Russia’s State Duma has just adopted a new bill which if enacted would broadly restrict the rights of all high-profile bloggers and social media users by treating them, in essence, as mass media outlets. The new law, billed as a measure against terrorism, will apply to anyone whose blogs or personal websites attract 3,000 or […]

In one more example of escalating tensions between Washington and Moscow over Russia’s annexation of Crimea, Russia has cut off all programming by the Voice of America, a move which the Broadcasting Board of Governors, the organization that oversees VOA, has strongly condemned. The decision was delivered in a curt, one-sentence letter from Dmitry Kiselyov, […]

A woman activist whose efforts helped end China’s “Re-education Through Labor” (RTL) in late 2013 has been arrested and charged with “picking quarrels and making trouble.” Between 2006 and 2011, Liu Hua served three terms in the Masanjia Women’s “Re-education Through Labor” (RTL) camp as punishment for her efforts to blow the whistle on corruption in […]