Aung San Suu Kyi casts vote in Myanmar’s first free election for 25 years
The opposition leader and one-time political prisoner under military rule battled through a media scrum to reach the polling station in the capital Yangon
Aung San Suu Kyi, the Myanmar opposition leader and one-time political prisoner under military rule, has cast her vote in the country’s first free election in 25 years.
Suu Kyi’s car inched through a scrum of news photographers waiting outside the school building in Yangon, and she was stony-faced as bodyguards shouted at people to move out of the way.
Most in the crowd of well-wishers gathered there were lucky to get a glimpse of the garland on Suu Kyi’s hair as she went inside to vote without a smile or a wave.
UN peacekeeping force turns blind eye to mass rape in Darfur, victims say
Exclusive: A year after Sudanese troops abused a town’s female population, they continue, with impunity, as a ‘punishment’
When 200 women and girls in the town of Tabit, north Darfur, were raped, local people knew there would be little chance of justice. The attacks, which took place over three nights, had been perpetrated by locally garrisoned government soldiers, who act with impunity under Sudanese law. The joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force, Unamid, which operates across Darfur, was known to turn a blind eye to human rights abuses.
But still they spoke to those who would listen. A year ago this week, Human Rights Watch began collecting testimony from townspeople, which the group believes could amount to crimes against humanity.
Among the victims were Khatera, a woman in her forties, and her three young daughters – all under the age of 11.
Governments and NGOs: Germany Spied on Friends and Vatican
Efforts to spy on friends and allies by Germany’s foreign intelligence agency, the BND, were more extensive than previously reported. SPIEGEL has learned the agency monitored European and American government ministries and the Vatican.
Three weeks ago, news emerged that Germany’s foreign intelligence service, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), had systematically spied on friends and allies around the world. In many of those instances, the BND had been doing so of its own accord and not at the request of the NSA. The BND came under heavy criticism earlier this year after news emerged that it had assisted the NSA in spying on European institutions, companies and even Germans using dubious selector data.
SPIEGEL has since learned from sources that the spying went further than previously reported. Since October’s revelations, it has emerged that the BND spied on the United States Department of the Interior and the interior ministries of EU member states including Poland, Austria, Denmark and Croatia. The search terms used by the BND in its espionage also included communications lines belonging to US diplomatic outposts in Brussels and the United Nations in New York. The list even included the US State Department’s hotline for travel warnings.
Burundians flee capital in run-up to crackdown
Growing international alarm as government urges security forces to use all means necessary to stamp out resistance.
| Politics, War & Conflict, Africa, Burundi
Families are fleeing their homes in Burundi’s capital over fears the government will unleash a fresh wave of bloodletting as part of a crackdown to stamp out resistance to the president.
International alarm has grown in advance of a deadline of midnight on Saturday for civilians to hand over weapons or face a new government crackdown, drawing warnings from the head of the UN, the US and the Hague-based International Criminal Court.
Fearing a fresh escalation of bloodshed, people on Sunday started leaving parts of Bujumbura that have seen the worst recent violence.
Burundi has been engulfed in violence, prompted by President Pierre Nkurunziza’s successful bid to win a third term in office, with bodies found dumped in the streets on a nearly daily basis.
‘Mysterious light in sky’ spooks California
A mysterious bright light in the sky has sent Californians into panic – only for it to be explained soon afterwards.
The light was spotted travelling quickly over Orange County and neighbouring areas late on Saturday, leading to fevered speculation online over its origin.
The Orange County sheriff said the light was from a naval test fire made off the California coastline.
Aviation officials had warned of possible US military activity.
Videos posted online show a bright flare rising high, before a wide, bright blue flash emerges in a cone shape. Many videos continue to track the light for several minutes.
On Friday, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said night-time flights to and from Los Angeles International (LAX) would avoid flying over the Pacific Ocean to the west of the airport, the second busiest in the US.
Police brutality and impunity in South Asia: Indian scene
On the evening of November 4, a prominent TV news channel in New Delhi went to town on a serious case of police brutality in the Andheri police station in suburban Mumbai (earlier Bombay) in the state of Maharashtra ruled by a right wing government.
A woman and a man were dragged into the police station on the flimsy charge of having ‘quarreled’ in the public space and were brutalised mercilessly. The video clip on the torture went viral on the social media. The mainstream print media did not take similar notice of the event. Was this the result of political manipulation by interested parties in Mumbai?
This case of police brutality against ordinary people was clearly illegal and constituted a serious human rights violation, punishable under the law. Participants in the TV panel discussion took pro-and anti-state government postures; one of them called for long-neglected police reforms.