China faces widespread condemnation following a BBC report about the mass rape and sexual torture of Uyghur women and other Muslims detained in the province of Xinjiang. Women who spoke with the BBC described gang rapes, routine sexual torture using electrocution tools, forced sterilizations and men outside the prison camps paying for access to the detainees.

As the U.S. COVID death toll tops 450,000, the Biden administration is attempting to ramp up its vaccination campaign to slow the spread of new coronavirus variants. Meanwhile, health experts warn any vaccination progress in the United States will be threatened without global vaccine equity. “We need to, as quickly as possible, expand access to the vaccines, both in this country, in the United States, as well as around the world,” says Dr.

Russian authorities have arrested thousands of people during anti-government protests in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who has been held in jail since returning to Russia on January 17 after recovering in Germany from an attempt on his life in August using the nerve agent Novichok. Navalny has accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of being behind the poisoning that nearly killed him.