Burma: 87 year old activist jailed

Democratic Voice of Burma reports that 87 year old Kyaw Khaing, chairman of the Taungok township branch of the National League for Democracy, was sentenced to two years in jail, after a trial during which he was denied medical care. He was “slipping in and out of consciousness” during the trial.
“"He has been suffering from [...]

Read Full Post »

Damascus Declaration signers – appeals rejected

France24 reports that a Syrian court has upheld jail terms for 12 democracy activists, including Riad Seif, who signed the Damascus Declaration.
The 12 are: Ali Abdullah, Dr Walid Bunni,  Akram Bunni, Riad Seif,  Fidaa Hurani, Ahmad Tomeh, Jabr al-Shufi, Yasser al-Iti, Mohammed Haji Darwish, Marwan al-Ish, Fayez Sara and Talal Abu-Dan.

Read Full Post »

Two dissidents released by China

The good news is that two dissidents arrested and imprisoned in China in 2001 have just been released: Yang Zili and Zhang Honghai. The NY Times has the story. The bad news is that these two were imprisoned for no real reason – the two were members of an informal discussion group that met several [...]

Read Full Post »

Thugs guarding Yuan Weijing continue brutal ways

Yuan Weijing is the wife of imprisoned, blind dissident Chen Guangcheng. She lives under constant guard of a large group of thuggish Chinese security men, with her young children and elderly mother. The thug guards harass her and have in the past brutally beaten people who came to see her. On March 8th, they accosted, [...]

Read Full Post »

Did the Olympics improve human rights in China?

The answer, as any rational person would have predicted, is No. ESPN offers some evidence here that the thugs who run China are just as thuggish today as they were in 2001 when China was awarded the games. The suggestion that having the games would change these thugs or improve the situation in China was [...]

Read Full Post »

Liu Xiaobo, Chinese human rights activist, wins award

Chinese human rights activist Liu Xiaobo has been honored with the Homo Homini Award by the People in Need Foundation, AsiaNews reports.
“Liu Xiaobo was honored together with 302 other scholars and personalities who signed the document Charter 08, published on December 9 to ask Beijing for more democracy and respect for human rights. The document [...]

Read Full Post »

Stephen Harper: Anti-Semitism is ‘pernicious’

Speaking at a memorial ceremony for Jewish victims of last November’s terrorist attacks in Bombay, India, Prime Minister Harper called the killings “affronts to the values that unite all civilized people.”
“Under our government, Canada will remain an unyielding defender of Jewish religious freedom, a forceful opponent of anti-Semitism in all of its forms and a [...]

Read Full Post »

Jason Kenney responds to the CAB

Canadian Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, whom we last saw giving a fine speech at the London anti-Semitism conference, has renewed his challenge to the Canadian Arab Federation’s leadership – the president of this outfit recently called Mr. Kenney a “professional whore.”
“I can tell you, at my ministry, I have no intention of funding that [...]

Read Full Post »

Swiss Jews worried about rise in anti-Semitism

JPost reports that Swiss Jews are worried about a sharp rise in the frequency of anti-Semitic acts in Switzerland – and about the lack of interest in this danger on the part of Swiss authorities.
“The latest anti-Semitic incident was on March 2 at the ZDVO annual fundraiser, held at the famed Teatre du Leman in [...]

Read Full Post »

March of the Living

“The March of the Living is an international, educational program that brings Jewish teens from all over the [...]

Read Full Post »