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Human Rights Watch Daily Brief, 15 December 2014

Russia, Turkey, Sudan, South Sudan, Chechnya, CARCrisis, Pakistan and US

Growing numbers of LGBT people have been attacked and harassed across Russia since the adoption of a federal anti-LGBT “propaganda” law in 2013, and authorities have failed to prevent or prosecute the attacks, a new report says. This effectively legalizes the discrimination of LGBT people.
Journalists in Turkey – including the general editor of the country’s largest daily paper and the head of a major broadcasting group – have been arrested for what appears to be political reasons. Limited evidence against the journalist has been made public, but both media outlets have reported extensively on corruption allegations leveled against Turkey’s President RecepTayyip Erdoğan and his cabinet.
Sudanese government forces and allied militias are killing,beating, torturing and raping civilians in government-held areas in Sudan’s Blue Nile state. Many of those who have fled the violence toSouth Sudan are Ingessana, the ethnic group of the major rebel commander fighting the Sudanese government. Their interviews provide a rare glimpse into life in Blue Nile state, as Sudan doesn’t allow human rights investigators access.
South Sudan is marking one year since the outbreak of devastating war.Today is also one year since the African Union announced the creation of a commission of inquiry to hold accountable those responsible for the brutal violence. But as time wears on, a report has yet to be published and further atrocities seem imminent.
A fire in Chechnya has destroyed the office of a prominent human rights organization.The cause of the fire is suspected to be arson, and the attack would be another act in an ongoing campaign of intimidation against rights defenders. Russia has not attempted to investigate.
The crisis in the Central African Republic is quickly slipping from global attention, even though many people are still trapped in the ongoing violence. But those able to escape are faced with new and increasingly desperate problems in crowded refugee camps.

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