Foreign Digest: Russia, Poland and Turkey

Russia: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was awarded the Sakharov Prize from the European Union Parliament today for his leadership on human rights. Navalny promotes freedom in Russia against the tyrannical regime of ex-Soviet intelligence officer Vladimir Putin and exposes the corruption of the oligarchical regime. The opposition leader has been poisoned and repeatedly arrested for exercising the freedom of peaceful assembly and speech. Navalny is currently a political prisoner. The EU appealed in its award announcement for his release. Those who criticize or question Putin are harassed, face prosecution and conviction from a judiciary that is not independent, or are forced into exile, assaulted or killed. Some Russian exiles have even been killed abroad. The prize is named for Andrei Sakharov, the scientist during the Soviet era who was a leading dissident. Poland: The European Union's court recently held that Poland’s far-right government had violated its rules by compromising the independence of its judiciary. Poland is an example of the global trend toward authoritarianism, especially in Eastern Europe. The main opposition party is a center-right party that believes in liberty. Turkey: The Islamist authoritarian Turkish regime continues to arrest of people accused of complicity in the failed military coup five years ago. There were well over a hundred more arrests yesterday. Anyone associated with a Muslim cleric living in exile in Pennsylvania who opposes the regime is blamed for complicity. The Turkish military was a safeguard for secular, free and representative government until the Turkish dictatorship brought it under its control after the 2016 coup attempt.