Opening statements in a landmark trial involving some of the world’s biggest social media companies, including Google, YouTube and Meta, opened in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Monday, to determine the platforms’ alleged harmful effects on children. The case will test claims about addiction and whether the tech giants can be held liable for [...]

The UN’s top human rights official on Monday warned of increasing atrocities in Sudan and demanded the international community take quick action to de-escalate violence in the country. UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk told member states at the Human Rights Council in Geneva that “we can only expect worse to come” unless international action [...]

Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado on Monday sounded the alarm via X on the re-arrest of opposition politician Juan Pablo Guanipa, pointing to ongoing concerns over arbitrary detention and political repression in the country.  According to Machado’s public statements on social media, Guanipa, former vice president of the Venezuelan National Assembly, was detained by [...]

A US federal judge on Monday temporarily halted her prior order requiring the US Department of Transportation (DOT) to release funds to New York and New Jersey for the Hudson Tunnel Project, to allow the administration time to appeal. The order denied the Trump administration’s request for a longer stay, only granting the pause through [...]

The Hong Kong Court of First Instance sentenced media tycoon and Apple Daily newspaper founder Jimmy Lai to 20 years imprisonment on Monday following his conviction in December on “national security” charges. This marks the latest development in a years-long legal battle, and the heaviest sentence since the instatement of the 2020 National Security Law. Lai was [...]

Nicaragua ended visa-free travel for Cuban citizens on Sunday, cutting off a pathway for Cubans seeking to enter the US. The order requires Cuban citizens to now carry more than an ordinary passport to travel in Nicaragua. The move is a shift away from Nicaragua’s “visa-free” policy for Cuban citizens, implemented in 2021 to promote [...]

France’s former culture minister resigned from his leading role at a French cultural institute, Institut du Monde Arabe (IMA), after the US Department of Justice’s recent “Epstein files” release revealed financial links to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, prompting a tax investigation. Jack Lang, who served as cultural minister in under president François Mitterrand, is accused [...]

Cuban authorities are escalating surveillance and harassment of families of political prisoners while denying adequate medical care to jailed dissidents, Amnesty International said Monday. The human rights organization reported that relatives of prisoners of conscience face police cordons around their homes, movement restrictions, and threats, and that these actions are occurring in the absence of [...]

A military drone strike in western Niger killed at least 17 civilians, including four children, and injured at least 13 others when it hit a crowded market on January 6, according to an investigation by Human Rights Watch (HRW) released Monday. The afternoon strike in Kokoloko village in the Tillabéri region killed three Islamic State [...]

Houthi authorities in Yemen have arbitrarily detained more than 20 Christians over the past three months in what Human Rights Watch (HRW) characterizes as a campaign of enforced disappearances targeting the religious minority. The detentions began in late November and early December 2025, with an expansion on December 24, Christmas Eve, according to HRW interviews [...]