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Scientologist Lord McNair, assisted by Mahmoud Heidari, talks to Iranians about human rights, 11 February 2015.
I have been writing rather a lot about the Global Network for Rights and Development (GNRD) lately. It's a story with some strange twists and turns, from the discovery that its founder/… Read more
A European politician who has been banned from public office because of electoral malpractice was involved in monitoring the 2014 presidential election in Egypt.
Last Thursday, an appeals court in Belgium confirmed a suspended prison sentence and a five-year ban from holding public office imposed… Read more
Last week brought more embarrassment for the UAE-linked Global Network for Rights and Development (GNRD) following the revelation a few months ago that its founder/president had previously run a fake university in Norway. On Thursday, a court in Belgium gave GNRD's extravagantly-titled "… Read more
Martin Indyk: "back to the future" with traditional allies
America's unreliable allies in the Middle East
"There is no place in the world today where chaos is more prevalent and the reestablishment of order more critical than the Middle East." This is the troubling first sentence… Read more
Change is inevitable, says report
Since 2011, the uprisings in Arab republics have led to a belief that monarchies are inherently more stable. But a new report from Chatham House, the British foreign affairs think tank, questions whether the resilience of Arab monarchies in the past means they will… Read more
On Tuesday President Sisi approved a new anti-terrorism law for Egypt which seems to be more about labelling political foes as terrorists than actually combating terrorism.
The new law is so broad that it allows people to be convicted of "terrorism" even if they don't in violence. Al-… Read more
As regular readers will know, some odd things have been happening since I raised questions about the Global Network for Rights and Development (GNRD), an organisation registered in Norway which has links to the United Arab Emirates and takes an unusually favourable view of the UAE's human rights… Read more
Fake Twitter accounts which have been used to promote a controversial human rights organisation are now being used to target me after I criticised the organisation in blog posts.
A series of tweets posted over the weekend claimed that I was being paid $50,000 a year by the Qatari… Read more
In a blog post earlier this month I wrote critically about the Global Network for Rights and Development (GNRD) and raised some questions about a conference on human rights and counterterrorism that it was organising in Geneva.
Some of those who attended the Geneva conference seem to have… Read more
Mansoor Lootah: attacked Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch has recently come under attack from a mysterious Swiss-based organisation objecting to a section of its annual World Report which discusses the United Arab Emirates.
Summarising the human rights situation in the Emirates… Read more
ARAB ART ONLINE: Susan Hefuna: Al Sabr Gamil (Patience is Beautiful) 2007. Ink stained on wood 140 x 170 cm. More information | Click to enlarge
