Rights News

Beijing - A Chinese court jailed a blogger for three years on Thursday, state media reported, the first person to be sentenced in a government-led crackdown on so-called Internet rumours.

Istanbul - Gay rights groups in Turkey expressed alarm Tuesday at a government-led project to build prisons only for criminals who declare themselves gay, saying it would lead to more discrimination in a largely homophobic country.

Pyongyang - A growing black market economy in North Korea is increasingly allowing private citizens to engage in illicit activity that funnels hard currency to the regime, a US-based group said Tuesday.

London - Amnesty International accused the authorities in Algeria on Monday of silencing critics and stepping up curbs on freedom of expression in the run-up to its presidential election this week.

Beijing - A prominent Chinese legal activist defiantly denounced a court as "absurd" on Friday as it upheld his jail sentence for supporting anti-corruption protests, his lawyer said.

Beijing - A prominent Chinese legal activist defiantly denounced a court as "absurd" on Friday as it upheld his jail sentence for supporting anti-corruption protests, his lawyer said.

Spartanburg - On Monday, the University of South Carolina Upstate announced that they were cancelling an appearance by lesbian humorist, Leigh Hendrix.

Madrid - A retired Spanish policeman denied Thursday torturing people during the country's Franco dictatorship and repeated his refusal to be extradited to Argentina for trial on alleged crimes against humanity.

- A thin mist hangs in the air as a handful of troubled souls wander aimlessly around the Bouya Omar mausoleum in central Morocco, the occasional chilling cry rising from behind its walls.

On Tuesday, a data communications collection requirement was struck down in the European Union and declared invalid, on the grounds that it infringed on basic privacy rights.