The Taipei prison executed death row inmate Weng Jen-hsien on Wednesday after the Supreme Court convicted him of killing six people. Rights groups condemned the execution, stating the death penalty is a human rights violation and should be abolished. Weng was convicted of killing his parents, niece, nephew, nephew’s wife and his parents’ caregivers after setting [...]

The UN General Assembly on Thursday unanimously agreed to a resolution urging international cooperation to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic. It is the first resolution the assembly adopted since the outbreak. The resolution calls on international cooperation to “contain, mitigate and defeat the pandemic, including by exchanging information, scientific knowledge and best practices and by applying the [...]

The Singapore Ministry of Health enacted stay-at-home and social distancing regulations on Thursday amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The penalty for violating the regulations is a fine up to $10,000 or imprisonment up to six months or both. All travelers coming back to Singapore, including citizens and permanent residents, will have to go into quarantine for [...]

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Thursday pardoned former army sergeant Sunil Ratnayake, who was sentenced to death for killing eight Tamil civilians during the country’s civil war. After a 13-year trial, the Colombo High Court found Ratnayake guilty of eight civilian murders and sentenced him to death in June 2015. The Supreme Court upheld [...]

The Afghan government delayed the release of Taliban prisoners on Saturday after disagreements occurred over the number of detainees to be released and uncertainty about whether the prisoners would return to fighting. The Taliban agreed to talks with the Afghan government after signing an accord with the US. The accord ended 18 years of US [...]

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy and Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont on Monday announced an unprecedented regional effort to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). In a joint statement, they said that restaurants, bars, theaters, gyms and casinos must close in the three states, effective 8 PM Monday. [...]

US Immigration Judge Rebecca Holt issued a removal order on Thursday against Tennessee resident Friedrich Karl Berger, a former Nazi concentration camp guard. Holt found Berger removable under the Immigration and Nationality Act because his “willing service as an armed guard of prisoners at a concentration camp where persecution took place.” Holt ordered Berger removed [...]

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet Jeria is moving to file an intervention application in the India Supreme Court to seek review of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), an official spokesperson for India said Tuesday. The application requests that the court review the CAA with regard to international human rights law and the [...]

A UN report published Wednesday found that in 2019, killings of women activists in Colombia increased by 50 percent and a total of 108 human rights defenders were killed. The UN documented specific killings of citizens who defended the rights of their communities. For instance, a woman named Magdelena was killed for defending land allocation and [...]

The New York state bar application will no longer ask questions inquiring into mental health, Chief Judge Janet DiFore announced Wednesday. DiFore made the announcement during her State of the Judiciary address. The goal is to protect law students seeking admission to the New York bar who are dealing with depression, anxiety and other mental health [...]