In a letter to the European Commission revealed Thursday, ministers of France, Germany, Italy and Spain proposed that a “binding mechanism” be added to the upcoming New Pact on Asylum and Migration to distribute asylum seekers. The proposal is an attempt to keep asylum reform on the agenda during the COVID-19 pandemic. The proposal states [...]

France’s national competition regulator on Friday issued a statement that urges Google to begin negotiating payment with publishers and news agencies for the re-use of their content. The statement calls on Google to begin negotiating within three months. The regulator agency states that press publishers and Agence-France Presse (AFP) complained that Google is infringing on [...]

The National Assembly of Cambodia passed a state of emergency bill on Friday due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The bill is now being sent to the Senate. The bill passed in the lower house by 115 votes in favor and 10 abstentions. Justice Minister Koeut Rith wrote an initial draft of the bill and later added [...]

The Taipei prison executed death row inmate Weng Jen-hsien on Wednesday after the Supreme Court convicted him of killing six people. Rights groups condemned the execution, stating the death penalty is a human rights violation and should be abolished. Weng was convicted of killing his parents, niece, nephew, nephew’s wife and his parents’ caregivers after setting [...]

The UN General Assembly on Thursday unanimously agreed to a resolution urging international cooperation to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic. It is the first resolution the assembly adopted since the outbreak. The resolution calls on international cooperation to “contain, mitigate and defeat the pandemic, including by exchanging information, scientific knowledge and best practices and by applying the [...]

The Singapore Ministry of Health enacted stay-at-home and social distancing regulations on Thursday amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The penalty for violating the regulations is a fine up to $10,000 or imprisonment up to six months or both. All travelers coming back to Singapore, including citizens and permanent residents, will have to go into quarantine for [...]

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Thursday pardoned former army sergeant Sunil Ratnayake, who was sentenced to death for killing eight Tamil civilians during the country’s civil war. After a 13-year trial, the Colombo High Court found Ratnayake guilty of eight civilian murders and sentenced him to death in June 2015. The Supreme Court upheld [...]

The Afghan government delayed the release of Taliban prisoners on Saturday after disagreements occurred over the number of detainees to be released and uncertainty about whether the prisoners would return to fighting. The Taliban agreed to talks with the Afghan government after signing an accord with the US. The accord ended 18 years of US [...]

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy and Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont on Monday announced an unprecedented regional effort to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). In a joint statement, they said that restaurants, bars, theaters, gyms and casinos must close in the three states, effective 8 PM Monday. [...]

US Immigration Judge Rebecca Holt issued a removal order on Thursday against Tennessee resident Friedrich Karl Berger, a former Nazi concentration camp guard. Holt found Berger removable under the Immigration and Nationality Act because his “willing service as an armed guard of prisoners at a concentration camp where persecution took place.” Holt ordered Berger removed [...]