Thousands of displaced residents of Idlib province in northwest Syria—under a Russian-backed bombardment by the Assad regime, which has killed about 300 over the past month and displaced more than 300,000—marched on the sealed Turkish border on May 31, demanding entry or international action to stop the bombing. With more than 3.6 million refugees already in Turkey, Ankara's authorities have blocked any further entries since 2016. But the regime bombing campaign, and accompanying a ground offensive that has shattered a so-called "demilitarized zone," now threatens a "humanitarian catastrophe," in the words of the United Nations. Abou al-Nour, an administrator at the overcrowded Atmeh camp, told Reuters that more than 20,000 families are now sleeping in an olive grove near the border. "They don't have any shelter or water, and this is beyond our abilities. We are doing all we can," he said. (EA Worldview)  A video posted to YouTube showed protesters rallying at the border wall with the Free Syria flag, and signs assailing the international community for its inaction. One spokesman said, "These civilians came here today to tell the world, if you cannot save us, we will break the border and come to Europe to find a safer place to live."

Amnesty International on May 29 released a report asserting that Burma's military is continuing to commit war crimes and human rights violations in the context of its campaign against the rebel Arakan Army in Rakhine state. The campaign began after the Arakan Army launched coordinated attacks on police posts in Rakhine on Jan. 4, killing several officers. The report finds that the military has fired indiscriminately in civilian areas, killing and injuring civilians and damaging homes and other property. Soldiers have at times obstructed access to medical treatment for civilians, including children, injured by such attacks.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) on May 28 detailed abuses against civilians by both the Egyptian government and militants in the Sinai Peninsula, some of which HRW classified as war crimes and possible crimes against humanity. The information in the report was collected over a two-year investigation into the conditions facing civilians in Sinai. The abuses detailed in the report include mass arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, torture, extrajudicial killings, and unlawful air and ground attacks against civilians. These actions are part of the government's fight against the ISIS-affiliated militants in Sinai. HRW claims that both groups are guilty of committing atrocities against civilians, but the Egyptian government is responsible for the majority of the abuses.

In Episode 34 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg interviews Rose Tang, veteran journalist, activist, artist, musician, and survivor of the Tiananmen Square massacre. In an in-depth oral history, Tang recounts her experiences as a student leader in Beijing in the spring of 1989, her witness to the June 4 repression, and her work as a public voice for Tiananmen Square survivors. Books and works discussed include: Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Premier Zhao Ziyang (Simon & Schuster 2009); The People's Republic of Amnesia: Tiananmen Revisited by Louisa Lim (Oxford 2014); "Tiananmen Massacre," Tang's contribution to The Princeton Reader: Contemporary Essays by Writers and Journalists at Princeton University (2010); and Jack London's "Credo." Listen on SoundCloud, and support our podcast via Patreon.

Seven soldiers imprisoned in Burma for killing 10 Rohingya Muslim men and boys have received an early release—serving less time than the reporters who uncovered the massacre they were convicted of. The soldiers were sentenced in 2018 to 10 years in prison for the killings at the village of Inn Din, but they "are no longer detained," prison officials told Reuters. The news agency said the men were freed in November. This means they served less than one year of their 10-year terms. They are the only people to have been convicted for atrocities committed during the 2017 military campaign against the Rohingya in western Rakhine state, in which more than 700,000 were displaced. Meanwhile, the two Reuters reporters who were imprisoned on charges of revealing "state secrets" for reporting the massacre were also just released—after serving 16 months. The reporters, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, received a presidential amnesty on May 6.

Four people were killed and three others injured in three explosions in Kathmandu on May 26, a grim reminder of the Maoist insurgency the shook Nepal for a decade before a 2006 peace agreement. Three were killed at a hairdressing salon; another improvised explosive device went off in a private home, and a third in a brickyard, possibly in transit toward the intended target. A dissident Maoist faction that has remained in arms since the peace agreement claimed credit for the blasts. The Netra Bikram Chand-led "Communist Party of Nepal" had declared a nationwide general strike for the following day. And in fact many businesses and transportation services were shut down, seemingly more due to fear of attack than support for the strike. (Kathmandu Post, Asia News, ANI)

The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York City on May 22 reversed a district court's dismissal of a class action lawsuit against French bank BNP Paribas over aiding atrocities in Sudan. The lawsuit was brought in 2016 by 21 refugees from Sudan's ethnic-cleansing campaigns Darfur and South Kordofan regions, alleging that the bank conspired with, and aided and abetted, the Sudanese regime. The plaintiffs' complaint alleges that BNP processed thousands of illegal transactions through its New York offices, which financed weapons purchases and funded militias in a "well-documented genocidal campaign." The reversal comes nearly five years after BNP pleaded guilty to committing large-scale violations of sanctions against Sudan, Cuba and Iran, which resulted in a record $8.97 billion fine.

A federal judge on May 24 blocked construction of Donald Trump's border wall, ruling that Trump cannot use a "national emergency" to take money from government agencies for the barrier. Judge Haywood Gilliam of the US District Court for Northern California ruled that the diversion of the money, largely from the US military, likely oversteps a president's statutory authority. The injunction specifically limits wall construction projects in El Paso, Tex., and Yuma, Ariz. Gilliam quoted Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, who said in a TV interview the wall "is going to get built, with or without Congress." The judge said presidential action "without Congress," when legislators refuse a funding request from the White House, "does not square with fundamental separation of powers principles dating back to the earliest days of our Republic."