Freedom House

“Burundi is at a severe disadvantage without an active civil society, and any remaining legitimacy is slipping away with these oppressive tactics.”

A renowned spiritual leader, scholar, dissident and many-times Nobel Peace Prize nominee, Thich Quang Do, 87, has spent more than three decades in detention in Vietnam for his peaceful advocacy of religious freedom, democracy and human rights.

The detention of the Zone 9 bloggers in 2014 became an international cause célèbre, and the release of the last of them in October was greeted with euphoria. But the regime’s crackdown on dissent continues unabated.

One of the most touted takeaways from Chinese president Xi Jinping’s visit to the U.S. was an agreement on the contentious issue of cyberattacks – and especially cyberespionage – against American targets.

Internet freedom around the world declined for the fifth consecutive year in 2015 as more governments censored information of public interest while also expanding surveillance and cracking down on privacy tools, according to Freedom House’s “Freedom on the Net 2015” report.

The plight of Bao Zhuoxuan, the 16-year old son of human rights lawyer Wang Yu and legal activist Bao Longjun, shows China doing its utmost to pressure human rights defenders by targeting entire households with punitive measures.

“The laws would ignore recommendations made in June by the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of assembly and association, when he called on Kazakhstan’s government to reduce, not increase, its regulation of civic groups.”

Angolan human rights activist José Marcos Mavungo was sentenced to six years in prison on charges of rebellion for his alleged role in planning an anti-government protest that did not even take place.