Wonderful News From China: Daily Brief

Liu Xia finally leaves China; World Cup football, rights & dictators; will NATO bolster inquiries into Afghan civilian deaths?; Supreme Court Justice nomination in US; Poland’s power grab; reform and continuing abuses in Uzbekistan; & still no justice two years after killing of Cambodia critic.

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Good news from China, where the authorities have finally allowed Liu Xia to leave the country. The widow of Chinese Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, who has been under house arrest since 2010, took a plane out of China to Berlin, family friends told the BBC. "President Xi Jinping should be held responsible for the extraordinary cruelty inflicted upon Liu Xia and Liu Xiaobo, and should refrain from harassing other family members,” says HRW's China director Sophie Richardson

As the football World Cup enters its final stages with semifinals today and tomorrow, the teams that are still competing offer an utterly different worldview from that of xenophobic political leaders, who have been in the news far too much recently. At the same time Russia's President Vladimir Putin — and dictators everywhere — seem to be the big winners at mega-sports events.

NATO has failed to fully investigate alleged unlawful airstrikes in Afghanistan, which may contribute to rising civilian casualties. Member countries that are attending the NATO Summit in Brussels this week should call for impartial NATO investigations into airstrikes in which civilians were killed.

US President Donald Trump's nomination of Brett M Kavanaugh for Supreme Court Justice has not gone down well with human rights defenders... 

The Polish government put another nail in the coffin of the country’s once-independent judiciary by forcing 27 Supreme Court judges – well over one-third of the court membership – out of their jobs last week in a blatant attempt to change the court’s political make-up.

There are hopeful signs that Uzbekistan could shed its reputation as one of the worst human rights abusers in the world, but activists say it still needs to do more. HRW's Hugh Williamson and Steve Swerdlow say it’s time for a reality check on Uzbekistan’s reforms. 

And Cambodian authorities have yet to carry out a credible, impartial investigation into the murder of prominent political commentator Dr. Kem Ley, two years ago today.