Under the Chinese Communist Party, there truly is nothing sacred. A report from National Review details that Chinese authorities have altered the famous Bible verse where Jesus forgives a woman who commits adultery, instead rewriting the story so that Jesus himself stones her to death . This is not only an egregious affront to the sacred text that Christians hold dear, but it is also one of many offenses committed by the CCP against persons of faith as the Party seeks to bring religion under state control.   For the Communist Party, the Sinicization of religion, codified in the 2018 “Regulations for Religious Affairs”, is part of a national strategy to heighten state power. Religious minorities across China have been subject to crackdowns from the local government for decades. In school, Chinese children are taught that religion is a “feudal superstition” that is both regressive and defunct. Moreover, the Party’s […]

In a remarkable change in the Middle East, three countries — the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Sudan — have taken steps towards normalizing relations with the State of Israel in recent months. These are the first countries to do so since Jordan made peace with Israel in 1994. These countries, along with Egypt, are the only four in the Middle East that currently have diplomatic relations with Israel.    This decision marks a radical shift by Arab nations from the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002. The resolution, upheld by a unanimous vote and signed by both the UAE and Bahrain, established several demands that, until they were met, would prevent signatories from establishing diplomatic relations with Israel. Key conditions for peace included establishing a Palestinian state according to the Israel-Palestine borders as drawn in 1967 with East Jerusalem as a capital. Following the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel annexed […]

The Current State of Greek Asylum Seekers There are currently more than 96,600 refugees and migrants in Greece. More than 35,000 of these migrants are asylum seekers living on five islands in squalid conditions. As of October 31, 2019 alone, more asylum seekers have arrived in Greece than the total number of asylum seekers that arrived in 2018. Despite the influx of asylum seekers in 2019, Greece is still receiving less compared to 2015 and 2016. On two Aegean Islands holding asylum seekers, families have created shelters on steep hillsides in a struggle to survive. Furthermore, the government cut public healthcare funding for new asylum seekers in July, forcing people to seek help from NGOs or privately fund their own healthcare, which is a big issue for people with chronic illnesses and children needing immunizations to enroll in school. Tensions are rising between migrants and Greek citizens. Asylum seekers on […]

The 23rd of September marked an important day for climate protectors worldwide. Sixteen child petitioners — including Greta Thunberg and Alexandria Villasenor — from all around the world presented a legal complaint to the United Nations, arguing that their human rights were being violated by nations that were failing to give legislative attention to the pressing threat of climate change. Their petition shed light on an important aspect of climate change that lawmakers and politicians have been reluctant to address; climate change may not destroy their homes, but it most definitely will destroy their childrens’. The petition  argued that 5 countries, namely Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany, and Turkey, have been “recklessly causing and perpetuating life-threatening climate change [and] have failed to take necessary preventive and precautionary measures to respect, protect, and fulfill the petitioners’ rights.” The complaint, filed under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of a Child, is […]

While speaking at Georgetown University on Oct. 17., CEO Mark Zuckerberg stated that Facebook will not be implementing any further restrictions on bad speech on their servers. This comes to the dismay of many who hope that the flux of falsified information on Facebook will come to a curb following repeated calls for better policing of fake news on the platform.  An Attempt To “Preserve Free Speech” Zuckerberg defended his stance on the issue by saying that “You can’t impose tolerance top-down.” Zuckerberg referenced the growth of less liberal Chinese technology platforms as a warning that it is up to Facebook to preserve online free speech as different social media companies compete for global users. He used America as a standard for free speech and free speech policy enactment in comparison to the global scene where the platform reaches.  Legal Compliance Because it is a publicly traded company, Facebook has […]

Russia’s “Sovereign Internet” Law On Nov. 1, 2019, the Russian government finally enacted its new internet internet surveillance law that it adopted in April of this year. The Russian government refers to the law as the “Sovereign Internet Law,” a move to take control over Russia’s free internet. The Kremlin, Russia’s executive branch, framed the need for the law in light of potential external cyberattacks, the need for protection against foreign enemies such as the United States, and potential “emergencies” where the state deems censorship a necessary act.   The new system of governance over the internet allows the Russian government to track all free-flowing information and selectively block information that it deems to be a “threat”. Furthermore, the new law enables the government to reroute Russian users, without the knowledge of the users as to what they are being rerouted from or why. The enactment of the law required the […]

Rise to the Presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is the former president of Brazil, whose term ran from 2003 until 2011. President Lula was born in Pernambuco, Brazil on October 27, 1945. He rose to acclaim in 1975, when the Metalworkers’ Union elected him to be president after he had led the legal section of the union. When elected, he spearheaded the movement in Brazil to increase wages for workers. During this movement, President Lula was arrested by the police for breaching Brazil’s National Security Law. This law, created in 1969 during the Brazilian government’s aversion to political opposition, allowed the government the ability to give their own definition to crimes against national security and allowed them to hold people in detention for up to twenty days without a charge.  After the Military Supreme Court released him from jail, President Lula established the […]

The legal definition of gender as ‘the two sexes, male and female, within the context of society,’ might change once and for all. The International Law Commission has recently asked the General Assembly to discard the current definition in international law as part of a new treaty on the prosecution of crimes against humanity; as the primary international body that develops and codifies international law, such a request from the ILC carries both significance and symbolic meaning. Indeed, such a change faces much controversy. The Commission had previously announced that it would not change any of the definitions from the Roman Statute in the new treaty (one of which being the current definition of gender). Moreover, the majority of countries do not seem to share the view. As of 2019, only seven countries have allowed the legal change of gender on the basis of self-identification alone; many others require psychiatric […]