bne_newspaper_July_21_2017

bne:Newspaper Follow us on twitter.com/bneintellinews
Content:
2 Top Stories
5 The Regions This Week 9 Chart
10 Central Europe 12 Southeast Europe 14 Eastern Europe 16 Eurasia
18 Opinion
20 Lists24 Lists
July 21, 2017 www.intellinews.com
Poland passes bill putting supreme court under PiS control
Wojciech Kosc in Warsaw
The Polish parliament on July 20 passed a hugely controversial law that effectively places the su- preme court under the control of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, removing checks and bal- ances usually expected of a modern democracy.
The passing of the legislation amounts to the final
Critics remain sceptical that serial humans rights abuser Uzbekistan has really reformed
Nizom Khodjayev
Uzbekistan is one of the world’s worst human rights abusers. Forced labour and child labour in the cotton industry, thousands of jailed political activists and torture are some of the most cited abuses on the Central Asian country’s long charge sheet. Suppressing media freedom, making arbitrary arrests, and cracking down on religious
More demonstrations such as this Committee for the Defence of Democracy (KOD) protest against PiS followed parliament's passing of the divisive law.
piece in the jigsaw for PiS in imposing political mastery over the judiciary, despite the growing protestations of the European Commission that the move is plainly contrary to European law. PiS claims it had to reform control over the judiciary
See page 2
Human Rights Watch slammed both the ILO and the World Bank for turning a blind eye to the continued use of child labour in Uzbekistan’s cotton industry.
groups are other serious blemishes on the ex- Soviet republic’s record.
Such violations were commonplace under the late Islam Karimov’s regime, with the worst instance
See page 3