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The 2011 Rafto Prize laureate will be announced at a press conference at the Rafto Human Rights House in Bergen, Norway.

This year’s big AFS happening will take place on 28-30 October at Sørmarka Conference Centre in Norway. AFS welcomes new and old volunteers to a rich and social weekend!

Vietnamese dissident’s appeal against a harsh jail sentence was turned down on 2 August by Appeals Court in Hanoi. As a result legal scholar Cu Huy Ha Vu will spend seven years in prison for “propagandizing against the Vietnamese government”. Roman Catholic priest Father Nguyen Van Ly was sent back to prison on 25 July to serve a sentence for political dissent despite very poor health condition.

Dalai Lama, Rafto laureates and many friends of Norway and its human rights organisations express their sympathy and condolences to the people of Norway. Secretary General of Norwegian Helsinki Committee Bjørn Engesland regrets that the attacks targeted the best Norwegians have: youth, openness, democracy.

The Rafto Alumni has been created for the first time and in November 2011 a get-together will be taking place in Bergen when Rafto Foundation celebrates the 25th anniversary of the Rafto Prize. The Rafto Alumni will comprise of former members of the Rafto student group. The idea of a new initiative is to give former members a place to meet.

Chinese authorities in the northwestern region of Xinjiang have detained at least six people following the appearance of leaflets in Aksu city calling for independence from Beijing on July 1, as the ruling Communist Party marked its 90th anniversary. Radio Free Asia reports that Uyghur students studying in eastern China are expelled for practicing their religion. The relatives of Uyghur political prisoners complain they too are living out a sentence.

Some 1,300 refugees are crossing into Kenya daily from Somalia, fleeing conflict and the region’s worst drought in 60 years. New refugee camps are rapidly needed. Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has found alarmingly high rates of malnutrition among the Somali refugees arriving and settling on the outskirts of the Dadaab refugee camp in northeastern Kenya. The findings have prompted MSF to reinforce its medical intervention there.

A statement demanding urgent action by the state of Mexico to protect migrants and human rights defenders was released by Rafto Laureate José Raúl Vera Lopéz, Rafto Foundation and other organizations in Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico on 16 June 2011.

At the conference in London of the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunisation (GAVI), Norway has pledged to double the amount of funding it currently provides for vaccinating poorer children around the world against preventable diseases like pneumonia. Doctors Without Borders Norway evaluates this is as an important step in the right direction.