A year after the Philippines witnessed the mass slaughter of 58 people, including 32 journalists, justice for the victims’ families seems a distant prospect. Harry Roque reports.
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The lawyer of imprisoned Nobel peace prize winner Liu Xiaobo has said his client will accept nothing other than an unconditional release. His statement follows recent reports that the authorities offered to release him into exile in exchange for a confession. Shang Baojun said he was unclear whether a specific offer had been made to the dissident, who is serving 11 years for incitement to subvert state power. Last week, it was revealed that Liu’s family are being prevented from collecting the Nobel Prize in Oslo on his behalf.
The Muslim Brotherhood has said that more than 1,000 of its members and eight of its candidates have been arrested ahead of next week’s parliamentary elections. Over recent days the group’s supporters have clashed with security forces in several cities. The Muslim Brotherhood is banned from the elections but it bypasses restrictions by putting up their candidates as independents. This tactic proved successful in the 2005 elections and the brotherhood currently control a third of the seats in parliament. The arrests have been criticised as part of a wider government crackdown on opposition electioneering.
The Attorney General’s Office today made an unprecedented application for the court to remind Alan Shadrake of his right to seek leave of the court if he wants to leave Singapore. This implies that if his defence team applies for Shadrake to leave the jurisdiction, the prosecution would not contest it. Last Tuesday, he was sentenced to six weeks in prison for “scandalising the court” in his book Once A Jolly Hangman. Shadrake, who appealed the sentence last week, has said that he will consider the offer.