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-Women are tortured and raped. And we have no legal protection, said Aminatou Haidar, right, who celebrated the international Women´s Day in Bergen. The Sahrawi human rights activist addressed the great differences in how the day is marked in Norway and back home in Western Sahara. -Here, you can demonstrate and celebrate in peace and freedom. In Western Sahara, women and youth will be beaten up by the Moroccan occupation forces if we take to the streets to demonstrate. (09-MAR-07)
 

For the first time in decades, the deserted Western Sahara village of Tifariti is reawakening to life. Located in the strip of land close to the Mauritanian desert border that is under the control of the Sahrawi pro-independence movement Polisario, Tifariti hosted on February 26 more than 800 delegates participating in an international solidarity conference. (28-FEB-07)
 

On February 19, the Moroccan occupational authorities arrested a Swedish journalist Lars Björk, who was visiting Western Sahara for his work. He is accused by the Moroccan authorities of inciting the Sahrawis to demonstrate and of having bad intentions. The Moroccan authorities have threatened him with expulsion from Western Sahara and, even worse, to charge him as if he was like an Al-Qaida sympathizer. (20-FEB-07)

On 7 February 2007 the Rafto Foundation received a letter from the Vietnamese embassy in Copenhagen informing that a long planned visit to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) to meet with Vietnam’s leading dissident, Venerable Thich Quang Do, is not possible. The Rafto Foundation is accused of harming good relationships between Norway and Vietnam. Right, Arne Lynngård, Chairman of the Rafto Foundation. (13-FEB-07)
 

For decades, a large part of the Saharawi / Western Saharan population has lived in camps in the barren desert of neighbouring Algeria. For ever more Saharawis, this is the only life they know. Their own country is but a distant dream. Independent photo journalists Rådmund Steinsvåg and Anne-Torhild Nilsen of Berserk Productions made it into the camps and produced this photo gallery. (12-FEB-07)
 

Uyghur political prisoner Ismail Semed was executed on the morning of February 8 in Urumchi, the provincial capital of East Turkistan (also known as Xinjiang Province) in northwest the People´s Republic of China. Semed, who was 37 years old at the time of hisexecution, was sentenced to death in October 2005 on charges of “attempting to split the motherland” and other charges relating to the alleged possession of firearms and explosives. 
(10-FEB-07)

February 5, 2007 will mark the 10th anniversary of brutal crackdown on a peaceful demonstration in the city of Gulja in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People´s Republic of China. Dozens of people were killed during the crackdown; hundreds, possible thousands, lost their lives or were seriously injured in the unrest that occurred the following day. (01-FEB-07)
 

The prominent Armenian writer and publisher Hrant Dink, right, was shot on January 19 just outside of the office of the Armenian newspaper AGOS in Istanbul, Republic of Turkey. Dink was a brave defender of the Armenians’ rights, human rights and multicultural Republic of Turkey. He was sentenced several times for “insulting and denigrating Turkishness”. As others journalists and writers in the Republic of Turkey Dink was threatened to death on several occasions. He informed authorities about these threats, but he never got any kind of protection. (24-JAN-07)
 

The Rafto Foundation for Human Rights has issued an appeal to the Chinese authorities and encourages people and organizations who care about the human rights issues to show their support to 2004 Rafto Prize Laureate, Rebiya Kadeer and her family. The appeal urges the Chinese government to put an end to the reported harassment of Rebiya Kadeer´s family as a reaction to her peaceful human rights activities. If you wish to support the action, print out the appeal, sign it and post it by air mail to the Chinese authorities. Thank you! (20-JAN-07)