Hong Kong police arrested at least 289 protestors on Sunday, as they assembled on the day the local elections were supposed to be held. Elections were postponed for at least a year, and officials pointed to the pandemic as the reason for moving the election date.

Police officers used pepper spray against protestors, and some of the arrests were made by plainclothes police officers. One activist was even arrested in his home on Sunday for “uttering seditious words”, whilst footage of officers tackling a 12-year-old girl to the ground also went viral.

Nearly 300 Rohingya refugees who were stranded at sea for months after being denied port in Southeast Asia were rescued by Indonesian fisherman this week. 

The group included 14 children, and two of the refugees were taken to the hospital for medical care. It has been reported that approximately 30 people died during the months they spent at sea.

Human Rights Watch said India should prohibit firing metal pellets through shotguns to disperse crowds in the restive Kashmir valley, in the wake of violent clashes with security forces when people defied a ban on public gatherings imposed due to reported concerns over the coronavirus pandemic on Muharram, an important date in the Shia calendar. 

Facebook chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg unveiled new measures to restrict the spread of misleading comments and politically-biased lies on Facebook before the United States presidential election on 3^rd November 2020. Zuckerberg said that he was “worried” but the election would not “be business as usual”.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) celebrated the Sierra Leone parliament’s repealed the criminal libel law on 23 July, completing President Maada Bio’s promise he made on the campaign trail before the 2018 election. 

In Sierra Leone, libel has been a punishable criminal offence since 1965, which journalists said restricted free speech and expression.

In a joint statement by Canada and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, they expressed their intention to intervene in support of Gambia’s genocide lawsuit against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Prashant Bhushan, an Indian public interest lawyer, who was fined one rupee for posting tweets that were critical of the Indian Supreme Court, called the decision “very dangerous”.

The builder who contracted a five-storey building in Maharashtra has been arrested following a collapse last month that saw at least 16 people killed.

The building collapsed during heavy monsoon rains in Mahad in the Raigad district, south of Mumbai. 

The leaders behind the coup in Mali said during an address to the nation that they will hold democratic elections, as talks on the transition to civilian rule begin in the country this weekend.

Photo of Kaing Guek Eav at his 2009 trial 

The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) has claimed the number of complaints it has received from Iraq relating to unlawful detention and mistreatment by British soldiers is too numerous and that a full disclosure of the sum paid to settle claims would not be possible.

The MoD insists that they cannot provide the full figure as it would take weeks for civil servants to collate all the figures however claim that they are able to provide approximate figures for the thousands of complaints lodged against British troops during their involvement in the 2003 US-led invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq.

This statement comes as British parliament is set to debate a controversial bill, “the Overseas which would provide partial amnesty for troops who have committed serious crimes - including murder and torture - while serving outside the country.

Former Bosnian Serb general, Ratko Mladic, has appealed his 2017 conviction of genocide and crimes against humanity during the Yugoslav wars, appearing in the Hague on Tuesday.

Rwanda’s government has issued an international arrest warrant for former Rwandan spy, Aloys Ntiwiragabo, for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

According to French news site Mediapart, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) has identified Ntiwiragabo as one of the architects of the genocide.

This warrant follows the arrest of alleged genocide architect, Felicien Kabuga, who had evaded authorities for 25 years by travelling to several countries. Kabuga is accused of financing the Rwandan genocide.