Four Angolan youth activists who are part of the Benguela Revolutionary Movement (Movimento Revolucionário de Benguela) are out on bail. The youth activists have not been charged.

Cuban graffiti artist Danilo Maldonado Machado (‘El Sexto’) continues to be detained in a maximum-security prison, a month and a half after his arrest.

Twenty-six men were killed and nine others severely injured in Alcaçuz prison in Rio Grande do Norte state, following the spread of riots and conflicts between criminal gangs in northern Brazilian prisons.

The Mexican lower house of Congress has finalized its version of a General Law on Torture. This version of the bill has key amendments that, if passed, would increase impunity for torture and undermine access to justice in relation to torture complaints.

Following revelations that he had been tortured in Segezha prison colony, prisoner of conscience Ildar Dadin was moved to a new prison colony.

Youth activist Musasa Tshibanda remains in incommunicado detention after the release of his fellow activist Gloria Senga on 27 December.

Two ethnic Kachin pastors, who had been helping journalists report on military abuses in northern Shan State, have been missing since 24 December 2016.

On 10 and 11 January security forces violently repressed members of the Mapuche community of Cushamen in Chubut, Argentina.

In December 2016, the Dominican President rejected a regressive reform of the Criminal Code regarding abortion that had previously been adopted by the Senate.

Kiryl Kazachok was sentenced to death by the Gomel Regional Court, in southeast Belarus, on 28 December. His was the fourth death sentence to be issued in Belarus in 2016.