Open letter to the following United Nations Special Procedures − Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to Freedom of opinion and expression (SR FRDX), Special Rapporteur against Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (SRT), Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights whi

Alkarama is concerned and condemns the recent arrests and detentions of members of the opposition coalition, the National Salvation Union (USN) and the constant harassment suffered by members of political parties and civil society in Djibouti.

On 7 December 2015, Eyad Qunaibi, a 40-year-old professor in pharmacology, was sentenced to two years imprisonment by the State Security Court for "incitement against the political regime" for having published a Facebook post, on 10 June 2015, criticising, among others, his country's ties with Israel and the westernisation of Jordanian society.

On 17 December 2012, Ali Al Shihabi, a Palestinian writer and former worker at the United Nations Relief and Work Agency for Palestine refugees in the Near East, was arrested by the Military Intelligence near the Al Yarmouk refugee Camp where he lived, most probably for his links with Syria's Communist Labor Party as well as his political writings.

On 16 December 2015, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression (SR FRDX) David Kaye, supported by other UN experts, published a press release expressing his deep concern over the growing repression of freedom of expression in Saudi Arabia, ment

Since 2011, Morocco has undertaken a series of institutional reforms affirming the protection of human rights. The 2011 Constitution embodies several rights and fundamental freedoms, and provides that secret detention is a crime of the utmost gravity. Despite these notable legislative reforms, the Moroccan authorities must do more to assure that certain provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), ratified by Morocco in 1979, are fully implemented.

On 8 December 2015, the prison personnel of Tora prison violently repressed a hunger strike launched by several prisoners to protest the denial of their medication and the harshness of their conditions of detention, forcing the urgent hospitalisation of several of them. Among the hunger strikers was 22-year-old engineering student from Cairo University, Mahmoud Talaat Abdelhamid, who, although his foot was broken during the prison crackdown, was denied the right to see a doctor.

On 5 November 2015, members of the Security Forces stormed into the house of 31-year-old security manager Ali Issa Ali Al Tajer and arrested him without presenting a warrant, taking him to an unknown location, where he was detained incommunicado for 25 days. On 30 November, he was charged with terrorism based on confessions obtained under torture.

On 9 December 2015, the United Nations Committee against Torture (CAT) expressed its concern over the practice of torture in Jordan in its concluding observations, issued after the Committee analysed Jordan's National Report and engaged in a constructive dialogue with the St

On the occasion of Human Rights Day, the Alkarama Foundation presented its 7th annual award for Human Rights Defenders in the Arab World on 8 December 2015 to Omani human rights advocate and former parliamentarian, Talib Al Mamari, in recognition of his important work defending human rights in his country, in particular since the crackdown on civil society that followed the 2011 protests.