Xenophobia & Islamophobia in Hungary, Czech Republic, France and The Netherlands; Crimea dissident locked up in psychiatric hospital.

Plus: War on Drugs in Philippines and its five-year old victim; anti-LGBT rhetoric in Indonesia and why the world’s biggest Muslim democracy should accept its LGBT citizens; interview & shocking video testimony on assault and gang rape of women in South Sudan.

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The government in Hungary has stirred up xenophobic sentiments against refugees and migrants and has gone to great lengths, and cost, to spew hateful messages nationwide before the 2 October anti-migrant referendum. Along with restrictive new laws making life difficult for asylum seekers and refugees, anti-migrant rhetoric by decision makers and high-ranking politicians is commonplace.
In Prague, a group of demonstrators chanted "Gas them!" when a group of Muslim women passed by during a protest against Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel, who visited the capital of the Czech Republic on Thursday.
A woman is confronted by state officials in a public place and forced to change her clothing, while another is fined for failing to wear “an outfit respecting good morals and secularism.” Unbelievable in a country like France? No, it happened on French beaches this week. Later today, the highest court in France will rule if the burkini ban can stay, or if it will be scrapped.
Xenophobia and Islamophobia in Europe is not limited to Hungary, the Czech Republic and France. In The Netherlands, far right party PVV, leading in the polls for some time now, has announced its program for elections next year, a one-pager advocating “de-Islamization" - closure of all refugee centres, mosques and Islamic schools and a ban on the Quran...
In Crimea, activist llmi Umerov has been involuntarily confined in a psychiatric hospital. Umerov is an outspoken critic of Russia's occupation of Crimea, a part of Ukraine. He also spoke out against the persecution of Crimean Tatars. “Umerov’s forced psychiatric confinement is an egregious violation of his rights,” says Tanya Cooper, HRW's Ukraine researcher. “It’s also a shameful attempt to use psychiatry to silence him and tarnish his reputation, a popular practice against dissidents in the Soviet Union.”
Phelim Kine, deputy director of HRW's Asia Division, confronted the Philippines' Justice minister on the new government's "war on drugs", as five-year-old Danica May became the youngest reported victim of the campaign.
The authorities in Indonesia have stoked an unprecedented attack on the security and rights of sexual and gender minorities in 2016. Here's why the world’s biggest Muslim democracy should accept its LGBT citizens.
Reports of assault and gang rape of foreign aid workers by soldiers in South Sudan have caught the world’s attention. Read this interview with Priyanka Motaparthy, HRW's emergencies researcher, or watch the testimony of the victims in this shocking BBC Newsnight video.
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