Human Rights Watch

On 23 May, the IACHR reported that severe financial problems have forced it to cancel its July and October sessions and all trips planned for this year and, if new funding cannot be secured by mid-June, will lead to the non-renewal of the contracts of 40 per cent of its staff

Turkmen authorities dropped a 13-year travel ban against three family members of an exiled dissident, Pirkuli Tanrykuliev, allowing them to leave the country on June 4, 2016, a coalition of human rights groups said.

“Algerian courts are not only convicting people who participate in peaceful labor protests,” reports Sarah Leah Whitson, HRW’s Middle East and North Africa director. “Now they’re punishing people who protest against such unfair convictions.”

The international community should press Venezuela to revoke the recent “State of Exception and Emergency Decree” that granted the government powers to restrict rights, suspend international cooperation for civil society groups and limit the constitutional powers of the National Assembly.

In his Facebook posts, al-Halabi accused Interior Ministry officials of corruption and possible complicity with people arrested by Internal Security forces on March 27 in connection with sex trafficking of Syrian women.

On 17 May 2016, President Petro Poroshenko signed a decree to implement a May 20 National Security and Defense Council resolution barring 17 Russian reporters, editors, and media executives from entering Ukraine through December 31, 2017.

The Russian parliament adopted amendments to the “foreign agents” law on May 25, 2016, without promised improvements to relieve pressure on independent groups, Human Rights Watch says.

For years, Ethiopia’s extensive restrictions on free speech and political rights have caused citizens to flee arbitrary detention, torture and politically motivated prosecutions. Thousands are believed to have fled into neighbouring countries, including Sudan, because of abuses associated with the crackdown.