The 2023 edition of Freedom in the World from Freedom House reports: The global struggle for democracy approached a possible turning point in 2022. The gap between the number of countries that registered overall improvements in political rights and civil liberties and those that registered overall declines was the narrowest it has ever been through… Read More »
Shutterstock By Shireen Daft, Macquarie University Recent media attention has drawn global focus on an escalating number of Iranian schoolgirls falling ill over the past few months because of suspected chemical attacks. Accounts differ, but many reports cite more than 1,000 cases of poisoning at schools across Iran. At least 58 schools in ten provinces… Read More »
Erin Clare Brown reports: After a fortnight of political arrests and detentions, Tunisia’s president, Kais Saied, has now unleashed a racist campaign targeting Black migrants in his country, with conspiracies that echo the “great replacement theory” and police raids in popular quarters across the country where many migrant workers live. In an address to his… Read More »
RFE/RL reports: The United Nations Human Rights Council has kicked off a new session in Geneva with sharp criticism of Russia for its full-scale invasion on Ukraine. Speaking on February 27 at the opening of the session, which runs until April 4, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said nearly 100 million people were forced to flee… Read More »
The New York Times reports: An engineer strode onstage at an event in Tehran, wearing tight pants and a stylish shirt, and clutching a microphone in one hand. Her long brown hair, tied in a ponytail, swung freely behind her, uncovered, in open defiance of Iran’s strict hijab law. “I am Zeinab Kazempour,” she told… Read More »
Rebecca Solnit writes: As the Russian invasion of Ukraine unfolded, I was reminded over and over again of the behaviour of abusive ex-husbands and boyfriends. At first he thinks that he can simply bully her into returning. When it turns out she has no desire to return, he shifts to vengeance. Putin insisted that Ukraine… Read More »
The New York Times reports: It was almost midnight in Grand Rapids, Mich., but inside the factory everything was bright. A conveyor belt carried bags of Cheerios past a cluster of young workers. One was 15-year-old Carolina Yoc, who came to the United States on her own last year to live with a relative she… Read More »
The New York Times reports: One day in November 2015, Saad Almadi typed out a 14-word post on Twitter about Saudi Arabia’s deputy crown prince. “Mohammed bin Salman has taken over the economy, defense and everything under the king,” he wrote, replying to a professor who is a fierce critic of the kingdom’s monarchy. A… Read More »
An editorial in the Washington Post says: On Feb. 27, 2022, Danuta Perednya, a 21-year old university student, reposted a message on the social media app Telegram criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko for the war in Ukraine. On Dec. 28, 2020, a young Saudi woman, Salma al-Shehab, tweeted an appeal… Read More »
Simon Tisdall writes: To drive into the heart of West Berlin on a dark, snowy night in December 1988 was to descend on to the cinematic frontline of the cold war. Watchtowers manned by armed East German border guards, searchlights, barbed wire, the blackened facade of the gutted Reichstag by the frozen River Spree –… Read More »
Jamelle Bouie writes: Over the past year, we have seen a sweeping and ferocious attack on the rights and dignity of transgender people across the country. In states led by Republicans, conservative lawmakers have introduced or passed dozens of laws that would give religious exemptions for discrimination against transgender people, prohibit the use of bathrooms… Read More »
The Moscow Times reports: Bulgarian investigative journalist and director of the Bellingcat investigative reporting group Christo Grozev is being forced to relocate from Austria, his home of nearly 20 years, due to the alleged threat posed to him by the Russian security services, the Viennese daily Falter reported on Wednesday. “I suspect that there are… Read More »
The Washington Post reports: Louisiana correction authorities routinely confine thousands of inmates beyond their release dates each year, in violation of the Constitution and wasting taxpayer funds, the U.S. Justice Department said Wednesday. Overdetention is not unheard of in other states, nor in federal facilities, but the scale of Louisana’s actions — which the Justice… Read More »
In response to comments reportedly made by Mike Pompeo in his new memoir, Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN) issued the following statement: “Pompeo’s crass and craven comments appearing to justify Jamal Khashoggi’s murder by disparaging his political views and falsely associating them with terrorism mirror the same justifications Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and… Read More »
The Guardian reports: A prominent pro-reform law professor in Saudi Arabia is facing the death penalty for alleged crimes including having a Twitter account and using WhatsApp to share news considered “hostile” to the kingdom, according to court documents seen by the Guardian. The arrest of Awad Al-Qarni, 65, in September 2017 represented the start… Read More »
Wired reports: Last month, a young woman went to work at Sarzamineh Shadi, or Land of Happiness, an indoor amusement park east of Iran’s capital, Tehran. After a photo of her without a hijab circulated on social media, the amusement park was closed, according to multiple accounts in Iranian media. Prosecutors in Tehran have reportedly… Read More »