As Britain counts down the days to the royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, there comes a reminder from the tiny kingdom of Swaziland in southern Africa of how not to be a monarch. On Tuesday, Swazi King Mswati III, the last absolute sovereign in Africa, unleashed his security forces on pro-democracy demonstrators. Police …
Human rights
Whose Human-Rights Record is Worse? The U.S. or China?
It’s a spring ritual. Each year, the U.S. publishes its report on China’s human-rights record the previous year—and then China presents its findings on America’s own performance in the same realm. Both countries, as might be expected, find plenty wrong with each other. Indeed, instead of highlighting the actual human-rights …
After Gbagbo’s Arrest, What’s Next for the Ivory Coast?
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Laurent Gbagbo, Ivory Coast’s isolated and besieged strongman, was finally seized by opposition forces in the country’s biggest city, Abidjan. His arrest follows weeks of bloodletting and mayhem in the West African country, fueled in large part by Gbago’s stubborn refusal to accept …
How to Understand the Responsibility to Protect
Since the international community found itself stepping in to try to stem burgeoning humanitarian disasters in Libya and the Ivory Coast, much has been made of the principles behind the interventions. A cadre of liberal internationalists (in Europe, often lapsed socialists) saw in the two countries — particularly in Libya — a mandate …
Detained Artist Ai Weiwei Under Investigation for “Economic Crimes”
The Chinese authorities are interviewing detained artist and activist Ai Weiwei for “economic crimes,” a Foreign Ministry spokesman said Thursday. The comments, at a regularly scheduled afternoon press conference, are the first official acknowledgment that Ai, who was detained on Sunday while trying to fly to Hong Kong, is under …
Party Police: Cops Raid Gay Bar in Shanghai
A weekend raid at a club in Shanghai was a stark reminder of what can happen when homophobia meets the all-too-heavy hand of the law. Shanghaiist reports:
Early Sunday morning, police stormed into Q Bar in the middle of a gogo boy performance, turned the lights on, and shoved about 70 bar employees and patrons (save the foreigners)
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Party-Run Newspaper Slams Detained Chinese Artist Ai Weiwei
The domestic media silence surrounding the detention of Ai Weiwei was broken today by a Communist Party-run newspaper, which declared that the Chinese artist and activist “will be judged by history, but he will pay a price for his special choice.” The strident tone of today’s article, which was published in the Chinese and …
Mapping the Missing in China’s ‘Jasmine Crackdown’
This map, created by Chinese Human Rights Defenders, a Hong Kong-based concern group, shows people who have been detained or disappeared in China since February. It was published on Mar. 31 and includes only cases confirmed by CHRD. It does not include the case of Ai Weiwei, the artist and activist who vanished this weekend. For more
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Ivory Coast: As Violence Intensifies, U.N. Finally Enters the Fray
For weeks, the U.N.’s mission in the Ivory Coast has sat pinned down in its quarters, watching as this West African country lurched toward civil war. An escalating conflict between the rival forces of Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara has led to hundreds, probably thousands of deaths and has displaced, by some counts, over a million …
The Murder of Juliano Mer-Khamis, an Artist Caught Between Two Worlds
As cosmopolitan as his name, Juliano Mer-Khamis was the son of a Jewish mother who had fought with the elite Palmach force during the 1948 war that created Israel, and a Christian Arab prominent in the Israeli Communist Party. When he was shot and killed by masked men on Monday, he was sitting in his car outside the theater he had …
More Catholic than the Pope? Manila Suburb Cracks Down on Condoms
If you live in Alabang and want to have safer sex, you’re going to need a doctor’s note. That’s because the wealthy Manila suburb has made prophylactics prescription-only. The local council says they wanted to discourage sex outside of marriage. They also wanted to stir debate about the morality birth control as the nation mulls its …
Not Another Day in the Life of Ai Weiwei
Ai Weiwei, the Chinese artist and political activist who was detained Sunday at the Beijing airport while trying to fly to Hong Kong, has been blocked from leaving the country before. He was prevented from flying to South Korea in December, shortly before the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony for imprisoned Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo. Ai has …
Promises Unkept: The Latest on Eman el-Obeidi
Last Saturday, March 26th, a woman burst into the dining room of the Rixos hotel, one of the two Tripoli luxury hotels where foreign journalists are forced to stay. Libyan security guards had taken her, she said, and gang raped for two days. Within minutes of her appearance, hotel staff and the ubiquitous government minders that frequent …