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In November the Peace and Security Council (PSC) once again discussed the crisis in Burundi and asked the African Union Commission (AUC) to increase the number of military experts and human rights observers in the country. Burundi, however, still has not signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that regulates the activities of these observers.

Yet again, meaningful democracy in Haiti has been eluded in favor of short-term stability.[1] Although a new date for elections was decided last January, no conditions close to being fair and democratic have been met. After months of electoral processes were thought as lacking transparency, it is clear that recent elections were found to be highly dubious and fraudulent that would not bring stability to the country.

The U.S. Marines and sailors with Special-Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force Crisis Response-Africa trained the UPDF in combat medicine, heavy equipment operations, Mine-Resistant, Ambushed-Protected vehicle maintenance and driving, utilities, communications, engineering and explosive ordnance training, during the past two months.

To mark Human Rights Day on December 10 IWPR asked Armenian human rights defenders whether the shift towards Moscow had made any difference. The consensus view was that it had, and that since accession to the Eurasian bloc in January, there had been a series of grave human rights violations regarding freedom of assembly and expression, in particular.