Public hearings into the Iraq war are set to begin on 24 November, the panel’s chairman Sir John Chilcot said today. But witnesses still do not know whether the evidence they give will ever make its way into the public domain, says Chris Ames
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Four men, believed to be plain-clothed police, seized independent journalist Slim Boukdhir near his home in Tunis yesterday evening (Wednesday 28 October), beating him, stripping him of his clothes, ID, money and phones and drawing a knife while threatening to kill him “next time”.
The kidnapping and assault occurred two hours after Boukhdhir was interviewed by the BBC, where he discussed President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali’s internationally derided election victory on Sunday and a banned book by two French journalists on Ben Ali’s wife and her rising influence in the country.
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Coincidence or serendipity? Index on Censorship has found itself oddly placed by legal developments in a long running spat between Israeli and UK human rights activists and the Israeli Medical Association (IMA).
Physicians for Human Rights in Israel (PHRI) and the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) accuse the IMA of failing to properly investigate reports that some Israeli doctors had overseen the torture of Palestinians by Israeli security forces.
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The road to greater surveillance and restrictions of liberties has been paved with good intentions from both the right and left, says Matthew Ryder. As the public mood changes, it is worth keeping this in mind
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