The Venezuelan leader and his supporters celebrated the country's referendum result on Sunday which voted in a constituent assembly that would have the power to re-write the constitution. 

The move has been fiercely opposed by opposition parties and supporters who say it consolidates the president's dictatorship. 

Protesters barricaded the streets on Monday, in a demonstration against Sunday's vote. 

The US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to impose new sanctions on Russia over Moscow's alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential election, reports the Financial Times.

The new sanctions package has faced intense scrutiny from Europeans countries with Germany raising concern about the impact new oil pipelines from Russia by limiting companies access to US banks.

The US government on Wednesday introduced sanctions on 13 senior officials in Venezuela, as the country's opposition protested against President Maduro's government. 

The vice president for the state oil company, army chiefs, police chiefs and the national director of elections were all targetted in the new wave of sanctions. 

The US has warned Iran of “new and serious consequences” if all unjustly detained American citizens were released and returned, said the White House in a statement made on Friday.

The statement made on Friday said President Trump and is administration were “redoubling efforts” to bring back unjustly detained Americans abroad, reports Reuters.

In a significant set back to judicial independence in the country, Poland's parliament on Friday approved a new law which brings the Supreme Court under the control of the ruling party. 

The move has been widely criticism by EU states and the US who have raised concerns over what is being described as Poland's shift away from liberal values. Protesters have also taken to the streets to voice their concern at the curtailment of judicial independence. 

Turkey’s parliament has forbidden its lawmakers from using the certain phrases such as “Kurdistan” or “Armenian genocide” during legislative sessions following the passing of a bill package on Thursday night.

Though the bill does not explicitly set out which words and phrases are banned from the Turkish parliament, terms that are “in violation of the administrative structure” as defined by the “indivisible wholeness” of the Republic of Turkey will now be banned.

Amnesty International condemned what it described as the Cameroon forces' "horrific use of torture" against Boko Haram fighters, saying investigations reveal wide spread war crimes, human rights violations and the use of secret torture chambers.  

Microsoft Corporation and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights this month agreed to work together to build a digital human rights monitoring system and databank, reported Pass Blue. 

The agreement, which was bourne out of conversations between the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay and Microsoft in 2013, includes a $5 million grant from Micorsoft as well as pro bono technical support over five years. 

The situation of the Rohingya has not approved  as surveillance and questioning of journalists and activists continues under Myanmar’s new government said the Special Rapporteur on Myanmar Yanhee Lee at the conclusion of her visit.

The United States on Tuesday introduced new sanctions on Iran over the country's ballistic missile program, which the US described as "malign activities". 

"The United States remains deeply concerned about Iran's malign activities across the Middle East which undermine regional stability, security, and prosperity," the state Department said in a statement. 

French President Emmanuel Macron apologised for France’s role in the Holocaust during a speech in Paris today, as he called for acknowledge of the role the country played during the massacres.

Mr Macron stated that “it was indeed France that organised this,” referring to the deportation of tens of thousands of Jews to Nazi camps during World War II.

A prominent Rwandan academic has been convicted of genocide and handed a life sentence, reports the Washington Post.

Leopold Munyazakazi was convicted by a court in the south of Rwanda on Friday and will be held under solitary confinement according to the verdict.

An ethnic Hutu, Mr Munyakazi was accused of playing a key role in the 1994 genocide in which over 800,000 Tutsis, and some moderate Hutus, were massacred.

Benghazi’s international airport, Benina, has reopened for commercial flights after a three year closure due to fighting in the city.

The first outward flights were from the airport to the Lybian capital Tripoli reports Reuters.

Benina is just east of Benghazi, Libya’s second largest city, where fighting escalated in the summer of 2014.

Parliamentarians in Sweden have filed a lawsuit against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, accusing him of carrying out genocide against Kurds.

"We are five lawmakers handing in a complaint... (requesting) punishment for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes," said Left party MP Annika Lillemets at a press conference in Stockholm.