A group of Iranian refugees at the border between Greece and Macedonia have sewn their lips shut, going on a hunger strike to protest controversial new immigration policies enacted by several Balkan governments. The new measures passed first by Slovenia, but quickly adopted by Croatia, Serbia and Macedonia, block access to any asylum-seekers that cannot prove citizenship from Syria, Afghanistan or Iraq, classifying asylum-seekers from all other countries as “economic migrants.”

The Russian opposition party has submitted a bill in parliament that will criminalise the denial of the Armenian genocide, carried out by the Ottoman Empire over a century ago.

"We have just submitted a bill on responsibility for failure to acknowledge the fact of a genocide of Armenians by Turkey in 1915," said the leader of Russia's opposition A Just Russia party, Sergei Mironov.

The European Union reiterated its support for a "just, lasting and mutually political solution, which will allow the people of Western Sahara to exercise their right to self-determination".

The High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini said the EU "follows closely the human rights situation in Morocco", and added "the EU will take no action that may undermine” the efforts of UN chief Ban Ki-Moon in the region.

See more from AllAfrica.com here.

United Nations Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights denounced the attacks in Paris earlier this month, stating that they “may constitute a crime against humanity”.

 “These attacks may constitute a crime against humanity and certainly one which viciously and deliberately targeted sites of arts and leisure where people come together to enjoy their cultural rights,” said Karima Bennoune in apress release last week.