When Merkel Meets Putin: Daily Brief
Merkel meets Putin; torture in Russia; Mozambique assaults free media; Angola sentences sergeant for killing boy; police killings out of control in Rio de Janeiro; Jakarta's criminal crackdown before Asian Games; Trump's family separation; Australian identity matching bill; and strengthening the support to the Group of Eminent Experts on Yemen.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday, 18 August. At least two issues should be high on the agenda.
Last month, a gruesome torture scandal broke out in Russia — one that finally means the authorities cannot continue to ignore the gravity of the problem. Graphic footage gripped the Russian public, but the lawyer who helped expose this torture needs state protection.
Mozambique’s government should cancel recently imposed exorbitant fees on local and foreign media operating in the country. The new fees are a huge setback for press freedom and access to information in the country.
A magistrates court in Angola has sentenced an army sergeant to 18 years in prison for the 2016 killing of a 14-year-old boy during a peaceful protest against house demolitions. The court decision sends a clear message that members of the security forces are not above the law...
In Brazil's Rio de Janeiro, the number of police killings increased by 39 percent from January to July as compared with the same period last year. At the current rate, with 895 people killed, the state will have its bloodiest year in more than a decade.
The Asian Games will start tomorrow in Indonesia. Ahead of them, local police in Jakarta killed over a dozen people in an attempt to end criminality before the sporting event. But the Games should celebrate human achievement, not provide a pretext for a police ‘shoot to kill’ policy in the name of crime control.
The mass criminal prosecutions of migrants under US President Donald Trump have increased sharply despite the formal end of the administration’s practice of separating families. Read our “question and answer” analysis to better understand the situation.
Today, the Australian parliamentary intelligence and security committee will discuss the identity matching services bill, which will seriously affect human rights...
A group of 54 organizations are calling states to support the renewal and strengthening of the Group of Eminent Experts on Yemen to improve its reporting structure and to take further steps towards accountability.