President Sarkozy of France has reignited the debate about how Muslim women in Europe should dress by calling for a ban on clothing that, as he puts it, imprisons women and undermines their dignity.

Throughout Europe, over the past decade, there has been a loud - and at times openly xenophobic - debate about whether a Muslim woman should be allowed to wear a headscarf while on duty in a government job.

German state bans on religious symbols and clothing for teachers and other civil servants discriminate against Muslim women who wear the headscarf.

The German government should not have permitted the head of Uzbekistan’s secret police to visit Germany immediately after the European Union lifted sanctions stemming from a 2005 massacre in Uzbekistan.

Germany’s Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier should press Russia to immediately end impunity for human rights violations in Chechnya and cease harassment of and restrictions on civil society in Russia, Human Rights Watch said today. Steinmeier will travel to Russia on May 12 to meet with government and nongovernmental organization representatives.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has made important progress since its creation five years ago, but the court continues to face major challenges, said Amnesty International, the German Red Cross, the United Nation Association of Germany and Human Rights Watch in a joint statement today. This message will be the theme of a two-day conference that the organizations are convening in Berlin on September 21-22, to galvanize public support in Germany for the International Criminal Court.

Germany should immediately stop revoking the refugee status of Iraqi refugees and should reconsider the cases of more than 18,000 Iraqis who have been stripped of their refugee status, Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to German authorities.