PAKISTAN: Bracing For More Drone Attacks

On Jan 23, days after Barack Obama was sworn in as President of the United States, a series of missiles slammed into Pakistan’s tribal areas along the Afghan border - in continuation of Washington’s policy of targeting al-Qaeda and Taliban elements regardless of sovereignty issues.

RIGHTS-MALAYSIA: Custodial Death Revives Calls For Police Reforms

The death of a youth in police custody and the torture of another in a police lockup, in recent weeks, have shocked Malaysians and revived calls for an oversight body - proposed in 2006 by a royal commission but unimplemented because of opposition from senior officers in the command.

INDIA/PAKISTAN: Artists Take On Post-Colonial Partitions

With national boundaries continually being redrawn in the post-colonial world, it’s time to deal with the reality of partitions and find a way "to make peace with our partitioned selves", contends international banker-turned-art curator Hammad Nasar.

RIGHTS-US: The Children of Guantanamo

Legal experts and human rights advocates are challenging the public to remember Guantanamo's "child soldiers" when the detainees there are characterised as "the worst of the worst".

COLOMBIA: Freed Hostage Calls for Peace Negotiations

"At one point I thought we weren't going to find him," said Colombian Senator Piedad Córdoba about Alan Jara, the latest hostage to be freed as a goodwill gesture by insurgents after more than seven-and-a-half years as their captive in the jungle.

RIGHTS-US: Indefinite Detention Case to Test Obama’s Pledges

In what promises to be the first major test of the Barack Obama administration's new approach to the rule of law, the Supreme Court will soon hear what could be one of the most consequential cases in U.S. history.

Q&A: ‘Internet Should Not Build Firewalls of Hate’

Rabbi Abraham Cooper, one of the world's leading human rights activists, is often heard on the subject of hate. He is an international authority on issues related to digital hate over the Internet.

U.S.: More Troops, More Worries, Less Consensus on Afghanistan

Even as U.S. President Barack Obama prepares to deploy more military forces to Afghanistan - what he has called "the central front" in former President George W. Bush's "global war on terror" - a consensus on overall U.S. strategy there remains elusive.

COLOMBIA: One More Day’s Delay for Civilian Hostages

Alan Jara, the former governor of the central province of Meta, was released by Colombian guerrillas on Tuesday, instead of Monday as originally scheduled. Former regional lawmaker for the western province of Valle del Cauca, Sigifredo López, was scheduled to have been freed on Wednesday, but his handover has now been postponed until Thursday.

RIGHTS-US: Study Challenges Claims of Gitmo Recidivism

A prominent law professor says the U.S. Defence Department is issuing questionable data on the number of Guantanamo detainees who have been released "and then returned to the battlefield" because the government "is now in a position where they have to find some bad guys - even if they have to invent them by naming people who were never there".

RIGHTS-PHILIPPINES: Poor Suffer Most From Corruption

Apo Aguila, a computer programmer, moved to Singapore in 2005, frustrated with the news that Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had allegedly cheated in the 2004 presidential election.

RIGHTS-NEPAL: Law on Disappearances Provokes Outcry

Despite loud opposition, the Maoist-led coalition government of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has vowed to push through an ordinance to resolve the cases of hundreds of people ‘disappeared’ during the decade-long people's war waged between Maoist rebels and the forces of the former monarchy.

INDIA: WSF Must Address Terrorism Says Mumbai

Civil society in this port city, victim of the Nov. 26-29 terrorist attacks and host to the 2004 World Social Forum, has one question to ask - will the movement seriously address terrorism?

THAILAND: Malay-Muslims Complain in Court of Torture

A year after they were allegedly subjected to torture by the Thai army, two young men from the country’s troubled southern provinces have done what no other victim of similar abuse in the area has dared to do - go to court.

RIGHTS-US: Close Torture Loopholes, Physicians’ Group Urges

While applauding President Barack Obama's recent executive orders banning torture and other harsh interrogation practices, medical authorities are calling attention to a little-reported section of the Army's Field Manual on Interrogation that they say still allows the use of tactics that can constitute torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment under U.S. and international law.

Q&A: "U.S. Must Take Seriously What the World Thinks"

John Brown, a Foreign Service officer with the U.S. State Department for more than 20 years, resigned in 2003 to protest the U.S. invasion of Iraq. He now teaches at Georgetown University.

POLITICS-US: Top Defence Chiefs Vow Focus on Afghanistan

Both the top civilian and military leadership of the U.S. Department of Defence had busy days on Tuesday, fielding topically varied questions on their new policy priorities since President Barack Obama took office one week ago.

AUSTRALIA: Complicit in East Timor Occupation – Records

Recently declassified government records from 1978 are a further indictment of Australia’s complicity in Indonesia’s 24-year occupation of East Timor.

US-EUROPE: Few Welcome Mats for Guantanamo Detainees

International human rights groups have expressed mixed reactions to the European Union's lukewarm pledge to accept some detainees from U.S. custody at Guantanamo Bay once the facility closes.

POLITICS: Muslim World Hails End of a Despised Symbol

While the decision of President Barack Obama to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay Cuba, and end the practice of interrogation techniques that violate international law, made front page news throughout the United States, press reaction in the Middle East was far less extensive - but generally favourable.

RIGHTS-INDIA: Clamour for Police Reforms Louder Post Mumbai

Following the Nov. 26-29 terror attacks on the port city of Mumbai, which exposed lack of coordination among various security forces, the clamour to implement long-pending police reforms in India has become louder.