Latest

Last week 7 journalists were detained in the semi-autonomous republic of Somaliland. On 14 January the police stormed the headquarters of a private TV network and sealed the offices. As a result, on 15 January Somaliland journalists gathered peacefully in front of the Presidential Palace to demonstrate against the media crackdown. The police disrupted the demonstration, 22 journalists were taken into custody.

The Writers in Prison Committee (WiPC) of PEN International is appalled by the killing of Raúl Régulo Garza Quirino, reporter for the weekly newspaper La Ultima Palabra. The journalist was gunned down on 6 January 2012 by a gang in Cadereyta, state of Nuevo León, and is the first journalist in Mexico to be murdered in 2012. The WiPC calls on the Mexican authorities to carry out a thorough investigation into Garza’s killing and to bring to an end Mexico’s climate of impunity in which attacks such as these take place

On 10 January another complaint from Belarus was submitted to the UN Human Rights Committee. However, for the first time a Belarusian complains about forced fingerprinting.

In December 2011 the Circuit Court in Świdnica heard the appeal in the case of an allegedly defamatory statement included in a reader’s article sent to a newspaper. The Court reversed the judgement entered by the District (first-instance) Court in September 2011 and remanded the case for retrial. The District Court will be hearing the case for the third time.

The Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights is concerned by the information about actions taken by the Military Circuit Prosecution Office in Poznań who requested the disclosure of the phone data of three journalists of national media investigating the crash of the presidential plane near Smolensk, Russia.

Чарговая скарга з Беларусі накіравана 10 студзеня ў Камітэт ААН па правах чалавека. Але ўпершыню беларус скардзіцца на прымусовую дактыласкапію.

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and association request non-governmental organizations to submit information for his new report.

The 20 year old Azerbaijani activist Jabbar Savalanli, arrested last February, was pardoned late December 2011. But still more than 15 demonstrators from last years mass rallies in Baku remain imprisoned.

During the year of 2011 Georgian Parliament adopted approximately 400 legislative amendments. Following laws have been adopted: Law on Assemblies and Manifestations, Code of Imprisonment, Law on Personal Data, Law on Operative-Investigative Activity, etc. The last amendments were done at the special session on December 28 where Georgian parliament adopted several laws among them are Organic Law on Political Unions of Citizens and Law of Georgia on Personal Data Protection.

Объявляется набор для участия в программе дистанционного обучения адвокатов и юристов международному праву прав человека. Отбор участников производится на конкурсной основе.

Two Chinese dissident writers Chen Xi and Chen Wei were sentenced to ten and nine years in prison for «inciting subversion of state power» in essays published on Chinese websites overseas.

Belarusian Human Rights House (Lithuania) in conjunction with the Human Rights Centre “Viasna” (Belarus) and the Civil Company “Our House” (Belarus) invites to the presentation of the book, calendar, children’s colouring book, postcards, and a number of video clips dedicated to the participants of 2010 Ploshcha – a peaceful protest that took place in Belarus on 19 December, 2010 against irregularities that occurred during the presidential elections in Belarus. The event will take place on 16 January, 2012 at 14:00.The peaceful demonstration was violently dispersed by police, hundreds of people were put behind bars. Events of 19 December, 2010 started an unprecedented wave of repression in Belarus, which continues to this day.