Saturday, October 31, 2015
Six In The Morning Saturday October 31
Russian airliner crashes in central Sinai - Egyptian PM
A Russian airliner has crashed in central Sinai with more than 200 people on board, the office of Egypt's prime minister has confirmed.
The Airbus A-321 had just taken off from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, on its way to the Russian city of St Petersburg.
Egyptian media reports said wreckage of the plane had already been found and at least 20 ambulances sent to the scene.
Most of the passengers are said to be Russian tourists.
The plane was operated by the small Russian airline Kogalymavia, based in western Siberia. Latest reports say it was carrying 217 passengers and seven crew.
Initially there were conflicting reports about the fate of the plane, some suggesting it had disappeared over Cyprus.
Lying press: Germany's misleading media
In a recent German survey, 44 percent of respondents said they partially, or wholly believe the media regularly lies to the people, as the Pegida movement asserts. Media experts examine whether that's true.
Media outlets in Germany "are controlled from the top," and therefore spread "embellished and inaccurate reporting." Nearly half of the 1,000 German citizens recently polled by the Dortmund-based Forsa Institute agreed with these statements.
Currently, the refugee situation dominates media reports. But Germans are simultaneously experiencing the crisis first-hand in their own towns and cities - and often finding dramatic differences between their perceptions of these events and journalists' representations of them.
This discrepancy has been busying media experts since former Berlin Finance Minister Thilo Sarrazin began describing Germany's integration of immigrants as a failure in his 2010 book "Germany Is Abolishing Itself."
Communist victims exhumed in Bali to stop their spirits disturbing villagers
Jewel Topsfield and Amilia Rosa
Ubud, Bali: As creeping censorship of politically sensitive issues by Indonesian authorities attracted international opprobrium last week, the bodies of nine victims of the 1965 communist purge were peacefully exhumed in Bali to stop their spirits disturbing the villagers.
The Balinese village of Batuagung has been troubled by a high suicide rate for no apparent reason in recent years and villagers reported paranormal sightings.
"A villager said he was just chatting with another man, but then he noticed the other man's head had fallen off," village head Ida Bagus Komang Widiarta said."A few times also, students at an elementary school were possessed."
Is SXSW apology, Harassment Summit enough for jilted panelists?
Organizers of the contentious gaming panel South by Southwest canceled over threats of violence but then reinstated – along with adding an Online Harassment Summit – aren't convinced they'll participate in next year's festival.
South by Southwest Interactive announced Friday that the two gaming-related panels it canceled earlier this week will be reinstated as part of a larger Online Harassment Summit at its 2016 festival.
Organizers of the annual event, which attracts tens of thousands of tech, music, and film industry professionals to Austin every year, previously said that threats of violence related to the panels led to canceling talks "focused on the GamerGate controversy."
But SXSW received significant blowback after the cuts were publicized, with many critics complaining the festival caved to intimidation by removing the panels, one of which focused on ideas for how video game developers can use design to combat harassment in gaming. That panel was not intended to focus on GamerGate, the hashtag associated with intense harassment of women in gaming.
Analysis: China faces mounting pressure over maritime claims
By MATTHEW PENNINGTON4 hours ago
Neither action appeared likely to stop China in its tracks, as it seeks to assert its control over resource-rich waters that it considers vital to its security. Beijing is expected to put a higher priority on what it sees as its strategic interests than its international reputation.
But it could damage China's efforts to win more respect on the global stage as it emerges as an economic and military power.
Copenhagen initiative gives bottle collectors 'dignity'
Danish capital introduces garbage bins with shelves to help those who make a living from collecting empties.
31 Oct 2015 07:01 GMT
A new type of garbage bin has been introduced in the Danish capital to make bottle collection easier - a move the city's deputy mayor says will give some marginalised citizens more "dignity".
When buying a beverage in Denmark, customers pay $0.15-$0.44 for the bottle or can - money that is returned in bottle machines in grocery stores.
While not highly profitable, collecting bottles and cans from garbage bins is a source of income for many of Copenhagen's homeless, pensioners, and other marginalised groups.
Over the summer, yellow bins with shelves on the sides were introduced where people could place their empty bottles - saving the collectors the inconvenience of digging through the smelly refuse.
Friday, October 30, 2015
Iranian influence in Syria: At what cost?
The number of Iranian soldiers killed on Syria's battlefields continues to rise.
Being invited to join the latest round of Syria talks in Vienna must feel like vindication for Iranian leaders.
It is the first time the United States has formally engaged with Iran on the Syrian crisis and it is a sign that Iran's political isolation is thawing.
But Iranian influence in Syria has come at a price.
An increasing number of high-ranking Revolutionary Guard officers have been killed in Syria, many of them on some of Syria's most active front lines.
They include one of Iran's best known generals, Hossein Hamedani, who was killed on the outskirts of Aleppo earlier this month.
It has led some Iranians to question their country's involvement in Syria and prompted the deputy commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guard to appear on television, trying to ease public concerns.
SIx In The Morning Friday October 30
Syria conflict: Powers backing rivals meet in Vienna
The first talks bringing together all foreign powers backing rival sides in Syria's civil war are due to open.
The meeting in Vienna will seek to close the gap between the US and its allies, who support the rebels, and the key foreign allies of the Syrian government, Russia and Iran.
It is the first time Iran has been involved in the diplomacy.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has urged participants to show flexibility" and "global leadership".
The four-year-old war in Syria, which began with an uprising against Mr Assad, has left 250,000 people dead and forced half the country's population - or 11 million people - from their homes.
Russia and Iran have recently stepped up their military involvement in the conflict, backing forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
The US, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab nations have long insisted that he cannot play a long-term role in Syria's future.
Indonesia is burning. So why is the world looking away?
George MonbiotI’ve often wondered how the media would respond when eco-apocalypsestruck. I pictured the news programmes producing brief, sensational reports, while failing to explain why it was happening or how it might be stopped. Then they would ask their financial correspondents how the disaster affected share prices, before turning to the sport. As you can probably tell, I don’t have an ocean of faith in the industry for which I work. What I did not expect was that they would ignore it.
A great tract of Earth is on fire. It looks as you might imagine hell to be. The air has turned ochre: visibility in some cities has been reduced to 30 metres. Children are being prepared for evacuation in warships; already some have choked to death. Species are going up in smoke at an untold rate. It is almost certainly the greatest environmental disaster of the 21st century – so far.
And the media? It’s talking about the dress the Duchess of Cambridge wore to the James Bond premiere, Donald Trump’s idiocy du jour and who got eliminated from the Halloween episode of Dancing with the Stars. The great debate of the week, dominating the news across much of the world? Sausages: are they really so bad for your health?
China warns 'provocative' US incursions in South China Sea could 'spark war'
Statement was prompted by the US decision to a send a destroyer 12 miles off a series of artifical islands owned by China
China has warned the United States that incursions by its warships in the South China Sea could lead to an incident that “sparks war”.
It follows the US Navy’s decision to send the destroyer USS Lassen within 12 miles of the Subi Reef, an artificial archipelago built by China approximately midway between Vietnam and the Philippines.
Tension has been slowly building in the Sea, which China maintains is within its territory.
Admiral Wu Shengli, China’s naval commander, issued the warning to his American counterpart Admiral John Richardson on Thursday, during a video conference attempting to defuse a possible situation.
Erdogan the gambler spins election wheel again in 'traumatised' Turkey
Paul McGeough
Chief foreign correspondent
Suat Kiniklioglu has done it all – once a suspect; then a player; and these days, again a bit of a suspect.
As Turkey girded for a portentous election this weekend, Kiniklioglu wondered about his standing in a fracturing country of 80 million people.
"I don't fit the normal type and identity … I don't know what's wrong with me," he told Fairfax Media.
As an officer in the Turkish Air Force, early in his career he was part of a military culture that would happily step in to "correct" or remove the government of the day; and as an MP in the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), he flew on the prime ministerial jet, with then PM and now Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan taking his thoughtful advice.
But once again, Kiniklioglu is in the firing line – in his role as a commentator at the anti-government Today's Zaman newspaper.
U.S. man fighting ISIS: It's not 'Call of Duty'
Updated 0546 GMT (1346 HKT) October 30, 2015
A former U.S. soldier battling ISIS alongside Kurdish fighters in Syria has warned others tempted to join him that life on the front line is no computer game.
"You meet a lot of people who think this is going to be the gaming experience -- [like] Call of Duty," he told CNN at his remote camp near the Tigris River in northern Syria.
"They think because they understand how to pull the trigger on a console they know how to do it in real life."
Randy Roberts is one of dozens of westerners who have come to Syria and Iraq to join the YPG, and help them take on ISIS.
They are a mixed bunch of men and women, from Europe and North America; among them a Canadian medic from Alberta, a young Swedish woman and a burly middle-aged man from Spain's Basque country.
UN investigator urges Myanmar to allow Muslims to vote
The special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar said the Nov. 8 legislative elections won't be free and fair unless they are inclusive.
UNITED NATIONS — A United Nations investigator accused Myanmar of discrimination and urged the government to take immediate action to allow minorities and migrants to vote in November elections.
Yanghee Lee, the special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, also urged the country's Election Commission to establish an independent process to review the disqualification of candidates, many of them Muslims – including two current members of parliament.
Ms. Lee told said Thursday that the Nov. 8 legislative elections will be "an important milestone" in the country's democratic transition. But she said the elections won't be free and fair unless they are inclusive.
"The credibility of the elections will be judged by the environment in which they are conducted and the extent to which all sectors of Myanmar society have been allowed to freely participate in the political process," Lee said.Thursday, October 29, 2015
North Korea putting thousands into forced labour abroad, UN says
Human rights official Marzuki Darusman claims 50,000 workers are being exploited to generate up to £1.5bn a year for the state
These people earn less than a fast food worker and are exploited not only by their government but those who employee them. Just look at the countries where they work:
Marzuki Darusman, the special rapporteur on human rights in North Korea, said in a report to the UN general assembly and at a news conference on Wednesday that the workers are being used as a new source of income, with North Korea facing a “really tight financial and economic situation”.
He accused the country’s government of violating the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which bans forced labour and to which North Korea is a party. Darusman said companies hiring North Korean workers have “become complicit in an unacceptable system of forced labour”.
Darusman said more than 50,000 North Korean workers are employed in foreign countries, mainly in the mining, logging, textile and construction industries, according to various studies – and added that the number is rising.
These people earn less than a fast food worker and are exploited not only by their government but those who employee them. Just look at the countries where they work:
The vast majority are working in China and Russia, he said, but others are reportedly employed in countries including Algeria, Angola, Cambodia, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Kuwait, Libya, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nigeria, Oman, Poland, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
Darusman said civil society organisations report that these workers earn $120-$150 per month on average and are sometimes forced to work up to 20 hours a day, with only one or two rest days a month and insufficient food. Employers pay “significantly higher amounts” to the North Korean government, he claimed.
Six In The Morning Thursday October 29
Saudi FM: Vienna talks to test if Iran serious on Syria
Saudi foreign minister's comments come after Tehran accepts invitation by US and Russia to attend meeting over Syria.
29 Oct 2015 07:37 GMT
International talks in Vienna this week will test whether Russia and Iran are "serious" about finding a political solution to the war in Syria, the Saudi foreign minister has said.
Adel al-Jubeir's comments on Wednesday came after Iran announced it was accepting an invitation by the US and Russia to attend the talks in the Austrian capital.
"If they're serious we will know, and if they're not serious we will also know and stop wasting time with them," Jubeir said at a news conference in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, with visiting British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond.
The two-day talks, which are expected to talk place on Friday, will also "test the intentions of the Syrians and the Russians," Jubeir said.
Hammond said the meetings will be a chance to see if it is possible to "bridge the gap" between Iran and Russia on one side, and other countries against Bashar al-Assad, on the opposite side, on the role of the Syrian president.
Arab states pose 'critical' risk of defence corruption
Watchdog says Middle Eastern governments involved in arms dealing are continuing threat to regional security and stability
Arab states that buy billions of dollars worth of weapons are at high risk of corruption and pose a continuing threat to regional security and stability, according to a new report by watchdog Transparency International.
As foreign secretary Philip Hammond continues a Gulf tour, the organisation warns that 16 of 17 Middle Eastern governments are graded as posing either a very high or critical risk of defence corruption. Only Tunisia performs better, although is still classed as high risk.
Hammond is meeting the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to discuss regional security and the crisis in Syria, ahead of talks in Vienna on Friday.
Saudi Arabia is the UK’s largest arms market. It bought £4bn of British defence equipment in the last five years and is categorised as a very high risk, as are Jordan and the UAE, which are also both close allies of the US and UK.
Australia rejects Amnesty's bribery allegations as 'slur' on border police
Australia has denied a report by Amnesty International that it secretly paid off people-smugglers. The report cites two instances of arranging payments to ensure migrants stay out of Australia's territorial waters.
Amnesty's findings, based on interviews with crew members in prison, appeared to support earlier news reports of the May incident, but the government, then led by Tony Abbott, has persistently refused to comment.
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton rejected Amnesty International's Thursday report -- which follows previous accusations Australian authorities had paid off people-smugglers -- as a "slur" and said Australia would not change its hard-line policies.
The minister told commercial radio 2GB that Amnesty did not like the government's policy "and the fact we've stopped the boats, but we are not going to stop our resolve."
Physical beatings still a daily reality for Afghan schoolchildren
Shafigh Shargh
A video showing an Afghan child getting beaten at school has given the issue much-needed attention after it began circulating on social media networks. Corporal punishment is officially forbidden in schools in Afghanistan, but the law is rarely enforced, and our Observer says that physical beatings are still a daily reality for schoolchildren across the country.
Although the video is short, it clearly shows a teacher beating a student with prayer beads. The child can be heard crying and yelling for it to stop. Our Observers say the incident was filmed in a school in Kotal Kheyr Khane, a suburb of the capital Kabul. Despite the efforts of activists who went so far as to reveal the teacher’s identity, Afghan officials have yet to react to the video.
Although corporal punishment has officially been banned in Afghanistan, children are still physically beaten in classrooms. The Afghan government ratified the UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) back in 1994. But it declared its “right to express (…) reservations on all provisions of the Convention that are incompatible with the laws of Islamic Shari’a and the local legislation in effect.” The practice was also expressly forbidden under article 39 of the 2008 Education Act. But the Global Initiative to End Corporal Punishment, a London-based NGO, claims that in the same year, research showed that corporal punishment was still being used against boys in 100 percent of the classes observed. For girls, the figure was 20 percent.
'Dehumanisation and stigmatisation' of Rohingya Muslims based on Nazism: report
Lindsay Murdoch
Bangkok: Nazi ideology and Islam-phobia are being used to stoke hatred of more than a million Rohingyas in Myanmar's western Rakhine state, according to the findings of an 18-month investigation.
The country's military-backed government, state-level officials and Buddhist monks are orchestrating the mass annihilation of the Rohingya, say researchers at Queen Mary University of London.
Drawing on leaked government documents, researchers say they have uncovered evidence that the persecution of the stateless Rohingya - including corralling them into ghettos, sporadic massacres and restrictions on movements - amounts to a longer term strategy by Myanmar's government to isolate, weaken and eliminate the group.Researchers said they found Nazi and SS paraphernalia such as t-shirts and helmets in official documents of the Arakan National Party, a Rahkine party.
North Korea believed to earn a fortune from forced labor overseas, U.N. says
Updated 0608 GMT (1408 HKT) October 29, 2015
North Korea's catalog of abuses against its own people within the secretive country's tightly controlled borders has been widely reported. But Kim Jong Un's regime is also believed to be pocketing huge sums from tens of thousands of its citizens who are sent abroad to toil in forced labor conditions, the United Nations says.
The laborers are made to work as long as 20 hours a day without enough food and under constant surveillance, according to a new report from Marzuki Darusman, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in North Korea.
He told a news conference Wednesday that the practice has become more visible in recent years and that "the numbers have grown."
"I think it reflects the really tight financial and economic situation in the North," Darusman said.Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Teacher films Israeli raid on West Bank primary school (video)
A school teacher in the occupied West Bank has filmed Israeli soldiers storming classrooms in an elementary school in the city of Hebron. Abdel Moniem Salaymeh said the troops entered every classroom in al-Hajj Ziad Jaber school in the Wadi al-Nasara neighbourhood and searched the children. "They were looking for signs of stones they said were thrown at them from the school," he said. Salaymeh told Al Jazeera's Awad Rajoub that the school staff had tried but failed to prevent the soldiers from entering the premises. The soldiers stormed the administrator's office and threatened to close the school if the stone throwing continued, the teacher said. Bassam Tahboub, Hebron's head of education, said that the incursion was not the first, adding that scores of students were transferred to hospitals on Tuesday after their school was exposed to tear gas.
Six In The Morning Wednesday October 28
US signals shift in Syria-Iraq campaign against Islamic State
The US has indicated a shift in its campaign against Islamic State (IS) militants in Iraq and Syria, including the use of direct ground raids.
Defence Secretary Ash Carter said there would also be more air strikes against "high-value targets".
Observers say his comments reflect acknowledgment of the lack of progress in defeating the militant group.
Separately, the US says Iran is being invited for the first time to international talks over Syria's war.
Mr Carter's comments, made to the Senate Armed Services Committee, come a week after US-Iraqi forces rescued dozens of hostages held by IS in Iraq.
"We won't hold back from supporting capable partners in opportunistic attacks against ISIL or conducting such missions directly, whether by strikes from the air or direct action on the ground," Mr Carter said, using an alternative acronym for IS.
New legal move to prevent Japan from whale hunting in Antarctic
Australian campaigners to bring court case in a bid to prevent whaling season from going ahead
Environmental campaigners in Australia have mounted a fresh attempt to prevent Japan from killing hundreds of whales in the Antarctic this winter, as officials in Tokyo indicated they would ignore an international ban on the country’s “scientific” expeditions imposed last year.
The Australian branch of Humane Society International claims that Kyodo Senpaku, the Japanese firm that conducts the controversial hunts, is in contempt of court after ignoring a 2008 federal court injunction not to slaughter the animals in a whale sanctuary declared by the Australian government.
Japan, which does not recognise the sanctuary, has not sent a whaling fleet to the region since March last year when the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered an immediate halt to the hunts after concluding that they were not, as Japan had claimed, conducted for scientific research.US, China tensions rise in South China Sea
Tensions are rising in the South China Sea after a US warship traveled through disputed waters. Washington says it's protecting freedom of navigation, but China calls the American naval maneuver a provocation.
After months of observation, the United States made its move. The USS Lassen, a guided-missile destroyer, passed within 12 nautical miles (22 kilometers) of an artificial island built by Beijing in the South China Sea.
"We are asserting the principle of global commons," Robert Daly, director of the Kissinger Institute on China and the United States, told DW. "These are international waters despite China's very strong suggestions otherwise."
The Chinese Foreign Ministry accused the USS Lassen of "illegally" entering the waters off the island, named Subi Reef, and called the maneuver a "deliberate provocation." A Chinese guided-missile destroyer and naval patrol ship tracked the US warship. Beijing summoned the US ambassador.
Video shows Paris police punching handcuffed suspect
Team Observers
French police have come under fire after a video has emerged of an officer punching a handcuffed suspected drug dealer in the face in a Paris suburb.
The shocking video, which was uploaded to Facebook, shows a police unit arresting a man on October 16. The man, suspected of being a drug dealer, is pinned to the ground by the officers in the suburb of Chanteloup-les-Vignes. Despite being handcuffed, the man is dragged to a police car, and then punched in the face.
Throughout the ordeal, the suspect does not appear to put up any resistance. A passer-by remonstrates with the police officers, protesting that the use of force seems excessive. An officer orders the passerby to step away, before his colleague fires a warning shot from the non-lethal hand-held weapon, Flash-ball.
Myanmar's purged party chief Shwe Mann orchestrating election comeback
Aubrey Belford
Phyu: Ousted Myanmar ruling party chief Shwe Mann is mounting a comeback ahead of a historic election next month, setting the stage for a likely presidential bid that will add to the unpredictability of the country's transition to democracy.
Hundreds of campaign workers are blitzing Shwe Mann's home district in an attempt to maintain the taciturn ex-general's foothold in parliament. If he succeeds, some analysts predict a split that could help opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD).
"There's nobody like him," croons a male vocalist as campaign trucks in the tumbledown town of Phyu blare a rock ballad lauding the area's most famous son. "He's the one the people should choose for democratisation."
Rights groups: Iranian poets face lashes for shaking hands with opposite sex
Updated 0654 GMT (1454 HKT) October 28, 2015
Two Iranian poets are facing 99 lashes each for shaking hands with people of the opposite sex in one of the latest examples of harsh punishments meted out against writers and artists by Iran's judiciary, according to human rights advocates.
The poets, Fatemeh Ekhtesari and Mehdi Musavi, have also both been sentenced to years in prison for "insulting the sacred" in their writings, a decision slammed by freedom of expression activists.
"Ekhtesari and Musavi's arrests and convictions are a travesty of justice, and send a chill over the already beleaguered creative community in Iran," Karin Deutsch Karlekar, director of Free Expression Programs at PEN American Center, said in a statement earlier this month.
Does meat cause cancer?
The World Health Organisation says processed meat could cause cancer and red meat is risky too.
The latest findings by the World Health Organisation (WHO) have re-ignited the debate about the impact of eating meat. The agency has concluded that eating too much processed meat causes cancer while red meat is a likely cause of the disease as well.
The findings have drawn sharp reactions from those in the meat industry, who argue meat forms part of a balanced diet and that cancer risk assessments need to be set in a broader context of environmental and lifestyle factors.
Other scientists have also criticised the WHO conclusions, saying they lack enough substantial evidence.
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Pioneers of Engineering: Al-Jazari and the Banu Musa
We trace the path from modern technology back to the scientists who developed robots, water pumps and trick mechanisms.
The Industrial Revolution was a major turning point in world history, shaping modern behaviour and every other aspect of human life.
The introduction of machines in the 17th century, often powered by water or steam, revolutionised food production, medicine, housing, and clothing.
In this episode of Science in a Golden Age, theoretical physicist, Jim al-Khalili examines the intricate automatic devices from the Islamic world, which paved the way for Europe's industrial revolution some 800 years later.
Jim starts his journey at the cutting edge of modern automation - a robotic kitchen that can be programmed to produce a number of dishes according to fixed recipes. Jim finds interesting parallels to this example of modern engineering in the Kitab al-Hiyal (The Book of Tricks) written by the three Banu Musa brothers in the 9th century.
In Maylasia One Party Rule Means Censorship
Since independence Maylasia has been a single party state. Yes, they have elections but the United Mayla National Organization (UMO) has always been the governing party. Given its powerful status the UMO has always dealt harshly with its critics. Using the courts to insure its detractors are imprisoned for violating draconian national security laws and the Sedition Act which came into force towards the end of Britian's coloinal rule in 1948.
Zunar can only publish his work online because no newspaper in his country will dare to publish his work
Zunar is will go on trial not for his polictial cartoons but for a group of tweets which critized the Maylasian government. He isn't the only person or group to run afoul of the ruling party.
Zunar can only publish his work online because no newspaper in his country will dare to publish his work
Less than a year after the Charlie Hebdo murders led to worldwide protests for freedom of expression, a cartoonist in Malaysia is facing a possible 43 years in prison after being accused of “sedition”.Zulkiflee Sm Anwar Ulhaque, who draws under the name Zunar, has arrived in Britain to highlight his trial next month, in which he faces nine charges under a Sedition Act introduced to Malaysia by the colonial British government in 1948.
Zunar has angered the Malaysian authorities with cartoons suggesting that the judiciary is controlled by the government and that the country is run not by Prime Minister Najib Razak but by his wife Rosmah Mansor.
Cartoonists and other supporters will join him in a protest on Sunday that begins at Speakers’ Corner in London’s Hyde Park.
Zunar is will go on trial not for his polictial cartoons but for a group of tweets which critized the Maylasian government. He isn't the only person or group to run afoul of the ruling party.
Revealing details of little-known cases, Human Rights Watch said the summit will present an opportunity for world leaders to press Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak to reform draconian laws and end censorship.
Mr Najib, fighting for his political life over an alleged corruption scandal, promised to "uphold civil liberties" and "regard for the fundamental rights of the people" when he took office in 2009.
But Human Rights Watch said repression intensified after Mr Najib's long-ruling coalition lost the popular vote but managed to retain power because of a gerrymandered voting system in elections in 2013.
The organisation said the government's use of the criminal code to silence peaceful expression violates international legal standards.
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