Interview With Pussy Riot Member: ‘I Want Justice’
By Matthias Schepp – Spiegel Online – 30 December, 2013

Pussy Riot activist Nadezhda Tolokonnikova talks about her plans following her release from prison, what she has in common with former tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and her five-year-old daughter’s drawings.

Despite the short nights since her release, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova seemed rested and combative when she sat down for a first lengthy interview with SPIEGEL last Friday. The conversation took place in a car, on the trip from Vnukovo International Airport into downtown Moscow. Her husband, Pyotr Verzilov, was sitting next to her. Tolokonnikova, 24, her fingernails painted a bright red, was in good spirits. Before long, she began talking about the “poor conditions in our prisons and our country as a whole.”

She said that she bears no hatred against Russian President Vladimir Putin, but that she is determined to change the system he has created. Then the Pussy Riot activist began singing a few lines from a song she had written while in prison, in which she pokes fun at Putin’s tendency to appear in photos that highlight the macho side of his personality.

“You’re catching a fish, but I want rebellion,” she sang. Before attending a press conference at the studio of opposition TV broadcaster Dozhd, she went to see her five-year-old daughter Gera, who had been living with Tolokonnikova’s in-laws since her arrest.

SPIEGEL: Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, how do you feel after your return from prison in Siberia?

Tolokonnikova: It isn’t easy to return to reality after being disconnected from it for two years. And to be honest, I feel a burden of responsibility to those who are still in prison, as well as those who have supported Pussy Riot and me in this difficult situation. Since I was released from prison on Monday of last week, I’ve only been able to sleep two or three hours a night. Now is the time to given something back to those who believed in me. Perhaps I’ll make mistakes in the process. I think I’ll need help along this path from people who think in political terms and aren’t indifferent to everything.

SPIEGEL: What was everyday life like when you were in prison?

Tolokonnikova: I spent most of the time at a penal colony in Mordovia. This is what my day was like there: Wake up at 5:45 a.m., 12 minutes of early-morning exercise, followed by breakfast and forced labor as a seamstress. Being allowed to go to the bathroom or smoke a cigarette depended on the guards’ mood. Lunch was greasy and of poor quality. The workday ended at 7 p.m., when there was roll call in the prison yard. After that, we were sometimes required to shovel snow or do other cleanup work. Then we waited in line to wash up a little, and finally we went to bed. …more

ISIS – major threat to media freedom in both Iraq and Syria
30 December, 2013 – Reporters without Borders

Reporters Without Borders condemns the attacks that the Jihadi group known as Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) has carried out against news media and journalists in the past few days in both Iraq and the so-called “liberated” areas of Syria.

“We are worried and appalled by the growing number of ISIS attacks on journalists in Iraq and Syria,” Reporters Without Borders said.

“This Jihadi group uses all means possible to further its goal of controlling news and information, systematically targeting journalists and media that do not share its ideology. Intimidation, abduction, torture and murder – ISIS rules nothing out in order to impose a reign of terror.

“The local media play a crucial role in Syria, where news gathering and dissemination is becoming increasingly dangerous. Nowadays they are virtually the only media reporting what is happing in Syria, so attacks on them are real crimes against freedom of information. We firmly condemn this armed group’s actions.”

In a communiqué posted on Jihadi sites on 23 December, ISIS claimed responsibility for the suicide attack earlier that day on the headquarters of Salaheddin TV in Tikrit (180 km north of Baghdad), in which five of the TV station’s employees were killed.

The communiqué said the TV station was targeted because it put out lies and gave a distorted image of Iraq’s Sunni community. The statement also described how the attack was carried out.

ISIS carries out equally violent actions against journalists in the regions it controls in neighbouring Syria and has become one of the main threats to freedom of information in that country, as Reporters Without Borders noted in a report published on 6 November, entitled “Journalism in Syria, impossible job?”

It also bans the circulation of publications it regards as “ungodly.” On 24 December, for example, it prohibited the distribution of the magazines Tlena Al-Huriya and Al-Ghirbal in the northern province of Raqqah and burned copies of them. …more

Saudi Arabia gives Lebanon $3bn to bolster military
The Guardian – 29 December, 2013

Lebanon said on Sunday night that it had received its biggest ever infusion of military aid, as Saudi Arabia offered to contribute $3bn to bolster the country’s beleaguered army in the face of spiralling violence and fallout from the conflict in neighbouring Syria.

The president, Michel Suleiman, said on national television that he would discuss the purchase of French weapons with his visiting French counterpart, François Hollande, as a result of the donation.

“The king of the brotherly kingdom of Saudi Arabia is offering this generous and appreciated aid of $3bn to the Lebanese army to strengthen its capabilities,” Suleiman said in a televised address. “The Saudi grant will allow the Lebanese army to purchase weapons from France.”

Lebanon is struggling to cope with the fallout from the civil war in Syria. That conflict has deeply divided Lebanon along sectarian lines, and paralysed the country’s ramshackle political system to the point that it has been stuck with a weak and ineffectual caretaker government since April.

A wave of deadly bombings and shootings have fuelled fears that Lebanon, which suffered a brutal 15-year civil war of its own that ended only in 1990, could be slowly slipping back towards full-blown sectarian conflict. The latest violence took place on Friday, when a car bomb killed a senior Sunni politician who had been critical of Syria and its Lebanese ally, the Shia militant group Hezbollah.

Addressing those concerns, Suleiman said in his address that “Lebanon is threatened by sectarian conflict and extremism” and that strengthening the army was a popular demand. …more

Bahrain: Urgent Appeal: Fear of Torture During First Days Of Arrest; No Access To Fair Trial
30 December, 2013 – Bahrain Center for Human Rights

The Bahrain Center for Human Rights issues an urgent appeal regarding the individuals who have been arrested in four cases recently announced by the Ministry of Interior. As has been seen in the past several years, and especially in cases where charges are brought under the internationally criticized terrorism law, those arrested by the authorities in Bahrain are often severely tortured during the first few days of their detention in order to obtain confessions. These confessions are then used in unfair trials, and lengthy prison sentences are handed down.

Details of the cases:

The Ministry of Interior announced that they had “foiled four plots” and added that “indications show these operations are linked to each others”, the cases that have been announced in the press conference are:

(1) First case: the dismantle of an “armed car” in Al-Hoora area.

(2) Second case: the arrest of thirteen individuals (one of them holds a Saudi passport) who were wanted by the authorities, and had attempted to escape Bahrain by sea; there were three sailors transporting them.

(3) Third case: the interception of a speed boat with two persons on board delivering weapons into Bahrain by sea.

(4) Fourth case: the uncovering of a “explosives/weapons warehouse in “AlQaryah” in connection with third case.

The details of these cases were announced by the “Chief of Public Security” Tariq AlHassan, who was previously included in the BCHR “Wanted for Justice” campaign.

…more

Bahrain: religious persecution continues, calls to investigate torture
By davidswanson – 27 December, 2013 – warisacrime.org

In a flagrant attack on religious freedom, the Alkhalifa regime has summoned the heads[1]of three Hussaini Oration Centres to attend the prosecution centre where many others had been tortured before. The heads of Bin Khamis and Sanabis mourning halls have been asked to attend the prosecutor’s office, which has become one of the main abusers of human rights in Bahrain. This follows the strong public participation in the mourning processions in the past few days to mark the Arba’een (Fourtieth Day after Imam Hussain’s martyrdom). Some anti-regime sentiments were expressed in those processions as people remembered their own dead, wounded and imprisoned by the Alkhalifa enemy.

Meanwhile the attacks on native Bahrainis have continued. In the early hours of this morning at least five[2] people were arrested; Sayed Mohammad Sayed Aqeel Al Mousawi, Salman Al Mawt, Baqir Ibrahim Khamis, Ali Hassan Al Tabbal and Hussain Ra’id from Sanabis.

The Bahrain Centre for Human Rights has issued a special report on the abuse of children[3] by the ruling Alkhalifa clan. It mentioned two boys aged thirteen years; Sayed Hashim Alawi and Sayed Tamim Majid. On 7th December they were arrested for taking part in anti-regime protests, but their detention has been repeatedly renewed and are still behind bars. They were accused of planning to overthrow the Alkhalifa regime by force. On 20th December Amnesty International issued an Urgent Action[4] about the two boys. It said: “Cousins Sayed Tameem Majed Ahmad Majed and Sayed Hashim Alwai Ahmad Majed were arrested on 7 December in the north-western village of Bani Jamra, and taken to the police station in al-Budaya, Manama, in two separate incidents. Sayed Tameem, who turned 13 on 19 December, was arrested at about 3.10pm in front of his grandparents’ house about 15 minutes after he had arrived with his family, for a visit, and while he was playing with a young er cousin. He had run away after seeing a police patrol car approaching, but his family did not see him being arrested. They were later told by eyewitnesses that he had been taken away by a police patrol. Sayed Hashim, aged 13, was arrested at about 3.45pm near his grandparents’ house while on his way to a nearby shop”. It also called for protecting the two children from torture and forming an independent commission to examine torture claims. …more

David Isaksson denied entry to Bahrain
28 December, 2013 – Global Reporting

David Isaksson, CEO of the Swedish consultancy firm Global Reporting, was today denied entry to Bahrain despite the fact that EU citizens can get visa on arrival. The reason given was that Global Reporting is a company working with communication and development issues and that David Isaksson was thus suspected of planning to meet with opposition and human rights activists in the country.

“I am currently travelling to 50 countries around the world where I have not yet been before, asking people about happiness. This was also the main reason for my visit to Bahrain”, David Isaksson says, adding:

“Obviously, happiness is a dangerous word in Bahrain today”.

David Isaksso spent about eight hours at the aiirport of Bahrain before having to board a plane back to Dubai.

Find out more about the Happiness project at www.globalhappiness.se follow David Isaksson on twitter at @davidglobal

Amnesty International, Reporters without borders and several other international organisations are criticising Bahrain for it’s human rights abuses. Recently, Amnesty has called for a halt on dentation, abuse and torture of children in Bahrain. …more

Bahrain Says Foils ‘Terror’ Attempts, Seizes Explosives, Weapons
By REUTERS – 30 December, 2013

MANAMA — Bahraini authorities have foiled an attempt to smuggle explosives and arms, some made in Iran and Syria, into the country by boat, the Gulf Arab state’s public security chief said on Monday.

Bahrain, home to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, has been rattled by bouts of unrest since February 2011, when protests led by members of its Shi’ite majority demanded that the Sunni ruling family give up ultimate power to an elected parliament.

“According to the investigations, which revealed plans to carry out terrorist acts, security deployment has been intensified,” Major-General Tariq al-Hassan said in comments published by the official news agency BNA.

He said security forces had also dismantled a car bomb in the al-Houra area east of Manama, seized a weapons and explosive cache and arrested 13 people, including a Saudi Arabian national, trying to flee the country by boat.

The smuggled munitions included what Hassan called anti-personnel and armor-piercing explosives, as well as “50 Iranian-made hand bombs” and “295 commercial detonators on which was written ‘made in Syria'”, he said.

The Manama government, dominated for generations by the Sunni Muslim Al Khalifa family, accuses the opposition of having a Shi’ite sectarian agenda and links to Iran and to Lebanese Shi’ite militant group Hezbollah.

The opposition denies this, saying such allegations are a pretext for avoiding democratic reforms. Tehran also denies any link, but champions the cause of the opposition while Hezbollah has criticized Manama’s crackdown on Shi’ite protesters.

The Bahraini government largely put down the uprising with help from Gulf Arab neighbors but small-scale clashes continue and bomb attacks mainly on policemen and security officers have been increasing since mid-2012.

Bahrain’s Shi’ite opposition groups suspended their participation in reconciliation talks with the government after the arrest of a senior member of al-Wefaq, the main opposition group, in September. …source