" I heartily applaud the Nobel Committee for awarding its Peace Prize to the imprisoned Liu Xiaobo for his long and nonviolent struggle for humanrights in China. In doing so, the committee has challenged the West to re-examine a...

Hundreds of men and women convicted of terrorism offences in Northern Ireland are planning to appeal against convictions based on confessions that were, they allege, beaten out of them. So says a new film on the Guardian site today...

Police in Beijing detained at least 20 human rightsdefenders who were celebrating the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Liu Xiaoboon 8 October. Up to now, at least fourteen activists are still missing.They are Wang Lihong, Wu Gan, Zhao...

The 9th of October is, as any self-respecting Beatles fan will probably tell you, the day John Lennon was born. Had he survived Mark Chapman’s bullets – and another 30 years of rock star fame and turbulence (not to mention ordinary...

For the past couple of days images have been emerging from Hungary of menacing toxic red sludge following a chemical spill from an alumina plant reservoir in Veszprem. Today the BBC has reported that the spill has contaminated water...