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More than 100 activists detained, three well-known critics of authorities arrested in last month in China. Famous China’s artist Ai Weiwe and prominent blogger Yang Hengjun were detained in the airports. Prominent pro-democracy activist Liu Xianbin was jailed for 10 years for writing articles critical of the government. Is this a new wave of crackdown on dissidents, a new kind of internet dissidents called ‘netizens’?

Bishop Raúl Vera, the 2010 Rafto Prize laureate, proposed on 10 March in Mexico that a temporary visa for migrants who travel through the country be established, as part of the revision of state’s migration law. The purpose of such a visa should be to make the several hundred thousand migrants passing through the country each year less vulnerable to assault.

The Ethiopian opposition reports that over 250 of its central members have been arrested during the week. The arrests are seen in connection with a planned mass protest. Opposition leaders recently assured they would not take a leading role in any possible mass protests.

On 3 March a hearing in the trial of Oleg Orlov took place in Russia. The head of the Russian NGO Human Rights Centre Memorial is charged with slander for saying that Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov was responsible for the death of his colleague, human rights defender Natalia Estemirova, who was abducted and murdered in 2009.

To be a journalist in Uganda means to be a representative of a dangerous profession. In February 2011 one journalist was shot by soldiers and six were attacked by mob. All of them suffered while covering elections in the country. Violence is being investigated.

English PEN is calling on our members to join a worldwide reading campaign for our Honorary Member imprisoned writer and Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo. The aim of the campaign, organised by the Internationales Literaturfestival Berlin, is to encourage as many of Liu’s supporters around the world to stage a reading of Liu Xiaobo’s poem ‘You Wait for me with Dust’ on 20 March 2011.

The Rafto Foundation is seeking nominations for the 2011 Rafto Prize for Human Rights. Every year since 1987, the Rafto Foundation has awarded the Rafto Prize to advocates of human rights and democracy.

Voluntary organisations, institutions and individuals worldwide are welcome to nominate candidates for the 2011 Rafto Prize for Human Rights. The Rafto Prize, awarded in memory of Norwegian professor Thorolf Rafto, is awarded to an individual or organisation that embodies and upholds the principles of the Human Rights Charter through activism or engagement.

In North Kivu, in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, violent conflict persists between government forces and an array of military groups. The frontlines constantly shift, and local people are trapped in the middle – often cut off from medical care. In and around Pinga, an MSF team has been reaching out to populations trapped by the conflict by running mobile clinics via motorbike and providing medical services to people who have no other hope of getting medical care.