Following the coup and a brutal crackdown on unarmed protestors, the people of Myanmar have taken up arms against the military which now only has stable control over 17 per cent of the country. 

Thwarted in his bid to consolidate his coup, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing responded with even more violence. The military has restarted political executions, burned entire villages to the ground, bombed hospitals and schools, and even an outdoor concert – attacks human rights groups say may amount to crimes against humanity.

The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a global crisis mapping group, estimates that some 27,683 people may have died from political violence in Myanmar since the military’s power grab in February of last year.

Under pressure, the military has drawn up civilian militias of its own, called Phyu Saw Htee, and launched a campaign of widespread arson, razing homes and villages to the ground in a bid to root out any resistance forces. The fighting is causing untold suffering, having also forced hundreds of thousands to flee their homes.

“Armed resistance, bolstered by an extensive popular non-violent movement, is now so pervasive that the military risks losing control of territory wherever it is unable to commit resources to actively defend,” The Special Advisory Council for Myanmar, a group of rights experts, said in a September report (PDF).

Read more at Al Jazeera.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has accused Russian soldiers of committing war crimes and killing civilians in Kherson, which was retaken by Ukraine last week.

“Investigators have already documented more than 400 Russian war crimes. Bodies of dead civilians and servicemen have been found,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address on Sunday, without specifying the locations where the bodies had been discovered.

It was not immediately possible to verify Zelenskyy’s allegations. Russia denies its troops intentionally target civilians.

Mass graves have been found in several places across Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion, including the bodies of civilians showing evidence of torture discovered in the northeastern Kharkiv region and in Bucha, near the capital Kyiv. Ukraine has accused Russian troops of committing the crimes.

The region was one of four that Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed to have annexed in September, a move dubbed illegal by Kyiv and denounced by Western countries.

Read more at Al Jazeera

The European Union and the United Kingdom have imposed additional sanctions on Iranian officials in response to the widespread use of force against protestors. 

So far, 336 demonstrators have been killed in the unrest and nearly 15,100 detained, according to the activist HRANA news agency.

“We stand with the Iranian people and support their right to protest peacefully and voice their demands and views freely,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a statement.

Among those sanctioned by the EU with travel bans and asset freezes are four members of the squad that arrested Amini, high-ranking members of the Revolutionary Guards and Iran’s Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi, according to an EU statement.

The sanctions are meant “to send a clear message to those who think they can suppress, intimidate and kill their own people without consequences,” German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock told reporters as she arrived for a meeting with her EU counterparts in Brussels.

Earlier on Monday, the United Kingdom’s foreign office said in a statement that it was sanctioning 24 Iranian officials, in coordination with international partners.

Those targeted by British sanctions include Iranian Communications Minister Issa Zarepour as well as the chief of its cyber police, Vahid Mohammad Naser Majid, and a range of political and security officials, it said.

“These sanctions target officials within the Iranian regime who are responsible for heinous human rights violations,” UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said.

Britain said Zarepour and Majid had been sanctioned for shutting down the internet in Iran, including disabling WhatsApp and Instagram as part of a wider clampdown on freedom of expression and peaceful assembly.

Read more at Al Jazeera 

A court in Tehran has issued the first death sentence to a person arrested for taking part in protests.

A human rights group warned authorities might be planning "hasty executions".

At least 20 people are currently facing charges punishable by death, Norway-based Iran Human Rights said, citing official reports.

Its director, Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, called on the international community to take urgent action and "strongly warn the Islamic Republic of the consequences of executing protesters".

The execution was ordered for an unidentified person for allegedly setting fire to a government building. It followed 272 of Iran’s 290 lawmakers voting earlier this month to implement the death penalty for serious crimes against the state.

 The court in Tehran found the defendant, who was not named, had set fire to a government facility and was guilty of "enmity against God".

Another court jailed five people for between five and 10 years on national security and public order charges.

Upwards of 326 people have died in 57 days of demonstrations, which erupted after the death of a young woman who was detained for wearing her headdress “inappropriately”. Thousands more have been detained.

Iran's leaders have portrayed the protests as "riots" instigated by the country's foreign enemies.

Last week, judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei declared that "key perpetrators" should be identified as soon as possible and handed sentences that would have a deterrent effect on others.

Read more at the BBC 

The UK has agreed to open negotiations with Mauritius over the future handover of the Chagos Island, in a major reversal of policy following years of resistance and legal defeats in international courts but will continue to maint control over it's military base in Diego Garcia. 

The proposed agreement will allow for the return of former inhabitants of the Chagos archipelago who were forcibly displaced by the British government in the 1960s and 1970s. 

When Mauritius gained independence from the UK in 1968, London severed the Chagos Islands from the rest of the country so it could lease the island of Diego Garcia to the US for a military base. The UK then forcibly deported 2,000 Chagossians, who have waged a long legal battle to return. 

In 2019 the international court of justice, the UN's highest court ruled that the continuing British occupation of the island was illegal. The ruling also determined that the Chagos' islands were rightfully part of Mauritius. 

Last year the Hamburg-based international tribunal for the law of the sea ruled that the British claim to the archipelago was illegal, but the UK also refused to accept that ruling.

More recently the tribunal took up the dispute between Mauritius and the Maldives over a 37,000-sq-mile (95,000 sq km) expanse of the Indian Ocean. Both sides are claiming the fish-rich waters as their own economic zones.

Earlier this year As many as 42 Eelam Tamil asylum-seekers launched a hunger strike after eight months of being detained on a military base 3,000 miles south of India, as a plea to the UK government to allow them to seek asylum in another country.  

The 42 refugees are part of a group of 89 Eelam Tamils, including 20 children who set out from southern India in a fishing boat in late September 2021 in the hopes of claiming asylum in Canada. Most of the group fled to India years earlier to escape death and violence during the culmination of the Tamil Genocide in Mullivaikkal of 2009. At least one of the asylum seekers took part in the Pottuvil to Polikandy (P2P) protest rally last year. They now fear being forcibly removed to a third country under Rwanda-style plans drawn up by the UK government.

Read more at the Guardian 

Ethiopia’s government and the TPLF have agreed to facilitate immediate humanitarian access to “all in need” in war-ravaged Tigray and neighbouring regions.

The agreement comes after talks in Nairobi, Kenya this week after the signed peace agreement between the two warring sides brought an end to the two year conflict in Northern Ethiopia. 

“The parties have agreed to facilitate unhindered humanitarian access to all in need of assistance in Tigray and neighbouring regions,” according to a joint statement read out at a Nairobi press conference on Saturday.

The agreement was signed by field marshal Berhanu Jula, Ethiopian armed forces’ chief of staff, and Gen Tadesse Worede, commander-in-chief of the Tigray rebel forces.

The two sides had also agreed to establish a joint committee to implement an agreement to disarm fighters with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the statement said.

After little more than a week of negotiations in the South African capital of Pretoria, the government of the prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, and the TPLF on 2 November signed a peace deal that has been hailed by the international community as a crucial first step in ending the bloodshed.

The northernmost region of Ethiopia is in the grip of a severe humanitarian crisis due to the lack of food and medicine, coupled with limited access to basic services, including electricity, banking and communications. 

The restoration of aid to Tigray and its 6 million people was one of the key planks of the accord.

The conflict between the TPLF and pro-Abiy forces, which include regional militias and the Eritrean army, has caused an untold number of deaths, forced more than 2 million people from their homes and driven hundreds of thousands to the brink of famine in Tigray.

Estimates of casualties vary widely, with the United States saying that as many as half a million people have died, while the EU’s foreign envoy, Josep Borrell, said more than 100,000 people may have been killed.

UN-backed investigators have accused all sides of committing abuses but also charged that Addis Ababa had been using starvation as a weapon of war – claims denied by the Ethiopian authorities.

On Wednesday, the World Health Organization called for a massive influx of food and medicines into Tigray after the ceasefire deal, saying aid had not yet been allowed in.

“Many people are dying from treatable diseases. Many people are dying from starvation,” the WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who hails from Tigray, told a press conference

Read more at the Guardian

The Brazilian Defence Ministry's report concluded that no discrepancies were found in the recent election, which saw right-wing president Bolsonaro unseated by a narrow margin. 

It is Brazil's method of casting votes that has drawn scrutiny and criticism. Brazil is the only country in the world that has fully transitioned to a paperless, electronic voting system. 

Some have criticised the involvement of the military in the election investigation. Paulo Calmon, a political science professor at the University of Brasilia, claims, "the idea to formally involve the armed forces in electoral processes is an error that should never be repeated."

The report in question was praised by independent security experts, who found its contents technically sound. However, the report may have armed Bolsonaro's supporters with enough fuel to continue their campaign to undermine the election outcome. 

As elaborated in the report, all computational technology has a well-established element of vulnerability. While the electronic voting system is efficient and reliable, the system is not one hundred per cent secure, as with any digital system. This is the point that Bolsonaro's supporters are hoping to leverage. 

Marcos Simplício, a cybersecurity researcher at the University of São Paulo, who has been involved in the testing of Brazil's voting machines, had the following to say; "That's the problem with technical reports: They just speak facts, and people take those and do whatever they want with it,". He continues, "They can just say, 'See, there are points of improvement. So it's not secure. We cannot use it.'" 

As part of his work, Mr Simplício and his team have tested the security of the voting system by attempting to hack the machines. They failed. The devices are not connected to the internet, making them almost impossible to tamper with remotely. The machines are also encrypted, and encryption keys are used to add a further layer of protection.  

Bolsonaro has avoided the public gaze since his election loss. He made a brief appearance two days after the election to call on his supporters to unblock roads and highways across the country as they protested the election outcome. Bolsonaro has not himself raised accusations of election fraud but has thus far refused to admit defeat.

Read more at The Guardian 

Dressed in full army uniform, President Xi called on military personnel to “focus all its energy on fighting” according to reports from a Chinese Communist party mouthpiece. 

President Xi made these comments when addressing the People’s Liberation Army during a recent visit to a command centre. “Focus all [your] energy on fighting, work hard on fighting and improve [your] capability to win,” the instructed army officials. He is said to have gone on to urge the cohort to “resolutely defend national sovereignty and national security”, referring to China’s security situation as “unstable and uncertain”. 

The President has urged the army to prepare itself before. He conveyed similar sentiments following his appointment in 2013 and again in 2017. However, political analysts have noted an escalation in his language during this recent visit. According to a senior fellow at the Washington-based Jamestown Foundation, Willy Lam, “He is sending a message to the United States and Taiwan,”. 

Taiwan appears to sit at the centre of this brewing storm. President Xi (who is seen as the strongest party leader in years) has long made his desire to ‘rejuvenate’ China known. Part of these rejuvenation plans appears to involve ‘reunification’ with Taiwan. 

Taiwan’s status has been ambiguous for decades. It is not recognised as an independent state. However, it is not part of the People’s Republic of China. The protection given to Taiwan thus far is of a tenuous construction of agreements by which, as long as Taiwan does not try to declare independence, China will not invade. As part of this agreement, the U.S. is expected to be non-committal regarding which side it would if war breaks out.   

In recent years China has amplified its aggression towards Taiwan. From illegally claiming the Taiwan Strait as Chinese territory to encircling the island with warships, in a manoeuvre seen as hinting at future blockades. 

In the past six years, the USA has sold more weapons to Taiwan than during President Obama’s eight years in office. Not to mention, recent visits made by a number of high-ranking U.S. officials to Taiwan have further provoked China. 

Most significant is the pro-Taiwan act that U.S. lawmakers from both sides of the aisle are attempting to pass. U.S. lawmakers see this act as a necessary step to support Taiwan. However, Beijing views this act as a threat. 

In this act, the U.S. has agreed to designate Taiwan as a ‘Major Non-NATO Ally’ and provide almost $4.5 billion in security support to Taiwan. The U.S. will, therefore, then, be obliged to facilitate Taiwan’s introduction to international organisations. Further, the U.S. will be required to formulate a sanctions program to “deter further PRC aggression against Taiwan.”

Amidst the uncertainty, Taiwan prepares to be invaded. “The purpose is to make China believe that if you want to invade Taiwan, you will suffer huge losses,” said Admiral Lee Hsi-ming. “And if you still invade Taiwan, you will not be able to succeed.”

As political tensions mount, experts warn of the consequences should a war break out. In the words of Vice President Gao, of the research group Centre for China and Globalization, “In a nuclear age, if one country tries to attack another, there will be mutually assured destruction; that country will be destroyed at the same time,”. 

The Iranian leadership is resisting growing demands from clerics and some reformist politicians to stage a new referendum on Iran’s constitution.

A current power struggle between the the country's rulers has left the government sending out mixed messages on how to deal with the ongoing protests. Hardline parliamentarians have called for violent protestors to be executed whilst some other senior members of Iran's administration have gone to university campuses, in an attempt to open dialogue with protestors. 

However, the security forces have gone ahead with a severe crackdown and arrested nearly 10,000 people, including 60 journalists.

The call for a new referendum was first made by Iran’s leading Sunni cleric Molavi Abdulhamid, who is based in the south-eastern city of Zahedan. “Hold a referendum and see what changes people want and accept whatever the wishes of the people. The current policies have reached a dead end,” he said.

“This constitution itself was approved 43 years ago and those who compiled it have all left and another generation has come. This law should also be changed and updated. Many clauses of this law are not up to date.

“It has been said many times that this law should be put to a referendum, but unfortunately nothing has been done and even the same law of 43 years ago has not been properly implemented.”

Read more at The Guardian

The Spanish government is facing growing pressure to explain how at least 23 people died in June at the fortified border of Melila, Spain's enclave in North-Africa. 

About 2,000 people attempted to cross the heavily fortified border between the Moroccan region of Nador and the Spanish enclave last week. The Moroccan authorities say 23 people died and 140 police were injured during the attempt, while several NGOs say the number of dead is at least 37.

MPs who visited the border on a fact-finding trip have appeared to corroborate reports – first aired in a BBC Africa Eye investigation broadcast last week – that dead bodies were dragged out of a Spanish-controlled area by Moroccan police.

Video footage shared by the Moroccan Association of Human Rights showed dozens of people packed into an area next to the border fence – some bleeding and many lying motionless – as Moroccan forces in riot gear watched over them in the aftermath of the incident.

Morocco and Spain say their border guards did not use excessive force to repel the incursion. But the BBC investigation and Spanish MPs have cast doubt on the official version of events.

“Given what we’ve seen, everything suggests that people obviously died in an area that was under the control of Spanish authorities,” said Enrique Santiago, an MP for the Unidas Podemos alliance, which governs Spain in coalition with the larger Socialist party.

“So if there were deaths in an area under the control of Spanish authorities, then Spanish authorities are the ones who need to be carrying out an investigation.”

Jon Iñarritu, an MP from the pro-independence Basque party EH Bildu, said: “There’s no doubt that the main events took place in Spanish territory.” Iñarritu also tweeted that Guardia Civil officers had responded to the incursion by firing 86 teargas canisters, 28 smoke canisters, 65 rubber bullets, 270 warning shots and 41 doses of pepper spray.

Independent UN experts have blamed the deaths on “excessive and lethal force”, described the continuing lack of accountability so many months after the tragedy as “alarming”, and called into question the official death toll.

Both E Tendayi Achiume – the outgoing UN special rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, xenophobia and related intolerance – and the refugee and migrant NGO Walking Borders have put the number of deaths at 37.

Read more at The Guardian

A petrol bomb attack on an immigration center in Dover, UK is said to have been motivated by extreme right-wing ideology according to British police.

The incident took place on 30 October. Nobody was seriously injured as a result of the attack.

66-year-old Andrew Leak was found dead at a nearby service station, Leak was said to have acted alone. Leak threw homemade bombs at the immigration centre, leaving two staff with minor injuries.

According to a statement put out by the Counter Terrorism Policing South East (CTPSE), there has been evidence which “indicates the attack at [the] immigration centre in Dover on Sunday, 30 October 2022, was motivated by a terrorist ideology.”

Senior national coordinator for counter-terrorism policing, Tim Jacques, added that there were “strong indications that mental health was likely a factor.” However, Jacques continued that the “suspects' actions were primarily driven by an extremist ideology.”

According to Jacques, the attack meets the “threshold for a terrorist incident.”

Read more here

Major international banks, including Australia’s ANZ, have continued to do business with a bank owned by Myanmar’s military administration despite its violent crackdown on anti-government protestors, according to an advocacy group and leaked documents.

ANZ, one of Australia’s “big four” banks, was used by Hong Kong-based insurer AIA to transfer funds to accounts operated by Innwa Bank, which is owned by military conglomerate Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC), in August and September 2021, Justice for Myanmar said, citing leaked bank documents.

Singapore’s UOB, one of Southeast Asia’s biggest banks, facilitated transactions between a Chinese shipping firm and MEC in June and July last year, according to the report.

The leaked Innwa Bank documents were obtained and published online by Distributed Denial of Secrets, a self-described transparency collective that regularly releases information hacked from governments and businesses.

An ANZ spokesperson said the bank had “no commercial relationship” with Innwa Bank.

“ANZ must comply with all applicable laws in all of the jurisdictions in which it operates, including requirements of supra-national organisations, such as the United Nations and European Union,” the spokesperson told Al Jazeera.

In April 2021, Sri Lanka was also met with widespread protests and condemnation as a result of its invitation to Myanmar's military junta to the 5^th Bay of Bengal Initiative of the Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Co-operation (BIMSTEC) summit, that was being held on the island. 

Read more at Al Jazeera

Senior UK Parliamentarians will investigate the state of human rights within Kazakhstan.

The former director of public prosecutions Lord MacDonald will lead an independent investigation into the detention and treatment of Zhanbolat Mamai, the leader of the unregistered opposition Democratic party in Kazakhstan.

Mamai has been detained since February 2022 over his role in nationwide protests over steep rises in fuel prices that were seen as the most serious dissent in the central Asian republic since Kazakhstan was granted independence from Russia 30 years ago. A crackdown after the protests led to more than 200 deaths in an event that came to be known as “Bloody January”.

At the time of the January unrest, the Kazakh president, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, denounced the protesters as terrorists and authorised a shoot-to-kill policy for anyone that did not surrender to state forces. As many as 10,000 were detained, mainly in the capital, Astana. The country has presidential elections on 22 November, where Tokayev will seek a second term and face one opponent.

Parliamentary elections are due next year, but many opposition parties cannot register.

Read more at the Guardian

Iran has announced that it will hold public trials for as many as 1,000 people detained during recent protests in Tehran alone – and more than a thousand others outside the capital.

The judiciary made the announcement as protests continued following the death of  22 year-old Kurdish Mahsa Amini. 

The latest signs of external support for the Iranian protests led by women and students came as sit-ins continued in universities and more than 500 civilian journalists put their names to an internal petition demanding that reporters who helped break the story of Mahsa Amini be released from detention.

Read more at the Guardian.