(2021-07-16). The Espionage Act & Julian Assange — Part 1: A History of Prosecuting Speech. orinocotribune.com 
By Joe Lauria — Jul 6, 2021 | From its earliest years the United States has found ways to deny the rights of a free press when it was politically expedient to do so. | One of the latest ways was to arrest WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange 29 months ago on April 11, 2019 and to indict him — the first time a publisher and journalist has ever been charged under the 1917 Espionage Act for possessing and publishing state secrets. | Though several U.S. administrations had come close to punishing journalists for revealing defense information, they all pulled back, until Assange. They were restrained because…
(2021-07-16). Why Human Rights in China and Tigray, But Not in Haiti, Palestine or Colombia? mronline.org Over eight days, from June 25-30, Haiti had been subjected to increasing state-sponsored, imperial and gang violence. Massacres killed almost 60 people in Port au Prince, including in Cité Soleil, Delmas and Pétionville, as well as on on Rue Magloire Ambroise. | July 16, 2021…
(2021-07-16). Online panel: Let Cuba live! End the U.S. blockade now! liberationnews.org 
Photo: Cubans rally to support the revolution and government in Camaguey on July 12 This webinar was organized by the ANSWER Coalition and aired live on Wednesday, July 14, 2021. Trump added 243 new sanctions to tighten the 62-year long US economic blockade of Cuba. Imposed shortages of basic goods have created grave suffering throughout …
(2021-07-16). Young Communists in NYC organize protest in support of Cuba. peoplesworld.org 
NEW YORK—"Cuba sí, bloqueo no!" (Cuba yes, blockade no!) chanted the crowd in Spanish while holding signs that read "Long live Socialist Cuba" and "End the inhumane sanctions!" The Young Communist League of New York took the initiative to organize a rally in support of ending the blockade on Cuba after a series of protests …
(2021-07-16). 'The US Has Failed to Destroy Cuba', Diaz-Canel Says. telesurenglish.net On Friday, Cuba's President Miguel Diaz-Canel questioned U.S. President Joe Biden's concern about the crisis on the Island and argued that Washington has failed to destroy the Revolution despite wasting billions of dollars in its attempts to do so. | RELATED: | "If Biden had sincere humanitarian concern for the Cuban people, he could eliminate the 243 crippling sanctions imposed by former President Donald Trump as a first s…
(2021-07-16). Texas Dems, AFL-CIO's Trumka link voting and workers' rights. peoplesworld.org 
WASHINGTON—Citing civil rights leaders the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the late Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and a delegation of Texas state Democratic lawmakers—who left Austin for D.C. to halt a draconian Texas GOP voter repression law—inextricably linked voting rights with worker rights. In an outdoor press conference at …
(2021-07-16). Congresswoman arrested during voting rights protest on Capitol grounds. nationofchange.org "I stand in solidarity with Black women and allies across the country in defense of our constitutional right to vote."
(2021-07-16). Venezuela and Switzerland Review Progress of Dialogue Process. orinocotribune.com 
Venezuelan Minister for Foreign Affairs, Jorge Arreaza, met with the head of the Peace and Human Rights Division of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs of the Swiss Confederation, Simón Geissbàºhler, to review the progress of the dialogue process in Venezuela. | The meeting between the representatives from both countries was held at Casa Amarilla, headquarters of the Venezuelan Foreign Affairs Ministry. The Venezuelan government has repeatedly promoted and encouraged the process despite constant attempts by sectors of the opposition to destabilize the government using illegal and undiplomatic maneuvers…
(2021-07-16). Zionists sold tools to hack Windows in Iran: Microsoft. en.mehrnews.com Microsoft and technology human rights group Citizen Lab announced a zionist group sold a tool to hack into Microsoft Windows in Iran.
(2021-07-16). Venezuela's Arreaza: A Good Sign if US Recognizes International Criminal Court. orinocotribune.com Thursday, July 15, Venezuelan Minister for Foreign Affairs Jorge Arreaza considered that Washington now recognizes the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) after Ambassador James Story sponsored an activity in which ICC prosecutor Karim Khan participated. | "A good sign that the US, through @usembassyve [James Story], recognizes the International Criminal Court and its jurisdiction, because there its officials will be investigated and tried for crimes against humanity derived from the illegal sanctions against #Venezuela," Arreaza wrote on his Twitter account. | The activity organized by the vir…
(2021-07-16). Pentagon: Colombians Arrested in Haitian President's Killing Had US Training. news.antiwar.com The Pentagon said on Thursday that some of the former Colombian servicemen arrested over the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moise had previously received training from the US military. | "A review of our training databases indicates that a small number of the Colombian individuals detained as part of this investigation had participated in past US military training and education programs while serving as active members of the Colombian Military Forces," Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Ken Hoffman
(2021-07-16). Saturday 7/17: Oakland: Good Trouble Vigil for Democracy & Voting Rights. indybay.org Preservation Park at pavilion and fountain site, 1233 Preservation Park Way, Oakland 94612 | Peaceful event. Follow all current COVID guidelines.
(2021-07-16). Monday 7/19: Voting Rights Now! Women's Protest March on Washington D.C. w/ CA PPC. indybay.org Online D.C. livestream & online voting rights actions…
(2021-07-16). Saturday 7/17: Sacramento: Good Trouble Vigil for Democracy and Voting Rights. indybay.org California State Capitol, 1315 10th St, Sacramento, CA 95814 | Peaceful event. Follow all current COVID guidelines.
(2021-07-16). Saturday 7/17: Corte Madera: Good Trouble Vigil for Democracy & Voting Rights. indybay.org Corte Madera Town Park, 498 Tamalpais Dr., Corte Madera 94925…
(2021-07-16). Saturday 7/17: Good Trouble Virtual Vigil for Democracy & Voting Rights. indybay.org Online call to action event…
(2021-07-16). Saturday 7/17: Petaluma: Good Trouble Vigil for Democracy and Voting Rights. indybay.org Petaluma Fairgrounds Park & Ride, 100 Fairgrounds Dr., Petaluma 94952…
(2021-07-16). Tuesday 7/20: Free Commander X aka Christopher Doyon – Nonviolent cyber activist defending the rights of the homeless. indybay.org Free Commander X aka Christopher Doyon – Nonviolent cyber activist defending the rights of the homeless has court appearance | Join the protest outside the Robert F. Peckham Federal Court House, 280 S. 1st Street, San Jose, California on on the day of his court appearance, Tuesday, July 20, 2021, at noon…
(2021-07-15). China's Foreign Policy Part 5, 1989-1995: Navigating to Global Economic Integration after Tiananmen. liberationnews.org 
In the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, China found itself internationally isolated and subjected to harsh new economic sanctions. Then in 1992, Deng Xiaoping launches the "Southern Tour", culminating in the dramatic deepening of market reforms. This leads to a massive influx of foreign investment as China becomes deeply integrated into the global economy.
(2021-07-15). Video: Let Cuba Live! End the U.S. blockade Now! answercoalition.org This webinar aired live on Wednesday, July 14, 2021. | Trump added 243 new sanctions to tighten the 62-year long US economic blockade of Cuba. Imposed shortages of basic goods have created grave suffering throughout the island. Covid-19 too has severely damaged Cuba's tourism industry. The US wants to topple the Cuban revolution but supporters of the revolution are fighting back.
(2021-07-15). Let Cuba Live! End the U.S. blockade Now! answercoalition.org This webinar aired live on Wednesday, July 14, 2021. | Trump added 243 new sanctions to tighten the 62-year long US economic blockade of Cuba. Imposed shortages of basic goods have created grave suffering throughout the island. Covid-19 too has severely damaged Cuba's tourism industry. The US wants to topple the Cuban revolution but supporters of the revolution are fighting back.
(2021-07-15). US Concerned About Democracy Everywhere in the World…Except the US. sputniknews.com Voting Rights in Texas; Food riots in South Africa; Confederate Statues come down in Charlottesville, VA…
(2021-07-15). After 64-day hunger strike, Palestinian activist released. workers.org 
Ghandafar Abu Atwan, a 28-year-old Palestinian man, has finally been released after a 64-day hunger strike. He was protesting his arbitrary imprisonment by Israeli occupation forces. Held in an Israeli prison since October 2020, Abu Atwan was placed under "administrative detention," a tactic condemned by international human rights groups by . . . |
(2021-07-15). Mexico: 28 Environmental, Indigenous Leaders Killed Since 2020. telesurenglish.net The Mexican Center for Environmental Law (CEMDA) denounced that 28 environmental defenders and indigenous leaders have been murdered in this Latin American country since 2020. | RELATED: | "We are facing an alarming situation. In Mexico, there is a structural and generalized violence against those who defend the natural heritage, land and territory," said Gabriela Carreon, the CEMDA human rights officer. | Her environmental organiz…
(2021-07-15). Critical Race Theory: Echo Chamber vs. Echo Chamber. dissidentvoice.org 
Social media is biased, not to the Left or the Right, but downward. — Jaron Lanier Critical race theory, according to Wikipedia, is "a body of legal scholarship and an academic movement of civil-rights scholars and activists in the United States that seeks to critically examine U.S. law as it intersects with issues of race in the U.S. and to challenge …
(2021-07-15). Imprisoned Palestinian leader Khalida Jarrar writes new letter: Write to Khalida and call for her freedom. samidoun.net 
Khalida Jarrar, the imprisoned Palestinian political leader, feminist and parliamentarian, jailed by the Israeli occupation for her political activity, issued a new letter to her daughter Suha, who died on Sunday, 11 July of a heart attack at the age of 30. Despite worldwide outrage and condemnation and considering that Jarrar has only two months remaining in her sentence imposed by an Israeli military court for her public political work to advance Palestinian rights and liberation, her lawyers' appeals for early release were denied by the Israeli occupation. She was not even allowed a furlough or to see her daug…
(2021-07-15). Congressional Progressive Caucus Urges Merkel to Support Vaccine Patent Waiver. commondreams.org Nations including Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan have some of the world's most abysmal human rights records—but that isn't deterring the Biden administration from seeking to work with them.
(2021-07-15). Indonesia parliament passes widely opposed Papua Special Autonomy law and other stories. peoplesdispatch.org In today's episode of the Daily Round-up we take a look at the revised Special Autonomy law passed by the Indonesian parliament vis-a-vis the Papua region despite widespread protests, an ongoing hunger strike by hundreds of undocumented migrants in Belgium to demand access to legal rights of residency, social services and work, the end of the over 5 week long strike by workers at the Volvo Trucks plant in the US after the imposition of a tentative agreement by the company, and the impact of existing inequities on Covid-19 vaccine access.
(2021-07-15). Warnock: "Shame on Us" If We're More Committed to Filibuster Than Voting Rights. truthout.org 
Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia applauded Texas Democrats on Wednesday for leaving their state in an effort to "Voting rights is not just a political issue, this is a moral i…
(2021-07-15). Guantánamo Memoir Film Skewers George W. Bush, But Exonerates Barack Obama. truthout.org 
Mohamedou Ould Slahi's Guantánamo memoir, Guantánamo Diary, is a book of remarkable power. Written during his incarceration and heavily redacted in its first editions, Slahi's story speaks with first-hand authority of the horror, degradation and brutality of life inside Guantánamo. It has the gravity of a historically significant document of state torture and the rich, intimate texture of a profoundly personal story. | The same cannot really be said of Kevin MacDonald's film adaptation of it, The…
(2021-07-15). SDF Fighters Killed Or Wounded Six Turkish-Backed Militants Near Manbij. southfront.org 
Illustrative image, By: sdf-press.com | On July 15, two militants of the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army were killed and four others were injured when their post was attacked by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) | According to the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, fighters of the SDF's Manbij Military Council raided…
(2021-07-15). Reckoning and Reparations in Afghanistan. commondreams.org "We urge HHS and the Army to use their authorities to immediately close the migrant detention center at Fort Bliss and prioritize the use of community-based solutions."
(2021-07-15). 'Shame on Us,' Says Warnock, If Senate Dems Let Filibuster Kill Voting Rights. commondreams.org "As we deal with a devastating climate crisis caused by decades of unchecked corporate greed, we need to center our children and their future."
(2021-07-15). Groups Demand Biden Administration End Child Detention at 'Contaminated and Unsafe' Fort Bliss. commondreams.org Any help or aid from the US always comes with conditions and ulterior motives.
(2021-07-15). US Courts Central Asian Dictators in Pursuit of Post-Afghan War Objectives. commondreams.org "When we say this is a civil rights issue it goes beyond false arrests, it's about who gets to access public spaces in a world of machine-driven segregation."
(2021-07-15). Moral Intelligence or Nuclear War. commondreams.org "When we say this is a civil rights issue it goes beyond false arrests, it's about who gets to access public spaces in a world of machine-driven segregation."
(2021-07-15). What Will Be the Language of Our Digital Future? thenation.com What Will Be the Language of Our Digital Future?
(2021-07-15). Destabilizing Cuba: Sanctions, Pandemic Hardship and Social Media Onslaught. strategic-culture.org Uncle Sam is not going to like Moscow and Beijing making inroads into his self-declared "backyard". But Uncle Sam has lost all moral authority to make serious objections. | A rash of public protests to hit Cuba was described by the White House as "spontaneous expressions of people exhausted with economic mismanagement and repression". President Joe Biden said the "United States stands with the people of Cuba as they bravely assert for their fundamental and universal rights." | The protests appear to have subsided as quickly as they erupted at the weekend. Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel has acknowledged there a…
(2021-07-15). Afghan Activist: George W. Bush's Claim U.S. War in Afghanistan Protected Women Is a "Shameless Lie" democracynow.org 
As the United States continues to withdraw its forces from Afghanistan after 20 years of war and occupation, the Taliban say they now control most Afghan territory, surrounding major population centers and holding more than two-thirds of Afghanistan's border with Tajikistan. Former President George W. Bush made a rare criticism of U.S. policy, saying, "I'm afraid Afghan women and girls are going to suffer unspeakable harm." But a leading Afghan women's rights activist says the plight of women in the country has always served as a "very good excuse" for U.S. military goals, while conditions in the country have bar…
(2021-07-15). 'One Speech… Isn't Enough'. zcomm.org Progressives Call on Biden to Get Tough on Voting Rights…
(2021-07-15). Trump started a war on journalism. Biden has yet to end it. zcomm.org Advocates for human rights and press freedom, as well as members of Congress, all need to raise their voices in this case before it is too late…
(2021-07-15). What they don't say about Cuba. peoplesdispatch.org The old-style information war that we have been experiencing for this last week against Cuba, did not start with Biden. Since 2017, the US has been incessantly and inaccurately talking about a social explosion in Cuba with its magical solution of a "humanitarian intervention." At the same time, Trump progressed in his litany of adding more sanctions to the blockade, 243 to be exact, which have been kept intact by the current administration. | In February 2020, the friends of Luis Almagro, Secretary-General of the OAS, and the Florida congressmen, in between taking selfies with the most despicable fascists of the…
(2021-07-15). The arrest of Shatha Odeh undermines access to health care in Palestine. peoplesdispatch.org On 7 July, Israeli Occupying Forces detained 10 Palestinian activists including Dr Shatha Odeh from Health Work Committees. Odeh's work is an important contribution to the right of health in Palestine…
(2021-07-15). Over 100 political prisoners freed in Algeria. peoplesdispatch.org Prior to yesterday's mass release, over 300 political prisoners were being detained by the Algerian government for supporting or participating in the anti-government Hirak protests or other opposition groups…