Germany charged two alleged former Syrian secret service officers with participating in crimes against humanity, in what rights activists said Tuesday would be the first trial worldwide over state-sponsored torture in Syria.
Germany said Thursday it would refrain from deporting members of China's mostly Muslim Uighur minority over human rights concerns, after admitting a Uighur man was sent back by mistake in April.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel met the wives of two detained Chinese human rights lawyers during her trip to Beijing last week in a rare move for a visiting leader, the women told AFP on Monday.
Turkish prosecutors have demanded up to 15 years jail on charges of backing a terror group for 11 activists, most of whom were detained in a raid on a workshop led by Amnesty International, a report said Sunday.
More than 27,000 images of torture and killings allegedly perpetrated by the Assad regime in Syria have been handed to German prosecutors who are investigating possible abuses, a rights group said on Friday.
Since last July, some 22 German nationals have been arrested in Turkey. Nine still sit in prison. But Berlin is struggling to come up with an effective strategy against an ever more hostile Ankara.
Germany on Monday urged China to allow terminally ill Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo to quickly get the medical help he needs, after friends of the Chinese activist said he wanted to be treated abroad.
Human Rights Watch on Thursday urged Chancellor Angela Merkel to bring up major rights violations, including a "policy of disappearances", when Germany hosts the president of Turkmenistan next week.
Human rights groups and legal experts are warning the government to react responsibly to the attacks and rampages which have taken place in Germany in recent days.
Germany’s hippest young comedian faces a jail sentence of up to five years if Turkey decides to press charges over a poem he wrote insulting its head of state.
Germany's refugee policy is "losing sight of human rights" and too focused on showing toughness, a report from NGO Amnesty International warned on Wednesday.
Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei, in Germany after being barred from overseas travel out of China for four years, says he is interested in teaching for a while in Berlin.
Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier insisted on Friday that calling Armenian massacres genocide risks belittling the Holocaust, after President Joachim Gauck broke a taboo by using the word on Thursday.
A representative of the German Labour Ministry went before a UN Committee on Friday to discuss the government's plan for improved rights for disabled people.
Speaking to the The Local ahead of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Germany next month, Amnesty International warned that his poor record on human rights must factor into the talks.
German Ambassador to the United Nations Joachim Rücker will take over the presidency of the Human Rights Council (HRC) in 2015 in a first for the country.
German sportswear giant Puma said Wednesday it would sign a new safety pact for Bangladesh's disaster-hit garment factories amid calls for Western brands to help improve workers' conditions.
German and Dutch leaders should urge Russian President Vladimir Putin during his upcoming visit to reverse his crackdown on civil society and erosion of human rights, Human Rights Watch, has said.
Embarrassment grew over the weekend for Green party co-leader Claudia Roth as video footage circulated of her high-fiving the Iranian ambassador at this year's Munich Security Conference.
A police officer was fined €10,800 on Thursday for his role in the death of asylum seeker Oury Jalloh, who died in police custody in a cell in Dessau eight years ago in circumstances which have never been properly explained.
Bosch, the southern German maker of household appliances and DIY tools, is touting for trade with Chinese jails - offering surveillance systems to spy on prisoners at visiting time.
Prisoners in Berlin have threatened a campaign of hunger strikes and disobedience in protest at overcrowding, a lack of social workers and the fact that people are being held for non-violent offences at high-security facilities.
The United States and Germany won a closely contested race Monday among western nations for UN Human Rights Council seats, while the likes of Venezuela and Pakistan secured places without a competitive vote.
