As Nick Davis’ feature on BBC News Online reminds us, the Jamaican Constabulary Force’s motto is “ Serve, Protect and Reassure ”. This claim must be pretty hard to swallow for the thousands of people living in poorer parts of the...

In May 2009 a group of legal academics in Beijing published a report on the government's handling of the unrest in Tibet in the spring of 2008. What was the Chinese government's response? Did they take the report seriously and look...

The Independent reports today that a Saudi princess has been given asylum in the UK because she would be in danger of being stoned if she returned to Saudi Arabia. She won her claim to political asylum, telling a judge that in Saudi...

Sonia Sotomayor , the soon-to-be-confirmed , Obama-nominated US Supreme Court judge, has been the subject of much debate in the American (and indeed local ) blogosphere. Is she liberal, conservative, pro-choice, anti-death penalty...

I met a Chinese woman on Friday whose story really touched me. Her parents were recently snatched from their home in Inner Mongolia by non-uniformed men and bundled into an unmarked car. They were taken to a detention centre, where...