Egyptian authorities are already holding a record number of journalists behind bars, and a draconian new anti-terror law signed by President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Sunday will further broaden the crackdown on dissent, press freedom groups warn.

The Executive Committee decided on Saturday night to start preparations for convening the Palestinian National Council as part of Abbas’s efforts to bring new faces to the leadership.
At the meeting on Saturday night, the Executive Committee voted in favor of the appointment of Erekat as PLO Secretary-General.

„The resignation of the president of the executive committee Mahmud Abbas and more than half of its members has created a legal vacuum, and therefore the Palestine National Council (PNC) has been asked to meet in one month to elect a new executive committee,“ committee member Wassel Abu Yussef.

Für kritische Journalisten bedeuten Politiker häufig die größte Gefahr. Trotz guter Schutzrechte für Reporter existieren Meinungs- und Informationsfreiheit schon lange nicht mehr

“Es ist klar, dass das Agrargesetz nur dazu gedient hat, die Vertreibung der einheimischen und indigenen Gruppen zu legalisieren, nicht nur in Xochicuautla. Es gibt auch Gegenwehr gegen den La Parota Damm im Bundesstaat Guerrero und gegen den Bau eines Aquädukts im Gebiet unserer Freunde, dem Yaqui Stamm,” sagt Fernandez, Sprecher und Mitglied der Gemeinschaft von Xochicuautla. “Das selbe passiert überall in ganz Mexiko,” fügt er hinzu.

Ein weiterer verborgener Riss ist die Kluft zwischen Israel und einem großen Teil der Juden in aller Welt, besonders denen in den USA. Israel erhebt den Anspruch, der „Nationalstaat des jüdischen Volkes“ zu sein. Alle Juden in der Welt schulden ihm bedingungslosen Gehorsam. Ein mächtiger Apparat „jüdischer Organisationen“ überwacht die Vasallen. Wehe dem Juden, der es wagt, Einwände gegen ihn zu erheben.

Damit ist es aus. Eine Kluft innerhalb des Weltjudentums hat sich aufgetan, die wahrscheinlich nicht überbrückt werden kann. Wenn die amerikanischen Juden zwischen ihrem Präsidenten und Israel wählen müssten, würden viele lieber zu ihrem Präsidenten halten oder sie würden sich einfach ausklinken.

“I’m gonna have to scare the Pope because it’s the only thing,” Trump said. “The Pope, I hope, can only be scared by God. But the truth is — you know, if you look at what’s going on — they better hope that capitalism works, because it’s the only thing we have right now. And it’s a great thing when it works properly.”

Won Tong-yon, a senior North Korean official with years of experience in inter-Korean relations, has disappeared from public view since last December, around the time of the publication of a memoir by former South Korean President Lee Myung-bak that mentioned a mission he was on. (…)

Won, who also led a delegation for high-level talks with South Korea in Kaesong in February 2014, is known for his dovish stance with Seoul.

Top aides to the leaders of North and South Korea will meet at the Panmunjom truce village straddling their military border at 0900 GMT (5.00 a.m. EDT) on Saturday to discuss the situation on the Korean peninsula, the South‘s presidential office said.

President Almazbek Atambayev‘s decree ordered the Central Election Commission „to ensure that the election is free, fair and transparent“. It ordered the government to take steps to safeguard public order and national security during the polls.

In the aftermath of the rioting, the two sides reached a compromise: the wall blocking the lane between cemeteries was torn down and the water canal was unblocked. On a governmental level, officials from both countries agreed to prosecute those determined to be instigators of the unrest.

The train line comes in spite of ethnic tensions. Violence has been endemic across Uzbekistan‘s city of Ferghana some 12 miles off Kyrgyz border, flaring most recently in 2010 when hundreds died in clashes between ethnic Uzbeks and Kyrgyz. But the authorities say it is now under control thanks to strict measures to rein in provocateurs. Kyrgyzstan, a mainly Muslim nation of 5.5 million, is a member of the Customs Union with Russia and Kazakhstan, though its GDP is far lower than that of both nations and it relies on financial assistance from Moscow to survive.

Devastated by civil war and economic collapse following the breakup of the Soviet Union, Kyrgyzstan now hopes to rise out of economic misery through the use of its own resources within the Eurasian Economic Union.

„In the area of ​​Kosovo and Metohija 174 religious sites and 33 cultural and historical monuments have been destroyed, more than 10,000 icons, religious, liturgical, and artistic items stolen. 5,261 headstones have been either destroyed or damaged in 256 Serbian Orthodox cemeteries – and not a single whole tombstone stands on more than 50 of the graveyards,“ said Dacic.

Noting that Serbia condemns any instance of desecration of religious facilities belonging to any religious community, Dacic said that the destruction of cultural and religious heritage in the Near East by ISIS is met with fierce condemnation everywhere in the world and is considered an act of terrorism, while those who are desecrating and destroying Serbia’s cultural heritage in Kosovo are asking to be granted UNESCO membership