The New York based rights organisation, Human Rights Watch on Tuesday published a report highlighting the South Sudanese leaders' failure to halt gross human rights abuses, and called on the international community to impost sanctions. 

“Four years into this crisis, gruesome crimes continue, with millions displaced and hundreds of thousands facing a man-made famine,” the executive director of HRW, Kenneth Roth said. “It’s well past time to send a strong message to those in positions of power that atrocities will come at a price.”

The Catalan government on Monday faced a set back to its attempt to fast track certain bills needed to hold the planned independence referendum on October 1, as Spain's Constitutional court accepted the government's challenge. 

On Friday the central government filed an appeal against the Catalan government's approving of the fast track scheme. 

"By presenting this appeal the government is fulfilling its duty to make sure the law is upheld," the Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy told a news conference.

"Catalan society needs to be protected from a radical and divisive project which is being imposed on them by force," he added.

The Venezuelan leader and his supporters celebrated the country's referendum result on Sunday which voted in a constituent assembly that would have the power to re-write the constitution. 

The move has been fiercely opposed by opposition parties and supporters who say it consolidates the president's dictatorship. 

Protesters barricaded the streets on Monday, in a demonstration against Sunday's vote. 

Criticising the vote as a "sham", Washington imposed financial sanctions on President Maduro. Mr Maduro is the fourth leader to have such sanctions imposed by the US.  

The US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to impose new sanctions on Russia over Moscow's alleged meddling in the 2016 presidential election, reports the Financial Times.

The new sanctions package has faced intense scrutiny from Europeans countries with Germany raising concern about the impact new oil pipelines from Russia by limiting companies access to US banks.

The US government on Wednesday introduced sanctions on 13 senior officials in Venezuela, as the country's opposition protested against President Maduro's government. 

The vice president for the state oil company, army chiefs, police chiefs and the national director of elections were all targetted in the new wave of sanctions. 

The sanctions came ahead of a vote on Sunday for a Constituent Assembly that has been opposed by opposition parties who say it will consolidate the president's dictatorship. 

The US has warned Iran of “new and serious consequences” if all unjustly detained American citizens were released and returned, said the White House in a statement made on Friday.

The statement made on Friday said President Trump and is administration were “redoubling efforts” to bring back unjustly detained Americans abroad, reports Reuters.

“Iran is responsible for the care and wellbeing of every United States citizen in its custody,” the White House added.

In a significant set back to judicial independence in the country, Poland's parliament on Friday approved a new law which brings the Supreme Court under the control of the ruling party. 

The move has been widely criticism by EU states and the US who have raised concerns over what is being described as Poland's shift away from liberal values. Protesters have also taken to the streets to voice their concern at the curtailment of judicial independence. 

The president of the European Council said, “it is my conviction that they are a negation of European values and standards, and that they put our reputation at risk,”

Turkey’s parliament has forbidden its lawmakers from using the certain phrases such as “Kurdistan” or “Armenian genocide” during legislative sessions following the passing of a bill package on Thursday night.

Though the bill does not explicitly set out which words and phrases are banned from the Turkish parliament, terms that are “in violation of the administrative structure” as defined by the “indivisible wholeness” of the Republic of Turkey will now be banned.

In effect, terms such as 'Kurdistan,' 'Kurdish provinces,' or the 'Kurdish region' are forbidden, reports Kurdistan 24.

Amnesty International condemned what it described as the Cameroon forces' "horrific use of torture" against Boko Haram fighters, saying investigations reveal wide spread war crimes, human rights violations and the use of secret torture chambers.  

In a report published on Thursday, the rights group said testimonies, satellite imagery, photographic and video evidence revealed at least 20 sites belonging to the security services where torture was used routinely and some detainees were even tortured to death. 

Microsoft Corporation and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights this month agreed to work together to build a digital human rights monitoring system and databank, reported Pass Blue. 

The agreement, which was bourne out of conversations between the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay and Microsoft in 2013, includes a $5 million grant from Micorsoft as well as pro bono technical support over five years.