500 RE: US Policy Toward the Middle East Dear President Biden, When you were elected last year, we urged your incoming administration to strive to be a leader in human rights and made a series of recommendations […]