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Iran: Protester's Death 'Hijacked by Regime'

The Iranian regime has been accused of hijacking the death of a young pro-democracy protester killed during rallies in Tehran on Monday. A family member of Saane Zhaleh, a 26-year-old theatre student at Tehran University of Arts, told the Guardian that the Iranian authorities had launched a campaign to depict the pro-opposition protester as a member of the government-sponsored basiji militia who had been killed by what they described as terrorists.

UPDATE: Egyptian Human Rights Defenders released

Military police arrested at least 37 human rights defenders and activists since January 31 and held them from periods ranging from 12 to 48 hours. On the afternoon of February 3, military police, accompanied by a uniformed policeman and plainclothes security officers, raided the Hisham Mubarak Law Center (HMLC), a human rights organization, and arrested 28 Egyptian and international human rights researchers, lawyers, and journalists. The HMLC also houses the FDP, which provides legal support to arrested protesters and document the violations against them. The coalition set up emergency telephone numbers ahead of the planned January 25 demonstration so that they could dispatch lawyers when people called in to report that they had been arrested. The HMLC premises were also used for meetings by the April 6 Youth Movement. Update to Egypt: Amnesty staff released but Egyptian activists still detained

Soudan: Les défis qui attendent le Sud-Soudan après la partition

Les résultats du référendum sur l'indépendance historique du Sud-Soudan montrent que 98,83 pour cent des habitants sont en faveur de la sécession. Si la région accédera officiellement à la souveraineté le 9 juillet 2011, il reste malgré tout de nombreux défis à relever.
Les observateurs estiment que ces questions doivent être abordées dès maintenant par les deux partis au pouvoir : le Parti national du Congrès (PNC), au Nord, et le Mouvement de libération du peuple soudanais (MLPS), au Sud.

UPDATE: Egypt: Amnesty staff released but Egyptian activists still detained

Two members of an Amnesty International fact-finding team were among five human rights workers and journalists freed by Egyptian military police late on Friday night after a day and half in detention. The five were among some 35 Egyptian and international human rights activists, lawyers and journalists arrested Thursday when military police raided the offices of the Hisham Mubarak Law Center in Cairo. Update to Egypt: List of detained lawyers & activists from Hisham Mubarak Law Centre in Cairo

Egypt: List of detained lawyers & activists from Hisham Mubarak Law Centre in Cairo

Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, reported yesterday that several international and Egyptian human rights activists, journalists and lawyers were picked up in a raid on the Hisham Mubarak Law Center in Cairo. The activists are currently detained at an unknown location in Egypt, and no news has been heard from them since their arrest. According to Bouckaert, the arrests are part of a clear campaign against independent eyewitnesses of the violence in Egypt, including journalists and civil society activists.” If you know more names tell @bouckap!#jan25 http://is.gd/FS8kG2

Egypt: Military and Intelligence at Egypt's Democratic Dawn

If the military is ever to be a legitimate national force, it must side with the protesters against Mubarak’s thugs and the police. These thugs have been ridiculously and mistakenly labeled by right-wing media as “pro-Mubarak demonstrators. This critical junction in the Egyptian Uprising when is the Egyptian Army’s moment of truth. As thousands of unarmed demonstrators are tortured, trampled, firebombed and molested by Mubarak’s thugs, will the military move to protect, or to crush the non-violent democratic movements that have occupied Tahrir Square in Cairo for the last ten days? Following on Paul Amar’s useful analysis (Jadaliyya, 1 Feb 2011) we need to know which faction of which of the Army's branches is ascendant, and where exactly, within these forces, we can energize possible allies.

Egypt: "We've waited for this revolution for years. Other despots should quail"

My birth at the end of July 1967 makes me a child of the naksa, or setback, as the Arab defeat during the June 1967 war with Israel is euphemistically known in Arabic. My parents' generation grew up high on the Arab nationalism that Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser brandished in the 1950s. But we "Children of the Naksa", hemmed in by humiliation, have spent so much of our lives uncomfortably stepping into pride's large, empty shoes.

Iran: MISE A JOUR: Shiva Nazarahari condamnée à quatre ans de prison et 74 coups de fouet

Le 8 janvier 2011, la Branche 36 de la Cour d’Appel de Téhéran a condamné Shiva Nazarahari à quatre ans de prison et 74 coups de fouet, pour « subversion contre Dieu », « propagande contre le régime » et « trouble de l’ordre public ». Shiva Nazarahari est porte-parole du Committee of Human Rights Reporters –CHRR (Comité des Reporters pour les droits humains) et membre de la campagne Un Million de Signatures. Elle avait été libérée sous caution le 12 septembre 2010.

Yemen: Physical assault of human rights defenders

On 14 December 2010, human rights defenders Ms Tawakkol Karman, Ms Bushra Alsorabi and Mr Ali Hussain al-Dailami were physically assaulted during a peaceful protest in Sana'a, Yemen.
Tawakkol Karman and Bushra Alsorabi are Chairperson and Executive Director respectively of Women Journalists Without Chains (WJWC), an organisation which campaigns for freedom of the press and other human rights in Yemen. Ali Hussain al-Dailami is the executive director of the Yemeni Organization for the Defence of Democratic Rights and Freedom.

Iran: Nasrin Sotoudeh’s Husband Arrested, Released

Reza Khandan was released on January 17, 2011. Reza Khandan, husband of imprisoned human rights lawyer, Nasrin Sotoudeh, was arrested early this morning when he arrived to the Prosecutor’s office to comply with the summon he received last week. According to reports by the website Change for Equality, the charges against Reza Khandan remain unclear. According to the family members, even though the court set a $50 thousand USD bail for his release, the bail amount posted by Nasin Soutoudeh’s sister has not been accepted.