repression

Nicaragua’s brutal socialist dictator Daniel Ortega hosted a meeting on Wednesday with Gen. Nikolai Patrushev, secretary of Russia’s Security Council, and several other high-ranking Russian security officials. 

A group of former Cuban military officials who defected from the communist regime called on active servicemen and other agents of the state to refuse to follow orders to repress their countrymen, the Cuban independent outlet 14 y Medio reported on Monday following violent attacks on unarmed civilians this weekend in Camagüey.

Kazakhstan’s fuel riots escalated dramatically on Wednesday, as dozens of police and protesters were killed in street battles across western Kazakhstan and Almaty, the nation’s largest city. Russian state media claimed one of the 12 law enforcement officers killed was beheaded. In response, Russian President Vladimir Putin sent paratroopers into Kazakhstan on Thursday to restore order.

Authorities in Hong Kong arrested the pro-democracy campaigner Joshua Wong on charges of “unauthorized assembly” during last year’s anti-China protest movement, those close to him announced on Thursday. 

Chinese state media debuted a propaganda film Thursday justifying imprisoning Muslims in concentration camps, describing it as a “rare documentary reveal[ing] counter-terrorism perseverance” across western Xinjiang province.

Police in Zimbabwe arrested a ten-month-old girl and her mother for “disorderly conduct” on Wednesday amid a brutal crackdown on opposition party members in the capital of Harare.

Canada’s Globe and Mail on Monday reported the Chinese government is staging Muslim prayer services and scenes of contented street life in Xinjiang province for the benefit of foreign visitors, when in truth the oppressed Uyghur population has been frightened out of worship and public assembly.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has accused President Donald Trump and his administration of failing to take any “meaningful” action against China over its repression of the country’s Uyghur Muslim minority.

“Global indifference” to human rights violations across the Middle East has allowed repressive regimes to get away with crimes that they would not elsewhere, according to the latest report by Amnesty International.

Police in Chechnya, a majority-Muslim region of Russia, have relaunched a campaign to arrest suspected gay and lesbian Russians, killing two and arresting over 40 others in the past month according to a report published Monday.

Police arrested a popular Chinese blogger this weekend for “insulting” the country’s national anthem with an insufficiently melodious performance of it, authorities in Shanghai confirmed.

Beijing is using its embassies and consulates to export repression targeting members of China’s predominantly Muslim Uighur minority group abroad, including the United States, a human rights activist told American lawmakers on Wednesday.

A Scottish man holidaying in Dubai is facing up to three years in jail for allegedly putting his hand on another man’s hip to avoid spilling his drink.

The Kurds are a major factor in the uneasy politics of Turkey and Iraq, and they have been holding the front lines against ISIS in Syria. There are Kurds in Iran, too, and they are nervous about the end of sanctions against Tehran, fearing the mullahs will use their increased wealth and power to further oppress the Kurdish minority.

China recently implemented legal sanctions for spreading false information about terrorist threats (or, really, disagreeing with the official narrative about terrorism in any way.)

With Venezuela stirring from the death of 14-year-old Kluiverth Roa at the hands of the Bolivarian National Guard, a human rights organization notes that police homicide of minors increased 55.5% in 2014, and appears to continue to be on the rise.

14-year-old Kluiverth Roa was shot in the head on Tuesday on his way home from school in San Cristóbal, Venezuela. Roa’s way home from school required him to pass through an anti-socialist protest; he was stopped by police almost immediately and shot in the head after witnesses say he yelled “stop the repression!”