China: one in five arrests take place in 'police state' Xinjiang

One in five arrests in China last year took place in Xinjiang, the nominally autonomous western territory that critics say has been turned into a police state rife with human rights violations.

Analysing publicly available government data, the advocacy group Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD), found 21% of all arrests in China in 2017 were in Xinjiang, which accounts for about 1.5% of China’s population. Indictments in Xinjiang, accounted for 13% of all charges handed down in the country last year.

Filming Israeli soldiers in action could soon become a crime

JERUSALEM — Recording or taking unauthorized pictures of Israeli soldiers clashing with Palestinians could soon bring criminal charges and penalties, if legislation proposed by members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hawkish coalition is enacted into law.

On Sunday, the Israeli government endorsed the proposal, which seeks to criminalize the filming and/or distribution of images and video footage showing certain Israeli military operations — if the aim is “hurting a soldier’s spirit” or “harming national security.” A conviction for such crimes could carry prison terms of five to 10 years.

This Is What A 21st-Century Police State Really Looks Like

KASHGAR, China — This is a city where growing a beard can get you reported to the police. So can inviting too many people to your wedding, or naming your child Muhammad or Medina.

Driving or taking a bus to a neighboring town, you’d hit checkpoints where armed police officers might search your phone for banned apps like Facebook or Twitter, and scroll through your text messages to see if you had used any religious language.

Indiana bill would allow police to shut down protests 'by any means necessary'

A bill that would require public officials in Indiana to dispatch law enforcement swiftly to remove any protesters blocking traffic by “any means necessary” prompted uproar on Wednesday.

Opponents of the bill, introduced by a Republican state senator, rushed to the general assembly in Indianapolis on Wednesday afternoon to attend a hearing for the legislation, arguing that it could give a green light to the police to shut down protests harshly “even to the point of costing lives”.

Egypt’s Young “Anti-Torture T-Shirt” Detainee Finally Free After Nearly 800 Days Behind Bars

ISTANBUL — Mahmoud Hussein, detained in Cairo while wearing an anti-torture t-shirt, is finally free after nearly 800 days behind bars during which he says he was repeatedly tortured.

Hussein, who was 18 years old when he was taken into custody on Jan. 25, 2014, after attending a demonstration against both military rule and the Muslim Brotherhood, has since spent over two years in detention without being formally charged.

Terrorizing Students: The Criminalization of Children in the US Police State

Violence has become the problem of the 21st century. This claim is indebted to W. E. B. Dubois' much quoted notion that "The problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of color line."[1] For Du Bois, racism was one of the most pressing problems of the time and could not be understood outside of the gross inequities of wealth, power, opportunity and access. What he did not anticipate was the degree to which the violent character of racism would come to define the 21st century on a national and global level. What he described as a ruthless ideology and attitude of racist hostility would later mutate in the new millennium into a raw display of police brutality and state terrorism, camouflaged under the guise of an alleged post-racial society.

Saunders' comments belong in a police state

This is police state stuff.

Two men were shot and killed, in public, in February. Police know who did it, but they will not tell us. They say no charges should be laid in the case, but they will not tell us why, or give us the information they uncovered in their investigation. Police have security-camera video of the incident, but they will not show it to us.

Michael Brelo, Cleveland Patrolman, Found Not Guilty In Deaths Of 2 Unarmed Suspects

CLEVELAND (AP) — A patrolman charged in the shooting deaths of two unarmed suspects during a 137-shot barrage of gunfire was acquitted Saturday in a case that helped prompt the U.S. Department of Justice determine the city police department had a history of using excessive force and violating civil rights.

Michael Brelo, 31, faced as many as 22 years in prison had the judge convicted him on two counts of voluntary manslaughter. Before issuing his verdict, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge John P. O'Donnell said he would not "sacrifice" Brelo if the evidence did not merit a conviction.

Insulting Police Online Banned By Granby, Que., Bylaw

Insulting a police officer or municipal official on the internet has been made illegal in the town of Granby, Que., after the council voted unanimously tonight in favour of beefing up an already controversial bylaw.

In Granby — a town situated about 80 kilometres east of Montreal — it was already illegal to insult a police officer and other municipal officials​. Offenders could face fines ranging from $100 to as high as $1,000.

Bill C-51: Steven Blaney Says Concerns About Liberties Are 'Ridiculous'

OTTAWA - Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney is trying to assure Canadians that proposed anti-terrorism measures won't run roughshod over civil liberties.

In his testimony Tuesday at committee hearings examining the federal legislation, Blaney dismissed concerns the new provisions would allow the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to squelch or infiltrate environmental protests that fall outside the letter of the law.

The planned measures are needed to protect the public from extremists who hate Canadian values, Blaney said during a meeting of the House of Commons public safety committee.

Steven Blaney Grilled For Invoking Holocaust To Defend Bill C-51

An NDP MP accused Canada’s public safety minister of using “inflated rhetoric” after he referred to the Holocaust during a hearing on the Conservative government’s proposed anti-terror legislation on Tuesday.

Public safety critic Randall Garrison grilled Steven Blaney on what he calls the minister’s “inflated rhetoric” and “offensive” remark on the first day of committee hearings into Bill C-51.

Blaney said the proposed bill would help the government target websites that distribute “extremist ideology” and promote “hatred and violence." To emphasize his point, he compared threats made by the Islamic State to those made by Nazi propagandists.

Bill C-51 Could Be Used To Target Activists: Amnesty International

OTTAWA - A prominent human-rights group says the Conservative government's anti-terrorism bill could be used to target environmental activists and aboriginal protesters.

In a brief made public Monday, Amnesty International Canada added its voice to those who say the bill would go beyond genuine security threats to ensnare those who mount demonstrations that fall outside the strict letter of the law.

The Conservatives brought in the bill — which would broaden the Canadian Security Intelligence Service's mandate — following the murders of two Canadian soldiers last October.

WOULD YOU TRUST A SECRET POLICE FORCE TO THIS MAN?

Given his well-known animosity toward those who get in his way, Stephen Harper seems like the last person to trust with a secret police force.

But a secret police force is exactly what the prime minister will soon have, as a result of Bill C-51, the government's "anti-terror" legislation currently making its way quickly through Parliament.

Even the pro-establishment Globe and Mail has come out strongly against Bill C-51 in a series of sharply worded editorials, accusing Harper of using the threat of terrorism to "turn our domestic spy agency into something that looks disturbingly like a secret police force."

Bill C-51 could be the biggest bait and switch Canada has ever seen: opinion

In the spring of 2011 the Government of Canada was renamed the Harper Government. While to some it may seem a relatively minor issue of semantics, in retrospect it has come to signify something much greater: the dismantling of the Canada you grew up in, and its replacement with a strange and frightening new Canada birthed behind the closed doors of the Prime Minister’s Office. While Canadians have complained about the unchecked power of majority governments in the past, this one feels like a landslide that just keeps coming.

George W. Bush once famously intoned that “you’re either with us, or you’re with the terrorists.” Now with the proposal of Bill C-51 the Harper Government has essentially said the same thing, only with a twist. You’re either with the Harper Government and the oil companies, or you’re with the terrorists. Disagreeing is treasonous.

Bill C-51 threatens to sacrifice liberty for security

Four former Canadian prime ministers (including a Conservative) and five former Supreme Court justices have warned Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper that protecting the security of Canadians and their most important freedoms is not a zero sum game.

In their own words criticizing his anti-terrorism legislation, Bill C-51, they warn: “Protecting human rights and protecting public safety are complementary objectives, but experience has shown that serious human rights abuses can occur in the name of maintaining national security.”

CSIS needs power to stop high-risk travellers, says Steven Blaney

Canada must take action to prevent its citizens from travelling abroad for terrorist purposes, Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney said after a CBC News investigation revealed a 23-year-old woman travelled to Syria after being radicalized.

"Clearly, Canada cannot become an exporter of terrorism. This is not the Canadian way of living," Blaney said Wednesday.

The woman, whom CBC News is calling Aisha to protect her identity, made the journey to Syria to join up with ISIS last summer, after taking an online course to study the Qur’an taught by a woman based in Edmonton, according to her older sister Rabia (whose name has also been changed).

Political activist Ken Stone takes CSIS to task for alleged harassment

What is it like to be targeted by Canada's spy agency? Veteran anti-war and environmental activist Ken Stone knows firsthand and is willing to talk about it.

The retired school teacher is presently taking the legal route: making a formal complaint against the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). This action follows the sudden appearance of two agents at his Hamilton home two years ago.

"The visit was not warranted under the mandate of CSIS. It caused anxiety for me and my family. It was an attempt to intimidate me, and my family members in lawfully exercising our charter rights, of freedom of speech and association, and my right to criticize the government of Canada, and its policies," said Stone.

Anti-terror bill would widen powers for Canadian border guards

Canadian customs officers will have another reason to comb through travellers’ computers because Ottawa’s new anti-terror bill will empower them to confiscate anything falling under the broadly defined category of “terrorist propaganda” at border checkpoints.

A little-noticed amendment in C-51, the Conservative government’s Anti-Terrorism Act, adds the broad category of “writings, signs, visible representations or audio recordings that constitute terrorist propaganda” to the list of things Canada Border Services Agency officials can seize without a warrant from those entering Canada.

Kenney rejects call to increase oversight of national-security agencies

The federal government is rejecting calls for more independent oversight of Canada’s national security agencies even as it speeds passage of legislation that would give sweeping new powers to spies and police in the name of fighting terrorism.

Parliament will vote Monday night on the Anti-Terrorism Act after the Conservatives limited second-reading debate for the legislation to three days. The bill will be sent to a Parliamentary committee for scrutiny. The Tories want the controversial legislation to become law before the summer begins.

Bill’s terrorist propaganda provisions overly broad: law professors

OTTAWA - A federal proposal to scrub terrorist propaganda from the Internet risks sweeping in too much speech that has no ties to violent threats, says a new analysis.

The definition of propaganda in the government anti-terrorism bill is dangerously broad, law professors Craig Forcese and Kent Roach say in their paper.

The bill, introduced late last month, proposes giving the RCMP power to seek a judge's order to remove terrorist propaganda from websites.

Forcese, of the University of Ottawa, and Roach, who teaches at the University of Toronto, say while they support the idea in principle, it should be rooted in actual or threatened violence.