Saudi Arabia sentenced seven government critics to prison on June 24, 2013, for allegedly inciting protests and harming public order, largely by using Facebook. The Specialized Criminal Court sentenced the men, all from the Kingdom’s Eastern Province, to prison terms ranging from five to 10 years and barred them from travelling abroad for additional periods.

Burma’s new telecom license winners should make a public commitment to strong human rights policies and broad transparency measures, Human Rights Watch said. Firms should say how they plan to protect users from illegal surveillance and censorship, given the current lack of legal human rights protections in Burmese telecommunications law.

The lynching of four Shia by a mob apparently led by Salafi sheikhs in the village of Abu Musallim in Greater Cairo on June 23, 2013, came after months of anti-Shia hate speech at times involving the ruling Muslim Brotherhood and its political party.

Lebanese Internal Security Forces threaten, ill-treat, and torture drug users, sex workers, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in their custody. The report was released on the United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture.

Syrian military and pro-government forces known as shabiha have arbitrarily detained female opposition activists as well as female relatives and neighbors of pro-opposition activists and fighters, and in a number of cases, subjected them to torture and sexual abuse, Human Rights Watch said today.

Morocco’s courts are convicting defendants based on confessions they claim were obtained through torture or falsified by police, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The country’s judicial reform agenda needs to include stronger safeguards to ensure that courts discard as evidence any statement made to the police under torture or ill-treatment.

New laws and lengthy jail terms for activists have put freedom of association in Bahrain under severe threat, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Bahraini authorities have left hardly any space for peaceful political dissent. Through a mix of restrictive laws and abusive policies, the government is sending a clear message that it will not tolerate calls for reform that challenge the ruling family’s monopoly on power.

Local media in Kuwait are reporting that at least two prisoners, both Egyptian, will be executed on live television at 7:30 a.m. on June 18, 2013. It will be Kuwait’s second round of executions since it ended its de facto moratorium on use of the death penalty in April.

Tunisia’s legislature should amend the latest draft of a law intended to bar government officials under former President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali from holding public office for seven years.

Yemeni authorities used lethal force against an apparently peaceful demonstration in Sanaa on June 9, 2013, that caused at least nine deaths and several dozen injuries, Human Rights Watch said today. The government should ensure that its promised investigation into the incident is carried out promptly, impartially, and thoroughly, and results in appropriate prosecutions of those responsible for serious abuses

Iraqi authorities should immediately investigate evidence that federal police executed four men and a 15-year-old boy on May 3, 2013, south of Mosul. Witnesses last saw the victims in the custody of the federal police 3rd Division, commanded by Gen. Mehdi Gharawi, who had been removed from his post as a federal police commander following claims he was implicated in torture and other abuses but was later reinstated.

The Syrian government has interrogated students and carried out violent assaults on their protests and military attacks on schools. An interactive map shows the destruction of schools across the country.

Jordanian authorities should immediately rescind an order to censor 263 unlicensed local news websites.The government should also scrap recent legislation that allows it to encroach on online media freedom. The attempts to regulate online speech violate Jordan’s constitutional free expression guarantees.

Several apparent bystanders were shot as police used force to suppress violent protests in Tunis on May 19, 2013. One person was killed and at least three were severely injured.

Qatar should immediately abolish its exit visa requirements, which expose migrant workers to the risk of exploitation and abuse. The exit visa system can prevent foreigners from leaving the country merely on the say-so of a current or former employer. The case of a French professional footballer who is unable to leave Qatar illustrates how the exit visa system can be used against migrant workers in disputes with their employers. Zahir Belounis, who played for the Al Jaish team, is pursuing a claim for unpaid wages in the Qatari courts. He told Human Rights Watch that his former employers have insisted that he drop his claim or they will not issue him the exit visa he must produce to leave Qatar.

Tunisian legislators should revise the 2003 counterterrorism law,Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to the National Constituent Assembly. The 2003 law uses an overly broad definition of terrorism and incitement to terrorism and undermines the right to an effective defense.

Repeated and sustained violence between armed groups in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli have imposed a deadly and destructive toll on its residents, Human Rights Watch said today. The recent round of violence that began on May 19, 2013, in the Jabal Mohsen and Bab al-Tabbaneh neighborhoods has killed at least 28, wounded more than 200, and seems to have brought life in Tripoli, Lebanon’s second city, to a halt. The dead include at least two Lebanese army soldiers and six members of the armed groups.

Libyan authorities should seize a historic opportunity to promote and protect women’s rights as the country transitions from four decades of dictatorship, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today.

Israel should strengthen an announced reduction of its military use of white phosphorus munitions by banning all use of “air-burst” white phosphorus munitions in populated areas without exception. Human Rights Watch has also urged all countries to make white phosphorus illegal when used as an incendiary weapon.

Kuwaiti authorities should amend a proposed new press law that would increase state control of the news media and further curtail the right to free speech. The draft should be revised to protect free speech, consistent with requirements under international law, not curtail it, Human Rights Watch said.

Human Rights Watch has reviewed graphic evidence that appears to show a commander of the Syrian opposition “Independent Omar al-Farouq” brigade mutilating the corpse of a pro-government fighter. The figure in the video cuts the heart and liver out of the body and uses sectarian language to insult Alawites. The same brigade was implicated in April 2013 in the cross-border indiscriminate shelling of the Lebanese Shi’a villages of al-Qasr and Hawsh al-Sayyed

Saudi authorities should ensure a fair trial for the Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr.

Four Saudi activists are under investigation after forming a human rights group on April 3, 2013, and could face prosecution for “establishing an illegal organization." Saudi authorities should immediately cease harassing the four founding members of the group, the Union for Human Rights (UHR), and give it an operating license.

Jordanian criminal justice authorities should immediately drop their three-year prosecution of two intellectuals and withdraw all charges against them.

The Lebanese government has failed to take adequate measures to protect against, deter, and punish retaliatory kidnappings along sectarian lines in border regions. Human Rights Watch interviewed both victims and family members who carried out retaliatory kidnappings, prompted by alleged detentions and kidnappings of their relatives by the Syrian government forces and armed opposition groups.

The Iranian government is increasingly violating workers’ rights to peaceful assembly and association. Dozens of labor and independent trade union activists are in prison for speaking out in defense of workers.Human Rights Watch called for the government to end the crackdown and free labor rights advocates in anticipation of International Workers’ Day on May 1, as part of a joint campaign by Iranian and international rights groups to highlight the plight of workers.

Prime Minister David Cameron should demand a thorough and independent investigation by the UAE authorities into credible allegations of torture by three British nationals.

British Prime Minister David Cameron should challenge the deteriorating human rights record of the United Arab Emirates during a state visit by the country’s president to Britain next week, a coalition of seven international human rights organizations said today. Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan will begin a rare state visit to the United Kingdom on 29 April, but the high-profile trip comes at a time when abuses in the Gulf state are escalating, according to rights groups.

Iraqi authorities should ensure that a promised investigation into a deadly raid on April 23, 2013, in Haweeja, near Kirkuk, examines allegations that security forces used excessive and lethal force.

All parties to the conflict in Syria should stop indiscriminate cross-border attacks on inhabited areas in Lebanon.

International racing bodies responsible for scheduling the Bahrain Formula 1 Grand Prix from April 19 to 21, 2013, have taken no steps to address human rights abuses that appear to be directly linked to the event.

Abdallah Sanussi, the long-time intelligence chief for Muammar Gaddafi, told Human Rights Watch in a prison visit on April 15, 2013, that he has not had access to a lawyer or been informed of the formal charges against him during almost eight months in Libyan detention. He did not complain of physical abuse and said his conditions in custody have been “reasonable.”

US President Barack Obama should press the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to reverse the worsening human rights situation in the country, Human Rights Watch said in a letter to Obama. Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan is scheduled to meet with President Obama in Washington, DC, on April 16, 2013.

Libyan authorities should immediately drop criminal defamation charges and free Amara Hassan al-Khatabi, editor of al-Ummah daily. Al-Khatabi, who has been in detention since December 19, 2012, is on trial for “insulting” and “slandering” members of the judiciary. His private lawyer was not allowed to visit him while he was detained in prison and says he was transferred to a medical facility due to his fragile health on April 6, 2013, where he remains detained under guard.

Saudi authorities need to lift the many obstacles facing the first woman to train as a lawyer in Saudi Arabia before she can enter the profession on an equal basis with men.

Tunisia’s new justice minister should ensure the immediate release of Sami Fehri, the director of the privately owned Attounissia TV channel.

The Syrian Air Force has repeatedly carried out indiscriminate, and in some cases deliberate, air strikes against civilians. These attacks are serious violations of international humanitarian law (the laws of war), and people who commit such violations with criminal intent are responsible for war crimes.

Bahraini authorities are carrying out home raids and arbitrarily detaining opposition protesters in advance of the Formula 1 Grand Prix weekend of April 19 to 21, 2013, Human Rights Watch said today, based on information from a variety of local sources.

Yemen’s Defense Ministry should cooperate in bringing the killer of a journalist and his friend to justice, Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to the defense minister, Maj. Gen. Mohammed Nasser Ahmed, requesting information about possible military involvement in the case.

President François Hollande of France should press for further human rights reforms in Morocco during his first state visit to this longtime French ally. Hollande is expected to meet with King Mohammed VI in Rabat and address the parliament while in the country on April 3 and 4, 2013. Several French ministers are scheduled to accompany the president, including Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and Najat Vallaud Belkacem, the minister of women’s rights and government spokesperson.

Libya should ensure that two Libyans with ties to the previous government of Muammar Gaddafi who were extradited from Egypt on March 26, 2013, are treated humanely and granted their full due process rights. Libya should grant humanitarian and human rights organizations access to them to monitor their detention conditions and treatment and respect for their basic rights as detainees – including giving them access to a lawyer and promptly taking them before a judge.

Algerian authorities illegally restricted rights to free movement when they barred 96 Algerian civil society activists from travelling to Tunisia, without giving any reason.

Algerian authorities illegally restricted rights to free movement when they barred 96 Algerian civil society activists from travelling to Tunisia, without giving any reason. Border officials stopped the activists on March 25 as they were about to enter Tunisia, where they intended to attend the World Social Forum. The forum, a global gathering of approximately 50,000 activists on areas such as human rights and the environment, runs from March 26 to March 30, 2013.

Jordan is routinely and unlawfully rejecting Palestinian refugees, single males, and undocumented people seeking asylum at its border with Syria, said Human Rights Watch and Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic (the Harvard Clinic).

The Libyan government should take urgent steps to stop serious and ongoing human rights violations against inhabitants of the town of Tawergha, who are widely viewed as having supported Muammar Gaddafi. The forced displacement of roughly 40,000 people, arbitrary detentions, torture, and killings are widespread, systematic, and sufficiently organized to be crimes against humanity and should be condemned by the United Nations Security Council.

The US legacy in Iraq reflects abuses committed with impunity by American and Iraqi forces throughout the US-led occupation. The abuses set in motion over 10 years ago by the Bush administration’s ‘torture memos,’ and the brutal detention policies that followed, facilitated Iraq’s creation of a system that is today either unwilling or incapable of delivering justice to its citizens.

Syrian forces’ use of cluster munitionsin residential areas is causing mounting civilian casualties. An initial review of available information has identified at least 119 locations across Syriawhere at least 156 cluster bombs have been used in the past six months.  

Israeli authorities are threatening detained Eritrean and Sudanese nationals, including asylum seekers, with prolonged detention to pressure them to leave Israel, Human Rights Watch and the Hotline for Migrant Workers said today.

United Arab Emirates (UAE) authorities should guarantee the safety of 94 defendants facing trial on state security charges. They should also establish an independent investigation into the defendants’ allegations of ill-treatment in detention. The next session of their trial begins on March 11, 2013.

Saudi authorities should immediately disclose the whereabouts and condition of the Jordanian activist Khaled al-Natour, and free him or charge him with a recognizable criminal offense.

Iran’s judiciary should conclude a speedy, independent, and transparent criminal investigation followed by prosecution of those believed responsible for the death of the blogger Sattar Behesht. Beheshti died in the custody of Tehran’s cyber police in November 2012. Iranian officials should stop harassing his family and hampering their efforts to seek justice and ensure that those responsible for the blogger’s death are held to account.

Yemen’s government should stop seeking and carrying out the death penalty for child offenders, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi should immediately reverse execution orders for three alleged juvenile offenders on death row who have exhausted all appeals and could face a firing squad at any moment.

The newly appointed investigative judge looking into the January violence in Port Said should fully examine police responsibility for unlawful killings during the episode, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), the Alkarama Foundation, and Human Rights Watch said today. Forty-two people, including two police officers, died after a court, on January 26, 2013, recommended sentencing 21 Port Said residents to death for killings after a soccer match a year earlier. The confirmation of this sentence and verdict against the remaining 52 defendants is scheduled for March 9.

The Syrian government launched at least four ballistic missiles that struck populated areas in the city of Aleppo and a town in Aleppo governorate during the week of February 17, 2013, Human Rights Watch said today. The attacks killed more than 141 people, including 71 children, and caused immense physical destruction.

Israel should immediately charge or release Palestinians detained without charge or trial for prolonged periods and stop denying them and their lawyers access to evidence of their alleged crimes.

Yemen’s transition government should take urgent steps to ensure justice for serious human rights violations during the 2011 uprising, and since the inauguration one year ago of President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi. As part of those efforts, the authorities should immediately carry out an investigation into the deaths of at least four protesters in clashes with state security forces in Aden on February 20 and 21, 2013.

President Francois Hollande of France should urge President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to reverse his administration’s crackdown on civil society and erosion of human rights when the two leaders meet on February 28, 2013.

Omani authorities immediately should release and expunge the convictions of a group of reform activists jailed solely for exercising their rights to freedom of expression and association. Twenty-four members of the group who are serving prison terms have been on hunger strike since February 9, 2013, to draw attention to their plight.

The acquittal of five Kuwaiti online activists charged with “offending the emir” could help ensure that Kuwaitis can freely express critical political opinions.

Iraqi authorities should complete promised investigations into the army killings of nine protesters in Fallujah on January 25, 2013, and make the results public. The authorities need to ensure that there will be independent investigations into the deaths, in addition to the promised inquiries by a parliamentary committee and the Defense Ministry, and that if there is evidence of unlawful killing, those responsible are prosecuted.'

At least 18 Israeli airstrikes during the fighting in Gaza in November 2012 were in apparent violation of the laws of war, Human Rights Watch said today after a detailed investigation into the attacks. These airstrikes killed at least 44 Palestinian civilians, including 12 children.

Investigators never questioned top officials in the criminal investigation by Yemen’s previous government into the shooting of demonstrators during the so-called Friday of Dignity Massacre on March 18, 2011, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Former President Ali Abdullah Saleh dismissed his attorney general when he demanded that government officials be questioned in the shooting deaths of 45 protesters – three of them children – and wounding of 200 others. It was the deadliest attack on protesters of Yemen’s uprising

Syria should urgently agree that humanitarian aid may be brought into the country across all of its borders, including from Turkey.Syria’s allies, including Russia, should press Syria to consent to such transfers. Donors should not wait for Syria’s go-ahead, but instead should immediately expand support to non-governmental organizations already able to deliver aid from Turkey into opposition-held areas of Syria.

A criminal court conviction of three former members of Kuwait’s parliament for “offending the emir” violates their right to freedom of expression. On February 5, 2013, the court found the defendants guilty, based on speeches they gave at a gathering in October 2012, and sentenced all three to three years in prison. The defendants have appealed their sentences, one of their lawyers told Human Rights Watch.

Qatar has not delivered on its pledges to improve migrant workers’ rights, Human Rights Watch said today at a news conference in Doha about its World Report 2013. More than two years after it won the right to host the 2022 World Cup, It is high time for Qatar to deliver on its promises for reforms to prevent the trafficking and forced labor of migrant workers, Human Rights Watch said. The Qatar Supreme Committee for Qatar 2022 – the tournament’s quasi-governmental delivery committee – has made encouraging pledges on workers’ rights, but these lack detail. Nor do they mask the failure of the Qatari authorities either to reform exploitative laws, such as the kafala system of sponsorship-based employment and the prohibition on trade unions, or to enforce the prohibition on illegal recruitment fees and the confiscation of passports.

Tunisian authorities should ensure that those responsible for the assassination on February 6, 2013 of the prominent opposition political figure Chokri Belaïdare brought to justice. Tunisian authorities should immediately investigate the circumstances of the killing and prosecute those responsible.

Human rights protection remains stymied in Tunisia a year after the election of a new National Constituent Assembly.The major concerns are the slow pace in reforming security operations and the judiciary, the failure to investigate and prosecute physical assaults by people apparently affiliated with violent groups, and the prosecution of nonviolent speech offenses.

The euphoria of the Arab Spring has given way to the sobering challenge of creating rights-respecting democracies. The willingness of new governments to respect rights will determine whether those uprisings give birth to genuine democracy or simply spawn authoritarianism in new forms.

Moroccans still await tangible improvements in human rights a year after the adoption of a progressive new constitution and the election of an Islamist-led parliament and government, Human Rights Watch said today in its World Report 2013.

The latest crisis in Egypt highlights the urgent need for the government to finally begin reforming the security sector and ensuring accountability for past abuses, Human Rights Watch said today while releasing its World Report 2013. Egypt gained its first democratically elected president in 2012, but overall the year was marked by a series of missed opportunities to institute human rights reforms, Human Rights Watch said.

Authorities arrested, detained, and harassed some of Iran’s most celebrated rights lawyers, and stepped up their assault on critical journalists, bloggers, and their families in 2012, HumanRightsWatchsaidtodayinitsWorld Report 2013.The government also prevented reformists and opposition leaders from participating in parliamentary elections, and is holding the opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi, and Zahra Rahnavard under house arrest as Iran prepares for its presidential election in June 2013.

President Mohamed Morsy of Egypt should reverse the emergency powers he issued on January 27, 2013, Human Right Watch said today. The emergency powers give the police the authority to detain people in three cities for up to 30 days without any judicial review, and permit trials of those detained before emergency security courts. Judicial review of detention is a fundamental right that may not be removed, even during emergencies.

Iran’s judiciary should quash death sentences against five members of Iran’s Ahwazi Arab minority and immediately cancel their execution, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said today. The sentences were handed down by a revolutionary court and upheld by the country’s Supreme Court on January 9, 2013.

Armed opposition groups appeared to have deliberately destroyed religious sites in mixed areas of Northern Syria, in November and December 2012.An armed opposition group destroyed a Shia place of worship in Idlib governorate, and two Christian churches in Latakia governorate were looted.

A draft law being prepared in Libya to bar Gaddafi-era officials from holding public office and senior posts should exclude only those who held carefully defined senior positions, or who are alleged to have committed specific acts. Anyone accused of past wrongdoing should be allowed a fair chance to rebut the charges

A letter sent to the United Nations Security Council on behalf of 57 states calling for a referral of the situation in Syria to the International Criminal Court (ICC) gives momentum to international efforts to stop grave abuses committed there. More countries should join the call and impress on reluctant Council members the urgency of taking up the issue of accountability.  

President François Hollande of France should publicly and privately convey concerns about deteriorating human rights conditions in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on his visit there. Hollande is scheduled to arrive for his first official visit to the UAE on January 15, 2013.

Bahrain’s Court of Cassation ruling on January 7, 2013, upholding lengthy prison terms of 13 prominent dissidents appears to confirm the inability of Bahrain’s judicial system to protect basic rights. A military court had convicted the dissidents solely for exercising their rights to free expression and peaceful assembly.