The Egyptian Religious Endowments Ministry suspended Sheikh Mahmoud Maghazi after he allegedly said, “Prayer is better than Facebook,” during a traditional Islamic prayer. The original line says, “Prayer is better than sleep.”
The rate of child-marriage in Islamic Bangladesh is accelerating, even though the primitive and damaging practice is technically illegal.
The Washington Post asked the United Nations to support its demand for the release of captive journalist Jason Rezaian, held prisoner for over a year by the Iranian regime on absurd charges of “espionage.” As Rezaian’s long, secret “trial” grinds on, several U.N. human-rights experts have expressed their concerns.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has released human rights activist Mazen Darwish “in a rare goodwill gesture” after holding him for three years. A verdict for his case should be released later this month.
Cecil, a 13-year-old lion that was, for many Zimbabweans, the sole source of pride in an otherwise hellish dictatorship, is dead. His death at the hands of an American dentist has done what the deaths of tens of thousands of Zimbabwean humans have failed to do since Robert Mugabe’s ascendance to head of state: get Americans to care about Zimbabwe.
Amnesty International has sparked a glitzy Hollywood backlash from its usual left wing fan-base by submitting a draft policy calling for prostitution to be legalised in order to promote the human rights of prostitutes. Hollywood actresses Lena Dunham, Emma Thompson, Kate
Human rights group are challenging President Barack Obama following his description of Ethiopia’s government as “democratically elected.”
Amnesty International’s latest report on Iran states the regime executed 694 people between January 1 and July 15. This means the country averages at least three executions a day.
Britain must outlaw parents smacking their children, a UN human rights report has demanded. The organisation’s human rights committee – which includes countries such as Egypt, Uganda and Algeria – urged the government to ban all forms of corporal punishment
To fund a nuclear program, North Korean President Kim Jong-un is sending slave laborers to countries around the world, including Russia. These slaves are worth almost $2 billion.
Police are swarming Scottish airports to protect females during the peak of “cutting season,” otherwise known as female genital mutilation (FGM). The airports provide direct flights to countries where the practice still occurs.
After a mass roundup of hundreds of human rights attorneys and employees at a human rights law firm, reports suggest at least six individuals are unaccounted for, believed to have been taken into Chinese police custody for interrogation and, some fear, torture.
The ANSWER Coalition, a well known far-left organization, is inviting Americans to join a “unique opportunity to travel to North Korea.” The group claims that the government-guided trip will show participants that “corporate-owned mainstream media” has “demonized” the country’s dictatorship, and that the United States of America should normalize relations with North Korea as it has done with Cuba.
The United Nations Security Council is expected to hold discussions on Israel before approving the nuclear deal between Iran and the P5+1 world powers (U.S., UK, Germany, France, China, and Russia).
As the world turns its attention to nuclear proliferation in Iran, North Korea is denying threats that it, too, is developing weapons of mass destruction.
BEIJING (AP) — China’s state media on Tuesday accused more than two dozen human rights lawyers rounded up in recent days of being troublemakers intent on illegal activism, as foreign governments and rights groups expressed growing concern over the crackdown.
Tenzin Delek Rinpoche, 65, a Tibetan monk and prominent political prisoner, died in Chinese captivity on Sunday. In 2002, he was arrested and imprisoned on a bombing charge his supporters claim was wrongful. The United States, European Union, and international human rights organizations all pushed for his release.
Moroccan officials arrested two women, ages 23 and 29, last month because they wore skirts. The arrests occurred after a market trader caused a ruckus over the outfits.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) reported the regime arrested or flogged at least 900 people for not fasting during Ramadan.
In a speech announcing the reestablishment of an American embassy in Havana, President Obama implored those in Congress who opposed his unilateral concessions to the communist Castro regime to “listen to the Cuban people” before taking a stance. Multiple reports citing Cuban nationals in Havana and throughout the island find that many are extremely apprehensive about the legitimacy a new embassy will give the Castro regime and are disappointed to see the United States support communist oppression.
President Obama has announced the reopening of the American Embassy in Havana this morning, following rumors that the United States had agreed to reestablish diplomatic relations with the communist dictatorship this month as part of the White House’s “normalization” program to reintegrate the Cuban regime into polite international society.
The annual State Department report on global human rights found 2014 to be a particularly dire year for individual rights, largely due to terrorist organizations like the Islamic State and Boko Haram. Atop the list of offenders, however, were also rogue states that President Obama has made the cornerstone of his diplomatic efforts: Iran and Cuba.
According to Anthony Lake, the executive director of The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), children in South Sudan face brutal violence in their everyday lives as the world’s newest country continues to fight a civil war.
New refugee laws in Turkey appear to give Syrians more rights, but they stop short of granting them full refugee status. Despite approval from the UN, Syrian refugees fleeing Bashar al-Assad and the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) still cannot find work or receive full residency in the NATO country.
Human rights advocacy NGO the Global Network for Rights and Development (GNRD) and its Palestinian-born president have been accused of handling stolen goods and money laundering. The organisation, which boasts over 100 staff, its own flag, and even “high commissions” in Africa, Asia,
The Pakistani government lifted its moratorium on the death penalty permanently in March, which led to more than 150 executions in the last six months. Pakistan now executes more people than Saudi Arabia, but it is important to note why.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, facing a tidal wave of international criticism over human rights violations and hunger strikes by his nation’s most famous prisoners of conscience, canceled a visit to the Vatican to meet with Pope Francis. Both dissidents and Vatican sources have told multiple Spanish newspapers that the cancelation, ostensibly due to a “cold,” actually occurred out of fear of being embarrassed on a public stage.
The Saudi Arabian Cultural Mission (SACM) held its annual celebration and job fair last month just outside Washington, D.C. The four-day event begun on May 22 was “designed to reward the graduates on the King Abdullah Scholarship Program (KASP) with the chance to both celebrate their success with their colleagues as well as search for jobs and meet top executives from leading companies and universities in Saudi Arabia.”
Christof Heyns, the United Nations Special Raporteur of Extrajudicial Summary and Arbitrary Executions, recently spoke out against the rise in executions in Saudi Arabia. “It is certainly very disturbing that there is such a fast pace of executions at the moment,” Heyns told AFP. “If it continues at this pace we will have double the number of executions, or more than double the number of executions, that we had last year.”
Venezuela is collapsing rapidly before the eyes of Latin America, with most of the region standing idly by. This exposes isolationism by countries throughout the Western Hemisphere, and exemplifies how the lack of engagement within the region is now confronted with a regional bloc that will not let it engage even if it wants to.
On May 13, dozens of members of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on the U.S. side of the Santa Fe Street border bridge in El Paso, Texas were handing out pamphlets to people they refer to as “international commuters” from Mexico, listing their rights under American law.
Following the Obama administration’s craven presentation of America’s–largely imaginary–human rights shortcomings to the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) Monday, the member states took their turns to add to the criticism. In many cases, the countries piling on were dictatorships that murder and persecute their own citizens with absolute impunity.
The Obama administration has, once again, complained to the United Nations about alleged American human rights violations–and boasted about liberal policies like Obamacare as the solution. The State Department report, released Monday as part of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) at the UN Human Rights Council, reads less like an accounting of human rights issues and more like the platform of the Democratic Party–and invites the world to judge America harshly.
Gunmen shot Sabeen Mahmud, a leading Pakistani human rights activist, to death outside of the headquarters of The Second Floor, known as T2F, an arts venue she founded.
Saudi Arabia has now committed acts worse than those promulgated by the “Zionist regime” (Israel), Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani, who is Chief Justice of the Iranian regime’s Judiciary body, announced Wednesday, according to a report by Iran’s state-controlled Mehr News Agency.
Big government always makes absurd decisions, as mandarins are forced to shoehorn real life into their regulations. But two immigration rulings made within the last few days exemplify everything that is wrong with the immigration system in this country today. Both
The National Council of Resistance in Iran, an opposition group, reported this week that the Islamic republic has executed 65 people in one week, putting them on pace to set a new record in 2015.
The Christian population of Turkey is evaporating rapidly. The nation, a NATO member since 1952, has experienced a reduction in its Christian population from 20% 100 years ago to only 0.2% today. The latest blow in the community occurred at the Hagia Sophia during Easter holy week.
It apparently took the Chinese Communist government a while to decide how to handle Gao Yu, a 71-year-old journalist prosecuted on what her supporters describe as trumped-up charges for “leaking state secrets.” After five months of deliberation, a court sentenced her to seven years in prison on Friday.
The State Department announced this week that it has received a guarantee from the Cuban government to enter a bilateral dialogue to discuss the extradition of American fugitives out of Cuba to serve their criminal sentences, as well as dialogue with Spain regarding Cuba providing safe haven to members of the Basque terrorist group ETA. The Cuban government has yet to publicly comment on the State Department’s claims.
