As Syrian diplomats are expelled around the world, reports emerge of Syrian diaspora opposition activists being subject to threats and intimidation by Syrian officials.
 
According to a story by Paul Daley in the Sydney Morning Herald, a Syrian business owner living in Australia, recounted the intimidation he faced.

See here.

Speaking anonymously, the diaspora activist described how he had received a call from the Syrian embassy while he was organising an international conference of young peaceful Syrian dissidents in Tunisia, and an embassy representative told him that “he could not guarantee [his] safety in Syria.”

The activist said, 

"This was October last year. He said I should not go, and that foreigners should stay out of Syria's internal problems. I told him that I had no plans to go to Syria. He responded … that 'we know you do'. He told me that I would be putting the young Syrians who would attend the conference 'in danger' and that they should be 'very careful'. I do not know how he found out about the conference.”
 
"I was told that 'people like you represent the problem in Syria'. I was told that the government 'will shut your fraud of a business down'.

"A week later, the premises of my business [in Syria] was trashed by thugs. Nearing the conference, the calls got more frequent and more aggressive."

"Gradually these calls came less from the embassy but also from Syrian government officials in Damascus, directly to my mobile. A mix of Arabic and English was used.”
 
"While a good deal of the Syrian diaspora in Australia supported Assad until very recently, there was a vocal minority of Syrians working with a number of peaceful opposition groups. I know they have been threatened - worse yet, they have had their families back in Syria threatened."

Over 2500 anti-government protesters disrupted Thailand's parliament on Friday, as they surrounded the building and blocked cars from entering the premises.

Dressed in yellow, protesters from the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), forced the speaker to postpone a debate on a reconciliation bill that could allow theformer Prime Minister, Thaksin Shinawatra to return.

Shinawatra was ousted from power by a military coup in 2006, and is currently in self-imposed exile.

Egypt’s ousted president Hosni Mubarak, along with his former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly, have been handed lifetime prison sentences for their complicity in the killing of protesters in 2011’s uprising.

Judge Ahmed Rifaat referred to Mubarak’s rule as “30 years of darkness”, stating that both Mubarak and Adly were complicit in a crackdown on protesters in the 18 days of demonstrations in Cairo and other major cities nationwide.

Egypt’s decades-long state of emergency expired on Thursday, marking the first time in more than 30 years that the law has not been renewed.

The ruling military Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) has stated that they will continue to “protect” the country “taking into account that the state of emergency has ended”, until power is officially handed over to the winner of the presidential elections in late June.

Chinese authorities have detained hundreds of people in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, as a young woman died setting herself alight protesting Chinese rule.

The crackdown follows two men self immolating in the capital earlier this week, marking the first time such an act of protest has occurred in the city.

Burmese democracy leader  Aung San Suu Kyi has called for “healthy scepticism” over Burma’s recent drastic reforms, in her first major speech outside of the country in more than two decades.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum on East Asia in Bangkok, she called on investors to "think deeply" saying,

"We do not want investment to mean more possibilities for corruption. We do not want investment to mean greater inequality. And we do not want investment to mean greater privileges for those already privileged."

UN observers have confirmed the discovery of 13 bodies near the eastern city of Deir al-Zour.

The men were found with their hands behind their back and some had gunshot wounds in their heads.

The head of the UN observers, Major General Robert Mood, said he was ‘deeply disturbed’ by the ‘appalling and inexcusable act’.

"All the bodies had their hands tied behind their backs and some appear to have been shot in the head from a short distance," he said in a statement released on Wednesday.

The former Rwandan minister, Callixte Nzabonimana, was sentenced to life in prison by the International Crimes Tribunal for Rwanda  (ICTR) on Thursday, for his part in the 1994 genocide.

In particular, the case focused on a meeting held on 18th April 1994, in Murambi, where Nzabonimana and other ministers formed an aggreement "to encourage the killing of Tutsis... with the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in part, the Tutsi population as such in Gitarama prefecture," the AFP reported.

Exerting pressure of Moscow and Beijing, the US Secretary of State, Hiliary Clinton warned of the "terrible" danger of civil war.

Condemning reports of a Russian arms shipment as "reprehensible", Clinton said,

"The Russians keep telling us they want to do everything they can to avoid a civil war because they believe that the violence would be catastrophic," Clinton said.